Riverina landholders seek independent legal advice on Reconnecting Rivers

Riverina farmers pushing back on the NSW Government’s Reconnecting Rivers and Landholder Negotiation Scheme have called in expert advice and will host a meeting at the Wagga RSL on Wednesday morning (20 November).

The seminar will be presented by partner at HWL Ebsworth Lawyers in Sydney, Peter Holt, to offer an independent legal perspective on flows, easements and making submissions.

Mundarlo landholder Deb Paton said many stakeholders remained in the dark ahead of the 24 November deadline for submissions.

“We feel that they’re obfuscating and telling us that we’ve been given the information when the fact is that we just haven’t,” she said.

“There are some very basic things that we have still not got, and there are hundreds of questions that we have submitted and the majority are still not answered.”

Early in October, Murrumbidgee stakeholders began coordinating their response to the proposed plan to acquire flow easements along riverfront properties to accommodate environmental water releases.

Ms Paton said that they were taken by surprise when a small number of property owners were invited to an information session last month that proposed a complex and impactful plan for their land.

“We haven’t even had the mapping for what 45,000 megalitres a day would look like on our properties,” she said.

“That number includes the proposed 5000 megalitre buffer, but numbers like 45,000 megs mean nothing to most people because we need to know – where does it land on your farm?

“I think people are just starting to wake up, to realise the significance of the property rights with respect to the easements.”

Save Our River Dweller Action Group (SORD) warns that the proposal will devalue their properties and endanger their livelihoods.

According to the NSW Department of Climate Change, Energy, the Environment and Water, the draft Landholder Negotiation Scheme (LNS) regulation will “outline the approach the NSW Government will take when negotiating voluntary agreements with landholders affected by future environmental water deliveries at higher flow levels, or under different regimes, than current operating practice”.

Mr Holt is a specialist in water law and has acted for various peak groups and landholders along the Murray-Darling system, as well as for landholders in the context of compulsory acquisition of farming land by Inland Rail and energy companies.

“Hopefully, he can assist us in answering questions and sharing his knowledge as it relates to easements and his negotiating with companies like Transgrid,” Ms Paton said.

“He’ll also speak about the Victorian system, relating to the Reconnecting Rivers, where they’re taking a very different approach with absolutely no easements.”

Ms Blackwell said that the majority of farmers were not opposed to environmental flows but that they would put their foot down on legislation that infringes their property rights.

“Most of us have never had an issue with an environmental flow. However, it does impact us, and it does create work for us, and it does create potential problems for us,” she said.

“We’re willing to work with environmental flows, but we are not prepared to accept an easement.”

Ms Paton said that they were working on several alternative approaches and hoped that the government would engage in a period of genuine consultation with landholders.

“We think that we can come up with quite a positive alternative, and while we don’t think they’re being fair and playing by the rules, we are trying to be a positive contributor to this whole plan,” she said.

The seminar with Peter Holt will be held at the Wagga RSL, on Wednesday, 20 November, at 10 am.