State politics

The Murray-Darling Association 2025 National Conference saw its new Strategic Plan unveiled, building on the direction of Vision 2025. Narrandera Shire Council was represented by Cr Jenny Clarke, who presented a report to the Council recently.

Preparations for a large-scale limestone shellfish reef – the first delivered under the Malinauskas Government’s Summer Plan – are underway on the Yorke Peninsula, in one of the biggest marine restoration projects ever undertaken in South Australia.

Facing aggravated assault charges he has denied, member for MacKillop Nick McBride says he is "chafing at the bit, desperate," and "can't wait to get to the court" to tell his side of the story. In an exclusive, wide-ranging interview with The [Naracoorte] News, Mr McBride asked voters for a "leap of faith," urging the electorate to uphold the Australian Constitution and the presumption of innocence until proven guilty.

Jackie Jarvis was appointed Minister for Agriculture and Food in December 2022. She picked up responsibility for Fisheries in March 2025, giving her three budgets and one election to get her head around the DPIRD budget papers ... Once again, I’ve gone back to the state budget to point out a glaring problem: the rhetoric simply does not match the money.

“WAFarmers are reaping what they sow,” Ben Wyatt declared recently, reflecting on the looming Maddox case and claims by WAFarmers that the current laws are being selectively targeted by the department ... There is a curious habit among former ministers once they leave office: they rediscover principle. Mr Wyatt’s recent commentary on Aboriginal cultural heritage laws is a textbook example.

The Victorian Farmers Federation has slammed the State Government's continued underfunding of the Country Fire Authority, with today's release of the CFA's 2024-25 Annual Report confirming a funding crisis that is placing regional communities at unacceptable risk. VFF President, Brett Hosking said the numbers tell a damning story that can no longer be ignored.

Kaali King. Few of us know that tin is one of the fastest growing rare-earth mineral commodities in 2025, outstripping lithium, cobalt, silver and graphite. Demand for electronics and EVs, all of which use tin solder (48 per cent of the global tin market) is fuelling the boom.

The Territory’s 45 million hectares of cattle country is “some of the most intact” land in Australia, something that pastoral families, over more than a century, have achieved not “by locking the country away ... Romy Carey, CEO of the Northern Territory Cattlemen’s Association, is making a powerful point in her group’s current newsletter, as her $1.5 billion a year industry is facing Chinese trade restrictions and criticism over its position on buffel weed.

A commercial fisherman affected by the Cook Government’s decision to permanently close the West Coast bioregion from Kalbarri to Augusta for demersal fishing says it should be mandatory for recreational boat fishers to provide data on their catch on the day they fish.

The Menindee Lakes system is often described as the beating heart of the Darling-Baaka river system, but in the halls of Canberra and Sydney, it is also a vital "battery" for the Murray-Darling Basin. As we move into 2026, the lakes find themselves at the centre of a major policy shift - the "rescoping" of a controversial water-saving project that has pitted engineering efficiency against cultural survival.

The NSW Government has called for community input on recreational opportunities in the proposed Great Koala National Park. Regular ARR.News commentator on koala issues, Vic Jurskis, responds and has some questions for the Environment Minister ... Where do koalas no longer exist in NSW? What is the evidence they existed there when Europeans arrived? What is the evidence they are no longer there? Do you intend to reintroduce them?

Colleen Krestensen. With the repeal of the Kosciuszko Wild Horse Heritage Act 2018 (NSW), the Australian Brumby Alliance and brumby rehoming organisations are deeply concerned that the NSW Government and NPWS will move to quickly slaughter the remaining brumbies by aerial culling or other lethal methods ... The ABA strongly believes that with the brumby population in Kosciuszko National Park now as low as 500 horses, and the perceived density problem addressed, there is time to review how the remaining horses are managed and to make animal welfare an imperative.

On Thursday 15 January 2026, the Minister for the Environment and Water, Murray Watt, announced the Federal Government's decision to list the Lower Murray River System as being of Critically Endangered conservation status pursuant to the Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act 1999 (Cth). Minister Watt's statement together with early statements from National Farmers' Federation and the Nature Conservation Council of NSW demonstrate some of the points of difference over this contentious decision.

Leader of The Nationals WA Shane Love says if growing unrest to Labor’s demersal fishing bans is any indication, the Cook Labor Government has bitten off more than it can chew and badly underestimated the strength and unity of Western Australia’s fishing community ... "The fishing community is ropeable, and rightly so," Mr Love said.

Indigenous Cultural Fire Practitioners and Queensland farmers are working together to improve grazing landscapes using First Nations land management practices, including Cultural Burning - transforming the way food and agricultural systems work.

Denice Barnes. The dumping of Member for Terrigal Adam Crouch as Shadow Minister for the Central Coast has resulted in a public backlash, forcing newly-appointed NSW Opposition Leader Kellie Sloane to defend the decision. Mr Crouch lost his role as Shadow Minister for the Central Coast in the recent reshuffle of the NSW Shadow Cabinet.

Mat Dalby. More than 120 people rallied in Denmark on Saturday, calling on the State Government to halt a planned summer prescribed burn in the Walpole–Nornalup National Park. The rally of people from Walpole, Denmark and across the Great Southern followed days of escalating concern of the Department of Biodiversity Conservation and Attraction's plans threatening the last remaining ancient red tingle forest.

The State only aims to promptly suppress 80 per cent of bushfires, effectively allowing one in five fires to grow beyond initial attack. According to the Department of Energy, Environment and Climate Action (DEECA) Annual Report 2024–25, the government’s target for “fires contained at first attack and/or within five hectares” sits well below what frontline agencies have actually achieved in each of the past five years.