Letters to the editor

To make matters worse, it is proposed that the new pavilion would only be single-storey.

On big game days, how are spectators (who don't want to stand in front of the bar) supposed to get a decent view?

I encourage council to revisit this component of the plan to consider a more sensible option.

Geoff Kelly,

Echuca

Communities weathering a storm

Communities in regional Victoria are still reeling from the floods that inundated their homes and businesses.

Towns worked tirelessly to sandbag as the water levels rose and took with them homes, livelihoods and businesses on which their communities relied.

But now — months after the water has receded — for communities that have begun the recovery process, too many are facing a new battle.

Ask anyone who has been dealing with their insurance company in the past few months and you’ll get a variation of the same story — everyone’s premiums are on the rise.

Depending on the insurer and location of the property, this increase is anywhere from $1000 to as much as a whopping $10,000 annually.

In places hit hard in the 2011 ‘once in a lifetime’ floods, some businesses were forced to self-insure as post-deluge premiums had skyrocketed to $100,000 a year — or more.

One business owner I spoke to had accrued almost $1 million in savings, but when the experts got their peak predictions wrong for 2022 — their second ‘once in a lifetime’ flood in 11 years — the damage bill was more than double the savings and once again the business was devastated.

Families who were already struggling to keep up with bills have lost their homes and now are faced with the decision to live in an uninsured home or find room in their budget for rising premiums.

It’s twofold when you consider the rising cost of living, with higher insurance premiums eating further into the weekly budget of many regional Victorians.

In some of our smaller towns, such as Rochester, for example, many people driven out by the floods have still not come home, and the impact of their absence on the local economy could become crippling.

Victorians urgently need financial relief.

We have seen gas and electricity prices continue to climb — some gas bills by as much as 21.4 per cent for households after a wholesale price increase.

And the Andrews Labor Government’s attempt to revive the SEC looks to do little to drive down prices for consumers and threatens our electricity grid’s reliability.

It’s a perfect storm, and one our country communities shouldn’t have to weather after the storms through which they have just come.

Peter Walsh,

Leader of the Nationals

Member for Murray Plains

While water flows are unpredictable, the same cannot be said for politics

Everyone agrees that water is a precious resource; in fact, arguably our most precious. It is also generally agreed that we have to use water wisely. We must ensure it is not wasted.

While using water wisely in the home and in our communities has become accepted practice, on a broader scale it is more problematic. Yet when we are talking large-scale water use it is even more important because huge volumes are involved.

Recent flood events have highlighted issues with water management that have been ignored to this point, and resolving them needs to become a higher priority.

Firstly, we have an issue with measuring and modelling large quantities of water. Communities impacted by recent floods are only too aware of inaccuracies with modelled flood peak predictions and the trauma this can cause.

What we need to appreciate is that predicting floods, not dissimilar to predicting the weather, is not an exact science. Nor is predicting water flows in general, and in particular the impact these flows will have on their surrounding environment.

Last month, in a detailed article on various issues involving the Bureau of Meteorology, including the weather, floods and its image, a bureau spokesman was quoted as saying “we don’t always get it right”. That’s okay, it happens in many professions. But with water management in general the problem is not that governments and authorities (in particular the Murray-Darling Basin Authority) ‘don’t always get it right’, it’s a refusal to acknowledge when ‘they get it wrong’.

The latter has been an ongoing problem with the Murray-Darling Basin Plan, both in its development and throughout its implementation. I don’t think anyone with a reasonable knowledge of the plan would argue that there are areas where we didn’t quite get it right. For example, in my region, along the mid-Murray stretches of our mighty river, one of the biggest unintended consequences has been damage to riverbanks from the increased flows. This has a significant environmental impact that desperately needs to be addressed.

There is a consistent view in our region that we did not get the modelling volumes right when the plan was being developed, and nor did we understand how increased flows would affect the river system. While there are undoubted environmental benefits from carefully managed flows, there is environmental degradation if flow volumes are too high, as we have seen with recent flooding.

The question that has rightly been asked is: If we are unable to accurately model and predict flood flows that are only days away, how could we possibly have accuracy around models that were predicting flows and their impacts a decade or more into the future? Because that is exactly what happened when the basin plan was being drafted.

The answer is simple. Basin plan flows were based on politics. When it was suggested that recovering 2,750 gigalitres for the environment would be sufficient, the South Australian Government decided to flex its muscles and demand an additional 450GL. If this wasn’t met, it would not sign up and the plan was set to fail before it even started. More than a decade down the track, all indications tell us the 450GL is: (a), not required; and (b), cannot be delivered to SA without causing further significant riverbank damage, plus additional flood damage to public and private infrastructure.

So, what do we do about it? Next month, water ministers from across the basin will meet to discuss the basin plan’s next steps. It would be sensible for ministers to acknowledge the above facts and agree that before any more water is recovered we need a detailed assessment of volumes recovered thus far, including the benefits achieved, any adverse impacts that need to be dealt with, and what volumes can be effectively stored and delivered without causing unnecessary damage.

While this would be a common-sense approach and provide best-case outcomes for our environment and regional communities, I fear it will again be trumped by ideology and politics. But we live in hope.

Lloyd Polkinghorne,

Barham

Congratulations

We just wanted to say congratulations to Todd and the Murphy family following his selection in the Australian Test cricket team for the upcoming tour of India.

Teresa and Max Jacobs,

Echuca

Chugging in the spotlight

I am writing this in exasperation after being accosted repeatedly by ‘’charity fundraisers’’ at the entrances to every supermarket in town for the past week.

It is my hope that people read these comments and refuse to engage in their “chugging” (charity muggings).

Please make no mistake, I am definitely in support of the wonderful institutions they purport to represent and encourage people to support — The Peter MacCallum Institute, the guide dogs, the children’s hospital etc — but please do it online or face-to-face with an actual representative of these establishments.

The attractive, young, aggressive people who engaged you in a well-practised, rehearsed patter are professional workers employed by fundraising companies, and are well-paid by a percentage of the funds that they raise, hence the very practised patter and slick presentation.

These ‘teams’ arrive in town in team uniforms and stay (in motels?) for the duration of their stay.

Who pays for that you may ask? Guess.

I have recently been playing a bit of a game with whoever accosts me.

It involves applauding the charity and offering $5, receipt required.

It is hysterical watching them decline your money, but then offering a payment scheme ($40 a month being the cheapest if you are interested).

So I then say, “Wait a minute, you are raising funds, but you won’t take my money and you are going to tell me how much you will allow me to give?”

There is a senior employee at one of the supermarkets who has the right idea.

Three strikes (as in three customer complaints) and he moves them on. Well done!

In closing, please remember that these people rely on your good manners and polite nature to simply either ignore them or leave them during their pitch — not the way country folk largely were brought up though, is it?

And they know it.

If it wasn’t profitable they wouldn’t be doing it, would they?

Send your contribution online or better yet, go to the Bunnings sausage sizzle and hand over some cash to real volunteers.

Lance Carrington,

Echuca

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