Accelerating Action For Maribyrnong Catchment Waterways

Accelerating Action For Maribyrnong Catchment Waterways

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The Maribyrnong River and Waterways Association seeks to make the Maribyrnong known, celebrated and protected as a living entity. As such, the Maribyrnong catchment must have a fair share of water.

The Maribyrnong is one of Victoria’s most flow-stressed river systems. Since 2006, governments have promised to allocate and deliver environmental water to it. Now, it is urgent that water authorities and the state government prioritise and accelerate action for the river. 

This means delivery of existing commitments to increase and safeguard environmental water, while ensuring future water demand does not compromise river health. Persuading agencies to stay …

The Maribyrnong River and Waterways Association seeks to make the Maribyrnong known, celebrated and protected as a living entity. As such, the Maribyrnong catchment must have a fair share of water.

The Maribyrnong is one of Victoria’s most flow-stressed river systems. Since 2006, governments have promised to allocate and deliver environmental water to it. Now, it is urgent that water authorities and the state government prioritise and accelerate action for the river. 

This means delivery of existing commitments to increase and safeguard environmental water, while ensuring future water demand does not compromise river health. Persuading agencies to stay on the case, and pick up the pace is key.

MRWA’s focus is twofold: increase the environmental water reserve, and mitigate the impacts of a key emerging threat (data centres).

The Maribyrnong River and Waterways Association is a not-for-profit charity that works across the entire Maribyrnong Catchment. This includes the municipalities of Maribyrnong, Moonee Valley, Brimbank, Hume and Macedon Ranges. 

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Accelerate Action for Maribyrnong Waterways

Signing on to support our letter for securing environmental water for waterways in the Maribyrnong Catchment will show the new Water Minister how much our community cares about action for waterways in the west.

August, 2026

Open letter to the Hon Michaela Settle MP, Minister for Water

Subject: Welcome Minister Settle – now is the time to secure water for the Maribyrnong Catchment

Dear Minister Settle,

Congratulations on your appointment as Victoria’s Minister for Water.

On behalf of the Maribyrnong River and Waterways Association and communities across the Maribyrnong (Mirrangbamurn) catchment, we welcome you to the portfolio and look forward to working constructively with you.

In your first speech to Parliament, you reflected on a lesson passed down by your mother, an environmental campaigner and scientist, that when you see a need for change, you must stand up and be counted. You also spoke about the power of communities to create change and the importance of putting communities at the heart of decisions that affect them.

Those principles resonate strongly with us and our community.

For twenty years, communities along the Maribyrnong and its tributaries have been waiting for a commitment made to their river to be fulfilled. The 2006 Central Region Sustainable Water Strategy committed to creating an environmental entitlement for the Maribyrnong. Two decades later, the catchment still does not have one.

There is, however, now a real opportunity to change that. Water agencies are actively investigating where that water can come from and how it can be delivered.

Now, we are asking you, as Victoria's new Water Minister, to bring government and water agencies together to accelerate action to:

  1. Secure water for the Maribyrnong environment by returning water from bulk entitlements, creating the long-promised environmental entitlement, and protecting the baseflow needs of the river’s tributaries.
  2. Invest in the infrastructure needed to deliver environmental water, ensuring the water being identified for the Maribyrnong can actually reach the river and its tributaries when and where it is needed.
  3. Protect environmental water from growing industrial demand by requiring major new water users, including data centres, to adopt best-practice water efficiency and prioritise recycled and stormwater for approval and ongoing operations.

Much of the technical work is happening now. What is needed is coordination, investment and political commitment to turn that work into water in the river.

We would welcome the opportunity to meet with you to discuss how the government and agencies can work together to make this happen.

And, as we offered your predecessor, we would be delighted to host you aboard our small electric boat, Puggle, to experience the Maribyrnong firsthand and hear from the community working to protect it.

Twenty years after the first promise of an environmental entitlement, we hope you will work with us to finally secure a fair share of water for the Maribyrnong River and its tributaries.

Yours sincerely,

Maribyrnong River and Waterways Association
with the support of
Communities Across the Catchment

 

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