The REAL cost of the Basin Plan

Every minute: about $7,600

Every hour: about $460,000

Every day: about $11 million

Every month: about $330 million

Every year: over $4 billion

That is the real, ongoing cost of the Murray–Darling Basin Plan.

Around $2 billion a year is spent just to own, run, police and administer the Plan. That money goes on governance, compliance, duplicated agencies, monitoring, reporting and management structures that never switch off.

Another $2 billion a year is the damage bill. Higher water prices. Productive water stripped from Murray farms. Processing plants running below capacity or shutting altogether. Jobs lost. Towns hollowed out. Food production pushed offshore. Water sent out to sea while upstream communities carry the cost, with no measurable environmental gain beyond a paperwork label of “critically endangered” on the Lower Murray.

Together, that puts the true annual cost at more than $4 billion, every year.

That equals over $400 out of every Australian family’s pocket

The Basin Plan began in 2012. Over the 13 years since, the lower-end estimate of total cost is already $26 billion. That figure includes buybacks, infrastructure, administration and ongoing operations. It does not fully capture the long-term economic losses flowing through Basin communities year after year.

This is no longer a temporary reform or a finite environmental program. It is a permanent system with permanent costs.

Australians are paying thousands of dollars every minute for a policy that removes productive water from the food bowl, drives up water prices, and delivers no clear environmental recovery on the ground.

We need a REAL independent review into this failed plan

We need a Federal Royal Commission into water

find out more at: https://www.helendalton.com.au/royal-comission-into-water