First Nations group challenging approval of the NSW Murray-Darling Basin Fractured Rock Water Resource plan

Traditional owners from the Murray-Darling Basin have filed a lawsuit challenging the federal government’s approval of a plan to manage groundwater in the basin.

The NSW Murray-Darling Basin Fractured Rock Water Resource Plan, accredited last year, covers groundwater stored in cavities and alluvial sediments overlying the fractured rock systems.

The Murray Darling Basin Authority acknowledged during the consideration process that there were shortcomings in NSW’s consultation with First Nations groups and people.

But the authority’s chief executive, Andrew McConville, recommended the plan be approved anyway in a letter to Environment and Water Minister Tanya Plibersek in November last year.

In the letter, Mr McConville said NSW had committed to working with affected First Nations people over the next 12 months, and that their objectives and outcomes would be incorporated into the water resources plan at a later date.

Ms Plibersek approved the plan in November.

A group of more than 20 Murray-Darling Basin First Nations people have launched a legal challenge against Ms Plibersek’s decision, saying they were not properly consulted, including about their social, cultural and spiritual values ​​in relation to water resources.

The Murray Lower Darling Rivers Indigenous Nations (MLDRIN) will argue that the water resources plan does not comply with the law, and will ask the Federal Court to rule that the minister’s accreditation of the plan is legally invalid.

Group leader Grant Rigney said they had been backed into a corner.

‘We have repeatedly raised our reasonable concerns with Minister Plibersek. We have been completely ignored,” he said.

Mr Rigney said the group wanted reform of the consultation process and improved provisions for First Nations water rights in the Water Act and River Basin Plan, including through the Restoring Our Rivers bill before Parliament.

“We cannot wait for legislative reform,” he said.

“This is urgent, so we are taking legal action now to ensure that the law as it stands is enforced and our rights are respected.”

Vice-Chairman and Tati Tati Millu Wudungi (Murray River man) Brendan Kennedy said proper consultation with the traditional owners of the catchment on the management of water resources was an inherent right.

“We hope not only to win this case, but also to set a precedent that ensures that all water resources plans in the Murray-Darling Basin must be properly implemented to fair and reasonable standards of consultation,” he said.

Environmental Defenders Office Special Adviser Emily Long, acting on behalf of MLDRIN, said traditional owners were seeking water justice in the catchment but were getting nowhere.

“The Water Act contains only the barest consultation requirements for First Nations and in this case MLDRIN claims even those have not been met,” she said.

Ms Long said it is a requirement under the catchment plan that traditional owners are consulted during the preparation of water resources plans.

“This must be done the right way to give First Nations a meaningful opportunity to contribute to water management and care for their lands,” she said.

Mr Kennedy said the Murray-Darling was not just a river system, “it is our lifeblood, the source of our cultural economies, but also an ancestral being.”

“The result of 240 years of mismanagement and water expropriation is the continued suffering of our people,” he said.

‘Water is life for us, without water the injustice against our people continues.’

A spokesperson for the Ministry of Climate Change, Energy, Environment and Water said they could not comment as the matter was before the Federal Court.