Canada tops the list of foreign owners of Australian water
A new report, released by the Australian Tax Office (ATO), shows Canada, the USA, China, and the United Kingdom are the largest foreign owners of Australian water.
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TVTranscript
00:00 The latest report out from the Australian Tax Office today does show that Canada leads
00:06 the way when it comes to foreign ownership of Australian water, holding about 2.1% of
00:13 entitlement, that is 2.1% of the water that is licensed to be taken mostly in the Murray-Darling
00:20 Basin, but in fact right across Australia.
00:24 There's some 40, almost 40,000 gigalitres, which is a whopping great figure.
00:29 I couldn't tell you how many Sydney harbours or Olympic sized swimming pools that is, but
00:33 I can tell you that Canada does top the list.
00:36 I understand that's because a pension fund that's run for public servants in Canada that
00:43 includes armed forces, police, including the Mounted Police, the famous Mounties, is responsible
00:50 for owning quite a decent chunk of water in the Murray-Darling Basin, where it uses that
00:55 water to grow a variety of different food crops.
00:59 Interesting.
01:00 So the Federal Water Minister, Tanya Plibersek, has made some comments about foreign ownership.
01:05 What does she say then about the 11% of water that is being held by overseas companies?
01:09 Yeah, I guess some interesting context around this is that the figures have weighed in today
01:13 at 11.3%, up 0.3% on the previous year, and we see the top four countries in terms of
01:21 foreign ownership, Canada, the US, with the UK and China tied in third spot, actually
01:28 remain the same.
01:29 But the Federal Water Minister, Tanya Plibersek, is keen to point out that under the former
01:34 coalition government, some 11% of Australia's water entitlements was allowed or permitted
01:42 to be used by or owned by foreign companies.
01:45 And she wants to raise this point because she's seeking for the Australian government
01:49 to be able to go into the Murray-Darling Basin River Network to purchase water, which she
01:57 claims, you know, if the former coalition was happy to sell water to overseas businesses,
02:02 it should be happy to allow water to be sold to the Australian government.
02:06 But one thing I would just point out about that is, although that is in fact correct,
02:12 what Tanya Plibersek is seeking to do, and she's got legislation she wants to bring before
02:16 the parliament next week, she wants the Australian government to buy water so that it can actually
02:21 be taken away from farming, no longer used for farming to grow food and fibre, but instead
02:27 to go to environmental causes to boost the habitat for native flora and fauna, to promote
02:33 bird breeding and fish breeding and things like this.
02:36 And she wants to do that so that she can deliver on promises that were made under the Murray-Darling
02:40 Basin Plan a decade ago.
02:42 I can tell it's already becoming quite complex, but it is indeed a complex story.
02:49 [BLANK_AUDIO]