PRESIDENTIAL ADDRESS. oO” 
past for not having taken advantage of any rights from 
the Murray that it might have had. 
The first sections of the channels constructed could be 
utilised for the supply of water down natural channels 
until funds were available for the construction of the whole 
scheme. There is scope in the Murray-Murrumbidgee 
basin for the construction of a few small dams on the 
Billabong and its ana-branch creeks, but the most neces- 
sitous areas are those away from those creeks that can be 
served only by the construction of artificial channels as 
proposed. The works that have been constructed up to 
the present in this area consist of the diversion from the 
Murray into the Tuppal and Hagle Creeks, from the 
Edwards into the Wakool River, and from the Murrumbidgee 
into the Yanko Creek; there is small scope for further work 
of this nature, they comprising most of the practical 
diversions. 
The area that can be supplied from the Lachlan forms 
a portion of the Murray-Murrumbidgee basin, the Lachlan 
itself being an affluent into the Murrumbidgee. The 
departmental records shew that in dry sensons the flow 
ceases, and that a supply for stock purposes can be main- 
tained only with the assistance of storages. This river 
affords exceptional natural facilities for the diversions and 
distribution of water by means of the Willandra Billabong 
into the back country over an extremely arid portion of 
the State; but unfortunately, except in good seasons, the 
supply is not on a par with these facilities. In the first 
instance the greatest good can be done by the construc- 
tion of a succession of small storages in the channel of 
this stream. The wholeriver should be dealt with in this 
way, beginning from the lower or most arid end and work- 
ing upwards in the first instance to the Willandra Billa- 
bong. This, besides storing, will result in an ultimate 
