Two reviews, one river: One Nation targets basin buybacks ahead of climate test

As Australia braces for more intense droughts and floods under climate change, the Murray-Darling Basin review is a critical test of whether the country can marry water reform with political reality. Barnaby Joyce's 'dry carpet' rhetoric taps into communities' economic pain but risks ignoring the science that shows environmental flows are the lifeline for a system already on the brink. For the climate sector, the review is a proxy for the broader challenge of sustaining natural capital when populist pressures mount.

The Murray-Darling Basin, Australia's largest and most economically significant river system, is approaching a policy reckoning. For the first time since its inception, the Murray-Darling Basin Plan will undergo a formal review at the end of 2026, alongside a parallel review of the Water Act 2007. The timing coincides with a resurgent political force: One Nation, now boasting former Nationals heavyweight Barnaby Joyce, is campaigning aggressively against the water buyback mechanisms that are central to the plan's environmental targets. Joyce, drawing on his decades of representing basin communities, frames buybacks as economic vandalism that hollows out rural towns while yielding negligible environmental benefit. His analogy—that the basin is a "big old dry carpet" where a bucket of water in one corner fails to saturate the whole—captures a seductive but scientifically contentious critique that will shape the review's trajectory.

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The timing coincides with a resurgent political force: One Nation, now boasting former Nationals heavyweight Barnaby Joyce, is campaigning aggressively against the water buyback mechanisms that are central to the plan's environmental targets.

The original plan, enacted in 2012, aimed to correct decades of over-allocation by recovering water for the environment, primarily through buybacks and infrastructure upgrades. The goal was to restore 2,750 gigalitres per year to rivers, wetlands, and floodplains, reversing ecological decline and building resilience against drought. Yet progress has been halting, mired in state-federal disputes and irrigator opposition. The review, therefore, is not a routine audit; it is a high-stakes negotiation over the future of water management in the face of intensifying climate extremes. The Menindee Lakes flooding in 2021 and repeated fish kills have underscored the system's fragility, while the Bureau of Meteorology's projections of hotter, drier conditions in southern Australia elevate the urgency.

Joyce's entry into the debate via One Nation injects a potent electoral dimension. The Farrer byelection win in May 2026 demonstrated the party's growing appeal in basin electorates, threatening the Nationals' traditional base. Joyce's defection from the Nationals earlier in 2026 signaled his willingness to challenge the bipartisan consensus that has underpinned water reform. His core argument—that buybacks transfer wealth from inland communities to coastal cities without achieving connectivity—resonates in towns struggling with depopulation and service decline. However, hydrologists and ecologists warn that buybacks are the most efficient means to secure environmental water, and that abandoning them in favor of infrastructure-only approaches risks locking in over-allocation. The tension pits immediate community interests against long-term basin health.