Our national action plan will combat the menace of salinity

To this end the Howard Government has maintained its commitment under the Murray/Darling cost sharing arrangements to equal contributions amongst the four member Governments to fund the proposed $60 million expenditure.

The Prime Minister has further announced a separate $700m National Salinity Action Plan requiring matching contributions of new and real money from all the States who wish to participate. So far the up take by the Labor states on this initiative to put in real dollars and avoid cost shifting is lamentable.

Notwithstanding the massive flow of 100% of the GST revenues to the States, as confirmed by the national advertisements the other day, the constitutionally responsible bodies for land management, the States, are trying to duck their salinity funding responsibility.

The Murray Darling States are also hard at work trying to cost shift their own Murray Darling Basin Commission salinity expenditure into the Commonwealth Government's Salinity Action funding. In each case the outcome is a reduction in overall salinity expenditure.

Two Australian States can find a lot of money to buy the support of an independent State MP, but are bickering about providing a fraction of that amount to reduce salinity flows to Australia's greatest river system.

What use are environmental flows in either the Murray or the Snowy if the water is as salty as the seawater it will join at the ocean mouth in South Australia.

Salinity of dryland farms and rivers is Australia's greatest environmental problem. It can be fixed with money and the bulk of available environmental funds should be directed to this task using the most cost efficient and productive solutions.