SA calls on Victoria to lift water trade cap

SA Premier, Mike Rann, has called on Victoria to follow the thinking of independent specialists and lift its restrictive four per cent cap water trade barrier along the River Murray System.

Mr Rann says the National Water Commission’s assessment of the water market and its Chief Executive’s recommendation that the cap be lifted is an indictment of Victoria’s intransigence.

The Premier says the NWC’s findings and those of the Productivity Commission clearly reinforce why South Australia has launched High Court action to have Victoria lift the cap.

Mr Rann says Victorian must get rid of the cap as soon as possible because it is putting a handbrake on the whole reform of the River Murray. He says Victoria needs to accept that the Murray, Lower Lakes and Coorong are facing environmental collapse, and if Australia continues to be stuck with a state versus state mentality, the river will continue to suffer.