SMALL towns in northern Victoria could be turned into ''welfare basket cases'' by the Murray-Darling Basin plan, with the loss of irrigation water causing business closures, job losses and a reduced need for services, a community meeting in Shepparton was told yesterday.
Ardmona dairy farmer Jeff Odgers told the public meeting that small communities faced this scenario ''as the plan unfolds''.
Mr Odgers, a member of the Australian Dairy Industry Council's ''basin taskforce'', said the water cutbacks could see towns move beyond ''critical tipping points'' and lose much needed businesses and residents.
''Smaller towns could essentially sit there, stagnate and rot. Turn into welfare basket cases. Now I know that sounds extreme, but if it's bad enough - that is what happens,'' Mr Odgers told the overwhelmingly pro-agriculture crowd of about 300-400.
''The MDBA plan feels to me, as if it's more about de-population than about water sharing. We have to make sure that it's handled in a smarter way,'' he said.
Stuart Grinter, a 25-year-old farmer from Kaarimba, said he came dressed as a bushranger to ''fit right in with our political leaders and the MDBA board''. The authority's use of the word consultation was ''a joke'', he said. ''This plan will cause financial hardship, family breakdown and suicide; but somehow that doesn't matter as much as a few grubs and slugs,'' he said.
The meeting was hosted by the basin authority and was addressed by chairman Craig Knowles and federal Water Minister Tony Burke. It was part of the 20 weeks of consultation following the release of the draft plan to boost environmental flows down the river system by 2750 gigalitres.
Richard Anderson, from the Victorian Farmers Federation, said the VFF did not support the Murray-Darling plan in its current form. ''What you're looking for as a community and what our towns are looking for is certainty. And I don't see any certainty in what we've got on the plate at the moment,'' he said.
Afterwards Mr Knowles told The Age that the meeting showed that communities were passionate about water, and that they want a basin plan and a ''say'' about it.
''It does demonstrate yet again why there is a need to have a plan that is for the whole of the basin, and try and strike that balance,'' he said.
Mr Burke, who sat alongside Mr Knowles at the front of the meeting, said he took ''10 to 15 pages of notes'' during it.
''I'm determined that the infrastructure money gets out the door and for this community we've been doing that,'' he said.
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