ALL EYES ON FARRER
The eyes of the nation are finally on Farrer, and for the first time in decades the big parties cannot pretend they have not seen what is happening to the food bowl of Australia.
Labor did not even have the guts to run a candidate. They stood back because they know the buyback policy they pushed has gutted irrigation communities from Wakool to Wentworth, and they could not face turning up at a town meeting in Deniliquin or Griffith and defending it.
Six of the seven candidates standing in this by-election asked at the meet the candidates in Griffith, are now campaigning to end water buybacks. The Nationals, the Liberals, One Nation, the independents, all of them suddenly running on the policy that this community has been asking for since the Basin Plan went sideways. The two leading candidates, David Farley and Michelle Milthorpe, have both vowed to back my Federal Royal Commission into water.
That tells you everything about how the political ground has shifted. The big parties have spent years feeding us inquiry after inquiry to keep us quiet, the Productivity Commission, the ACCC, the ANAO, every one of them landing on a shelf while the rivers keep dying. Now that they are staring down a by-election in the engine room of the country, they are finally listening.
The Murray-Darling Basin feeds Australia, growing every grain of our rice, around 74% of our wine grapes and billions of dollars of fresh produce every year. You cannot keep hollowing out the towns that grow the food and expect the country, or your own primary vote, to hold together.
Farrer is the test. If you have city friends who think food just appears on the shelf, send this to them.
Back the Federal Royal Commission into water:
