Right now as the daily grind of managing stock and water supplies takes its inevitable toll on farmers the last thing they need is political bickering.
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Don't blame the states, don't blame people for not building dams, as none of this helps the current situation. We are facing a critical period especially in so far as water is concerned and that requires consensus and evidence based decisions not ad hoc policy made on the run.
There was a great deal of angst in rural communities when Prime Minister Scott Morrison announced $150 million for the Mars project at a time when many farms in our region already look like a lunar landscape.
In what could only be described as a knee jerk reaction once he returned to Australia from his USA trip he flew to Queensland and announced $100m extra drought package. Details were scant on what this would provide.
Many want to see a truly national approach to handling droughts. A national drought strategy which recognises we farm in a southern hemisphere environment prone to severe droughts and we farm on fragile land.
Now is the time to develop our own unique set of farming practices that sustain us and our land.
We must also protect agricultural regions that have maintained production despite the drought - don't put them under housing, carparks, highways or dig them up for resources. Bylong Valley is a classic example - don't dig it up for coal. The same applies to the Liverpool Plains.
For the record you cannot remake soils that have taken a millennium to create. High quality soils should be considered sacred ground.
But back to politics the recent call by Labor's Shadow Minister for Agriculture and Resources Joel Fitzgibbon for the Auditor-General to investigate the Government's drought programs is worthwhile as everyone including the government should know where the money has been spent and was it effective.
Mr Fitzgibbon wrote to the Australian National Office of Audit (ANAO) asking the Auditor-General to examine the Morrison Government's drought response initiatives including:
- The claim the Government has committed $7 billion in "drought support funding";
- The design, implementation, value and effectiveness of all drought programs;
- The criteria underpinning the Drought Communities Program which excluded local government areas that were clearly more drought-affected than some that were included; and
- The Government's refusal to release the Drought Coordinator's report.
"As large parts of Australia suffer the worst drought on record, the Government's response has been ad hoc, confusing and lacking in direction," said Mr Fitzgibbon.
"Farmers and rural communities are tiring of Prime Ministerial drought tours, empty talk about dams, exaggerated funding announcements and now, what appears to be political favouritism and pork barrelling.