My working week took me to Philadelphia and Baltimore - two very historic cities that take a dominant place in American political history. Philadelphia was home to the Continental Congress when the Revolutionary War was going on. Baltimore is the location of Fort McHenry which was getting pounded by the British while Francis Scott Key paced the deck of a British ship in concern. The experience led Key to write the "Star Spangled Banner". They are large cities now, but back then they were much smaller.

Philadelphia in 1776, despite being one of the larger cities in colonial America, was a small regional town dominated by Quakers. When fevers hit the streets of Philadelphia the few main streets would empty as people fled to the countryside for fresher air. When I think of Revolutionary War Philadelphia, I think of it in the same exotic, mythical forms I see many of the Australian regional towns in the Southern Tablelands, Western Plains and along the Murray.

One of those towns, Goulburn, has a looming crisis. Philadelphia, and the brilliant minds of James Madison and Alexander Hamilton combined in post-revolutionary war Philadelphia to change how we think about political systems. Will Goulburn rise to the challenge and change how we view water?

Non-Sydney Australia

When I was an ankle-biter, one of our regular family holidays was to visit Aunty Nell in Narooma. It was a good six hour trip from Sydney that wound its way through the Southern Tablelands before ending up on the south coast. There were many highlights along the way. The first of these being either Mittagong or Goulburn. Depending on whether we, as kids, voted for the spaceship play-bars in Mittagong or the McDonalds and Big Merino in Goulburn.

The other majorly anticipated stop was the meat pie ship in Braidwood. Other than Maroubra Bay Pie and Cake shop meat pies, I still consider the Braidwood pies the best in Australia. The major highways have largely by-passed the towns like Goulburn, Mittagong and Braidwood. But these historic old towns are impossible to ignore for anyone interested in non-megapolis Australia. I have a fondness for the Southern Tablelands and Western Plains - each time I return to Australia my travels end up taking me through their beautiful landscapes.

Goulburn

The regional centre of Goulburn has a population of about 23,000 and was one of Australia's first inland cities. Deriving its importance from a thriving wool industry and a rail-head which enabled it to connect to the southern agricultural economies. The railway played a large part in Goulburn's development, being the first rail-line to connect Sydney to a regional centre.

William Bradley was responsible for it, setting up the Sydney Railway Company and becoming the member for Argyle in NSW Parliament to achieve it. There was contention over where the rail should end in Sydney. Ultimately those that wanted it to end at Cleveland paddock won. This is modern day Central Station.

Bradley and other agricultural businessmen wanted the rail to end at Darling Harbour - right on the docks. The wool industry was export oriented, and NSW was a free trade colony. Producers and distributors saw the extra handling of the product between Central and the Harbour being an added and unwanted cost. Eventually the rail was extended to Darling Harbour. It remains a fact however, that the rail system was a Goulburn initiative.

Goulburn's wealth grew from its thriving agricultural industry and it indulged itself in competing with Sydney for extravagance. The Coast and Country magazine records some of this;

In February 1884, British organ-builders Foster & Andrews shipped to Australia what remains today the largest organ of its type in the country. You would not be surprised to find such a majestic instrument in a cathedral in a capital city like Sydney or Melbourne, but it is unexpected, to say the least, to discover it in the midst of sheep-growing country, in a place which, though technically a city, is really a country town of only 23,000 or so. That place is Goulburn in south-eastern New South Wales, and the church in which the organ thunders out each Sunday is St Saviour's Anglican Cathedral, itself an unexpectedly grand building for a rural community.

Goulburn has a strong political and Republican history as well. When Dan Deniehy found himself in dire fiscal straights and his law practice floundering in Sydney, he set off for the town of Goulburn to re-establish himself. In 1854, Goulburn was a small town of approximately 3,000 people, but significantly for Deniehy's compulsory literaryism, it had one of the first regional newspapers in the Goulburn Herald - a media outlet that Deniehy was soon writing for.

From Goulburn Deniehy established his political and media base of thwarting nomineeism and inequitable land distribution. Deniehy having routed William Wentworth's hope for an Australian aristocracy with his bunyip aristocracy speech, Deniehy worked for the removal of the Wentworth's squatocracy which had established itself in the NSW Legislative Council.

Deniehy ran for government, and was elected into the NSW Assembly, representing Goulburn. Members of Parliament were not paid, and Deniehy, already fiscally precarious, had great difficulty absorbing the cost of constantly travelling to Sydney and leaving his law practice in Goulburn unattended. Sadly, his responsibilities in parliament left him little time to publish his editorials into the local newspaper either.

Through prominent figures such as Bradley and Deniehy, Goulburn has a history of economic and political activism that connected to wider issues confronting the country, the cities and ultimately, Australia.

Water, Water ********* And Not A Drop To Drink

Goulburn lies within Sydney's Warragamba Catchment area [PDF Warning] being fairly close to the Wolondilly River. It appears to have its own water supplies outside of the Warragamba Dam which are faltering. From the NSW Parliament's Hansard for May 5th, Katrina Hodgkinson;

As at last Monday Goulburn's usable water supply was 11.9 per cent of full capacity. The last time that Goulburn's water supply was close to 100 per cent was five years ago. Goulburn has been on water restrictions since 2002, and on stage five restrictions since October 2004. I believe that stage five restrictions would be unheard of in Sydney. They are severe. The use of any town water out of doors is totally banned, which means no outdoor watering, no filling or topping up of pools, and no washing of cars or outdoor surfaces. The target average water consumption in Goulburn per person per day is 150 litres. In June 2004 a Sydney Water annual report showed that water consumption in Sydney stood at a climate-corrected 367 litres per person per day. Sydney Water's target to reduce water consumption for the year 2011 is 330 litres per person per day. Compare that with Goulburn's target of 150.

Goulburn certainly is doing it tough, but the city is saving water. The weekly water consumption figures to the end of March show that Goulburn is using about one-third less water, only some 6.6 megalitres a day on its five-year average consumption, but, unfortunately, that is not enough. Some 10 days ago the level of potable water in Goulburn's water supply was 14 per cent. Last Monday it was 11.9 per cent. If this usage rate continues there could be as little as six weeks worth of water left. In September 2003 I wrote to the Minister for Energy and Utilities requesting funding to investigate the provision of emergency water supply bores. Unfortunately the Minister did not grasp the gravity of the situation and he wrote back to me on 3 February 2004 stating that he was unable to provide funding for this investigation as the funds available for drought-related works had been provided to severely affected areas elsewhere in the State.

I could not find where Goulburn's water supply is coming from, I presume it is somewhere local, as opposed to coming through Sydney Water (and the Warragamba Catchment scheme). Goulburn is intending to get through the crisis by dropping a bore;

A special council meeting will consider tenders for the construction of a new borefield system.

Councillors will today consider tenders from engineering firms wanting to build a borefield transfer system at Kingsdale to ensure ongoing water supply.

Coupled with ongoing restriction measures, and an eye to further conservation;

"We have a lot of large buildings here with a great catchment area and we are costing the installation of large tanks to harness that water and direct it back into the jail," Mr Folpp [manager of Goulburn Jail] said.

As another longer-term measure, Mr Folpp is seeking emergency funding from the Department of Corrective Services to explore the feasibility of sinking bores and using this water in certain parts of the jail.

But in the meantime, he said management was implementing more immediate measures.

Restriction devices are being installed on all showers to reduce flow from 12-15 litres per minute to 5-7 litres per minute.

"When you're looking at 570 to 580 inmates, it is a huge saving," Mr Folpp said.

"We're also restricting the time limit of showers to five to six minutes in some parts of the jail by installing a solenoid.

Goulburn is also looking to either trucking in water by road or rail. A highly expensive solution. As Gary Sauer-Thompson points out, there will remain a continued reliance on rainfall to supply future water, as opposed to recycling existing water supplies. This is part of the big-dam mentality. As Sydney expanded westwards forty years ago into Blacktown, Penrith and the Hawkesbury, Sydney Water told people to get rid of their water-tanks as they were now on the Sydney mains and the inexhaustible water supply from the Warragamba. A system which hitting record low levels.

Responding To The Crisis

In 1776, a small group of patriots established the Continental Congress in Philadelphia to keep the continental army funded, clothed and operating while providing the framework of laws and procedures that would grow into the world's most successful republic. A small provincial American town provided the backbone for some of America's greatest minds to change how we view political systems.

Goulburn is in the same situation today. Will it be short-term politics of public satiation and instant gratification, no matter the cost or unsustainability of the solution? Or will some of Australia's greatest minds respond to the Goulburn water crisis and change how we think about water, its use, and collection? Will that permeate solution permeate through Australia effectively changing our culture?

At this stage I am only seeing dig holes, truck water in and pray for rain. Hardly responding to the challenge in a way that will set the basis for the future; it is just more of the same mentality. So where are Australia's great minds on this issue that can secure Goulburn its future water usage? or will it just be the people of Goulburn saying, "bugger this for a joke" and setting up their own decentralised water catchment system to remove their reliance on the failed centralised water system?

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A nice dollop of rhetoric from Malcolm Turnball without any alternative being offered . It seems the first best is mumble, mumble ... recycling ... mumble mumble.

From the article, Turnball is quoted as saying;

"The tragedy of Sydney's water is a pretty simple one," Mr Turnbull said.

"It has been obvious for the best part of 20 years that Sydney needed to do something big to augment its water supply and nothing has been done."

So what is his big solution;

"The Federal Government is committed to a more sustainable approach to the use of water and that includes a greater emphasis on recycling ... certainly desalination is at the unsustainable end."

I went looking for more information on Turnball's big solution, but could not find anything. Supposedly he has a blog , but it looks more like media releases. I could not find anything on the Liberal website. Since Parliament is not sitting there was nothing in the Hansard either. So I do not know what his policy no water supply, conservation and recycling is. I am genuinely interested.

Note to Malcolm, publish in a more internet friendly manner.

Water is an issue in Australia as we are not guaranteed seasonal rainfall courtesy of El Nino. I have covered Goulburn's Challenge and Yass' water supply problems in the past. This is going to become a major political issue once people get stuck on 5 level restrictions for any extended period. It will affect society, the culture and the economy.

Dams are not the answer. The solution will have to include decentralised structures - which a desalination plant is not.

More

• Guy at wsacaucus.org has more information on the immediate political ramifications in NSW .
• Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet - National Water Initiative - COAG supported water management policy.

Most other special interest political issues have a mono-purpose party supporting them. Age, firearms, etc. NSW is no longer pursuing desalination , Qld is now holding an inquiry into why their water system is leaking, decrepit and aging. I would not be surprised if a the Party For Water popped up in a state election soon.

The Greens would be the party that would be equated with water conservation, but not necessarily water usage, rights etc. My vision of the Greens is them being more focused on macro-conservation, like rainforests than the management of scarce resources. That is probably unfair on them, and a reflection of the media's inability to get a wider Green message out. It is probably also laziness on my part for not going to read the Greens' website for their policies.

But water is an extremely scarce resource in Australia. It is also non-seasonal, so any water pressures around the globe will probably be seen in Australia first. It could be argued they are already . Certainly Goulburn and Yass have been two examples of regional towns that were impacted heavily by water shortages.

Given that government is often the process of centralising resources, and then determining who gets the benefits of that centralisation; I would not be surprised to see a political party dedicated solely to water management and water rights.

Victoria has had a dry winter and already water restrictions are being tabled for the city with John Thwaites saying, " It is very likely that we will need to go onto stage one restrictions from the first of September. We indicated at the beginning of the month that unless we got average rainfall or above average rainfall for August, we would need to be on the restrictions, and unfortunately we've had below average rainfall through August. ".

Where is Victorian water used? State-wide, Melbourne is a very small user of water. From southeastwater.com comes the following graph ;

South East Water also links to a graph showing the 200 largest users of water. The food and non-food industries are the biggest users of non-residential water with council's in third place, but significantly behind in percentage terms.

The Department of Primary Industries contains information that Victoria is highly dependent on surface water . With 90% of Victoria's water coming from surface water sources and 10% from ground-water. Given that Australian rainfall is non-seasonal, unlike North America and Europe. Australian rainfalls are highly dependent on El-Nino and consequently are irregular. The high dependence on surface water is an issue.

Last year Goulburn and Yass went through deep water difficulties due to lack of rainfall, despite the Wollondilly River being nearby.

The water catchment areas are going to have to decentralise and diversify with greater reliance on water tanks and and other suburban catchment forms for non-drinking water uses. Recycling of water is another conservation method, though Toowoomba knocked that on the head in a recent referendum.

This doesn't change the fact of the wet nature of the Australian economy which has primary industry drawing heavily from our water supply. It may be that industry is concentrated around water supplies, like the Murrumbidgee, while cities such as Sydney and Melbourne are not, however livestock, rice and cotton make up the dominant portion of primary usage in NSW .

Well, with a Queensland Election coming up, the two (and a half) major parties are competing to see who can propose the most extravagant, inefficient, centrally planned dam in the stupidest places. I was starting to despair of finding anyone pushing a conservative solution that respected property rights and promoted individual water responsibility.  

This morning I found out a party promoting such a policy. The blasted Greens.

For the record, I can't stand half of Bob Brown's antics in the Senate. He's less a gadfly than a class clown. But even on the non-environmental policies they're not spectacularly more communist than the major parties, in what, under our current constitutional settlement, is a naturally tax-and-spend tier of government.

On separating the major parties in the crucial latter preferences, I guess it will have to come down to the stagnation of Labor against the slapstick performance of the Coalition. The Nationals do have at least some decentralising instinct left: they're planning to reinstate local hospital boards (PDF).

As it happens, both the major parties also tuck their policies into PDF documents, that hallmark of bland mass media pap hastily wrapped up for web distribution.

Polls all seem to indicate Beattie will get up again with ease. At least they won't have to repaint the traffic signal box on Edward and Albert St.

The Queensland National's have their state policy platform [pdf] up on their website. Like most of the Australian party platforms it is fairly reasonable and often at odds with their media presence and party stereotype. Their water policies caught my eye.

The National's policy toward water first declares water's importance to the life, environment and economy of the state. They write that they believe the state has a role in supplying water in a fair and equitable manner. They also see improvements that can be made to develop the water supply as well as efficiencies to use water more effectively - such as recycling.

Among their beliefs are;

The State Government should facilitate the storage and mobility of water using both private and public infrastructure.

The State and Federal Government should make the development of water infrastructure to support the maintenance and expansion of industry a high priority. ...

The State Government should invest significantly in recycled water programs, water conservation measures and the development of desalination technology.

They have a section on Water Rights which deals with existing entitlements and the Water Act 2000, which I am no familiar with. I presume that this is to do with rural supply of water for industrial purposes such as stock and grazing.

The Nationals seek to subsidise the cost of water so that it is delivered at cost;

The price of water for irrigation from existing schemes ['rural water'] should be capped at the cost of operating, maintaining and refurbishing water schemes.

Though this doesn't appear to be for urban purposes. The Nationals are also not against reusing recycled water for non-potable purposes. This makes sense despite the recent Toowoomba referendum;

The use of treated recycled water and wastewater should be supported for non-potable purposes.

Desalination, storm water reuse and other innovative water saving options should be investigated.

They do mention in their policy that they see further development of water infrastructure as necessary;

We should unlock the benefits of further water development in Queensland, manage water resources in an environmentally sustainable way and promote the rights of water users.

Their policies have a strong rural focus which is their main constituency and they do not deny that they would seek water development, such as dams which are dominating the Queensland media at the moment . However their water policy contains the language of sustainability, environmentalism, efficiency, conservation and reuse.

Given the non-seasonal nature of Australian water and its scarcity in comparison to other continents. I don't think any party has the choice to ignore those stances on water.

Labor has been in government in Queensland since 1998. So any discussion of the Beattie government's policies on water come with the caveat that they have had eight years to put policies in place. The Labor policies on water cover increased water for outdoor use and statewide approaches to infrastructure.

Labor's policy documents;

• Water for garden's, parks and sporting grounds.
• Statewide Water Policy

As mentioned in the intro, the Beattie government has been around for eight years. Their policy document on outdoor water is small and starts with;

Severe drought, climate change and strong population growth are putting unprecedented pressure on Queensland's water supplies.

In response, many local councils have applied restrictions on the outdoor water use.

The problem appears to be drought, climate change and local councils - not the state government's policies in this area. As per a party in government dollar figures are thrown around to get voter buy-in. One of the more curious is the $5 million worth of rebates to buy native plants. Kind of like a state level baby-bonus electoral bribe.

This is an interesting use of money;

$500,000 ($50 per household) over two years for the nursery industry and Queensland Government to develop an education campaign to promote water-wise gardening tips and the use of native and drought-resistant plants;

But I am not convinced of its necessity, most Australians know European plants are maintained at a large cost in water. This is not new knowledge by any means. I also recall the local parks in the eighties going around and planting natives for the same reason. Again it is not knew.

There exists rebates under current policies for water conservation devices;

The Government is already helping Queenslanders to save water indoors by providing rebates on water-saving devices such as rainwater tanks, washing machines, showerheads, dual-flush toilets and greywater devices through the Home WaterWise Rebate Scheme.

The PDF that contains the outdoor water policies doesn't include any information on the proposed dams, though the blurb has;

The Beattie Labor Government is implementing a comprehensive plan to provide additional water and greater water security for Queensland by building new dams, raising existing dams, establishing other water infrastructure with connecting pipelines.

Most of the engineering build-outs and their policies are in the statewide water policy document. Basically it is big dollars chasing big capital works.

• $496 million to a statewide water grid to complement the SEA grid.
• $222 million to raise the dam heights and storage capacities in existing locations.
• $434 million (already) to the Western Corridor Recycled Scheme
• $80 million to a (stop)leakage program in SEQ.

There is no mention of the cost of the proposed dams. The Labor government's approach to water policy is capital works and subsidy. Both expensive propositions. Any conservation is either through rebates of water using devices, including plants, or education schemes.

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When Canberra cherry-picks responsibilities from the states it is anti-federalism. When the states take from the local councils there is no real name for it other than centralisation. Tasmanian Councils are defending their authority and responsibility over sewerage and water. It is a familiar pattern, a crisis appears, and a central authority uses that crisis or emergency to covet new powers. It has been a dominant force in Australian politics.

The issue is the State Government of Tasmania wanting to take over the power of water and sewerage; as the water crisis demands that the local councils can't be trusted with the responsibility in a time of emergency. Which isn't true. Decentralisation is a strength; especially in politics.

One of the reasons a representative democracy is stronger than a monarchy or dictatorship is because it decentralises political power. The opposing force is the desire of the executive to collapse all power into themselves - which leads to a monarchy or dictatorship, so representative democracy is maintained at a cost.

There was an op-ed in The Canberra Times by Greg Barns recently that argued for separation of service delivery between the feds, states and councils. One of the reasons a market economy is seen as superior to public sector service delivery is that it promotes overlapping services and products. We commonly call that consumer choice.

Yet we view overlapping public sector service delivery as waste. I would argue that the road system is an example of overlapping responsibilities providing a good outcome; Australia has federal, state, local and private roads. These go through all sorts of political boundaries and their overlapping regulations and laws. Probably the only way roads could be provided is through that method.

Barns writes:

And what of local government? Why is it, that there are, for example, 144 local councils in Western Australia, 68 in South Australia and 29 in Tasmania, when the total population for these states is just over three million people?

Again; decentralisation is a sign of political strength. In a modern state innovation bubbles up from the most innovative areas; rather than the capital intensive industrialised nation-state who spends on the slow areas with capital accrued centrally in order for them to catch up to the faster areas. Australia is a good example of the capital intensive centre - the federal government does 85% of all taxation.

There has been a gas pipeblast in Mexico which local rebels have claimed responsibility for. These are examples of John Robb's global guerillas. Because the cost of warfare has decreased so much, the heavily centralised political, urban and economic structures are unnecessarily exposed to shock and delivery failure. Energy is one of those susceptible systems.

Australia is uniquely situated to decentralise two very susceptible systems; water and energy. Because Australia periodically goes through water failure where the big central systems such as dams cannot meet demand; then there needs to be a decentralised approach. Rain tanks and conservation being the obvious.

This decentralisation has obvious advantages; one it reduces the cost of local government as water becomes primarily a household responsibility, two, conservation becomes one of personal responsibility, and three, it isolates the water supply from a centralised disruption such as drought, salination, poisoning, terrorism, etc.

Energy is another where Australia is well situated. The sun is a massive producer of energy we just have not worked out to harvest it efficiently and cost effectively yet. However, if we start seeing centralised failure of energy delivery systems, it will become cost effect quickly. There will be the same advantages from a decentralised (and networked) approach to energy as there is to communications and water.

The same goes for our political structures. Australia unfortunately has moved to a heavily centralised federal government. It dominates taxation, policy and revenue. This is a structural weakness in the current environment. Like water and energy, decentralised political structures protect against shocks and central failure.

Australian politics need to decentralise and remove power from the national government in order to increase the health and robustness of the Australian political system.

A company in Arizona wanted to pump Arizonan water across the state border to a new development in Southern Nevada. Both states are water scarce states, in fact the whole US South-West is in permanent water scarcity.

An administrative law judge has recommended that the transfer of water be denied [pdf]. IIRC from what I heard on the radio this morning, there is some 1970s law which has never been used before which stops that kind of water transfer. The local Arizonan residents are concerned as the water is from an aquifer and they are worried it would leave their wells dry.

From the decision:

The ADWR staff is recommending that the Director deny Wind River's Application because it is inaccurate in certain respects, and because ADWR determined that Wind River did not submit studies that are satisfactory to determine the probable hydrologic impact on the Mormon Wells area.

The objections are mainly administrative. There is also a history of cross border co-operation for what are largely arbitrary state political boundaries.