After the draft: the Fitzroy plan and the partnership gap.

On 30 June 2026, submissions closed on the draft Fitzroy–Derby Water Resources Management Plan — the first water plan for the Fitzroy River catchment and the related groundwater of the Canning–Kimberley area. It is a genuinely significant document. It is also, on the public reaction of the Traditional Owners it most affects, a disappointment.

The Kimberley Land Council, responding to the release, said it had entered the process “with a willingness to provide genuine and practical recommendations” and expected “meaningful progress toward a long-term partnership with government,” but that the draft instead “reflects a continuation of business-as-usual approaches that are already failing.” That is a serious verdict, and it is theirs to make. What follows is not a rebuttal of it, nor an attempt to speak for anyone. It is one advisory practice’s reading of why a plan can do many things well and still land as business-as-usual — and what would have to change for it not to.

What the draft gets right

Three things in the draft are worth holding onto, because a partnership-first version would keep them.

• No dams. The draft reaffirms that the river and its tributaries will not be dammed. For a living river system of profound cultural significance, that is not a small thing — it removes the single most extractive option from the table.
• Allocation limits, stated. Proposing groundwater allocation limits — to protect drinking-water security for towns, Aboriginal communities and pastoral operations — is the responsible starting posture for a catchment with no prior plan. You cannot govern a resource you have not bounded.
• A reserve, in principle. The State supports establishing a Fitzroy Aboriginal Water Reserve, and a process for Traditional Owners to exercise water-related cultural heritage and native title rights and to advise on planning and licensing. The intent is real.

None of that is business-as-usual on paper. So where does the gap open?

Where it falls short: a reserve is not a holding

The gap is in a single word that does a great deal of work: reserve.

A reserve is a volume set aside — a quantity of water notionally kept for Aboriginal use, with a right to be consulted about how the rest is allocated. It is a better position than no set-aside at all. But it is a share of someone else’s decision, not a decision of your own. The State still holds the plan, sets the limits, runs the licensing, and invites advice. Advice can be received and set aside. That is precisely the shape of arrangement that reads, from the other side of the table, as business-as-usual — however well-intentioned.

The question a plan answers is not how much water Traditional Owners are allocated. It is who decides, and who keeps the value.

Ridgeline’s own submission to the Department of Water and Environmental Regulation argued for a different instrument: an Aboriginal Water Holding — a meaningful volume (in the order of 25 GL/year) that Traditional Owners hold and control, with the standing to use it, licence it, partner around it, or leave it in the river, on their own authority and at their own pace. A reserve asks to be consulted. A holding confers the right to decide. The difference is not rhetorical; it is the difference between an entitlement on paper and an entitlement you can act on.

What a partnership-first version would look like

The test we apply to any partnership on Country is six questions. Read against them, the distance between a reserve and a holding becomes concrete:

• Who decides? A holding puts approval and licensing authority with Traditional Owners for their volume — not a right to advise a decision made elsewhere.
• Who keeps the value? A holding lets value from any future use flow to the community as owners, rather than as beneficiaries of a State-run allocation.
• Is it investable? Clear, TO-held title is more bankable, not less — a proponent negotiating with an owner has certainty a consultation process cannot give.
• Does it build capability? Holding and administering an entitlement builds the water-governance capability that being consulted never will.
• Is culture in charge? A holding lets the choice to leave water in the river carry the same standing as any commercial use — because it is the owner’s choice.
• Can you walk away? A holding can be used, partnered deal-by-deal, or held unused indefinitely. A reserve cannot be walked away from because it was never yours to leave.

A partnership-first plan would keep the no-dam commitment and the allocation discipline, and convert the reserve into a holding: real volume, real title, real decision rights, resourced governance to administer it, and the freedom to do nothing with it if that is the right call. That is not a more radical plan. It is the same plan with the authority moved to where it belongs.

Our stance

The Fitzroy is not ours to plan, and Traditional Owners do not need an advisory firm to tell them what they are owed — the Martuwarra Fitzroy River Council and the Kimberley Land Council have been clear, and the authority is theirs. We offer this as a resource: a way of naming the gap between a reserve and a holding that partners on both sides of the table can use. Take it up, change it, or set it aside.

This briefing is independent analysis by Ridgeline Advisory, drawn entirely from public sources. It does not represent the views of the Kimberley Land Council, the Martuwarra Fitzroy River Council, or any Traditional Owner group, and does not speak on their behalf. Quoted statements are attributed to their sources.