SA irrigators penalised $15m for using Murray water they did not own
South Australian Murray irrigators are fighting to overturn massive penalties of up to $9000 per megalitre of water they pumped, but did not own.
A GROUP of South Australian irrigators are fighting for survival, after being slapped with $15 million in fines for pumping water from the Murray River they did not own in 2019-20.
SA irrigators say “the punishment does not fit the crime” and have launched a campaign to have the overuse penalties of up to $9780 a megalitre waived.
Penalty notices seen by The Weekly Times show one Murray River pumper, who did not own entitlement, was hit with a fine of $20,754 for using 4.7ML he did not own at the end of September, but did not receive the penalty notice until January 23.
Other penalty notices show fines of $37,818 for overusing 8.6ML, $73,896 for 28ML of overuse and $373,563 for 90.6ML the irrigator did not hold.
Irrigators and water brokers say one major irrigation company faces a penalty in excess of $6.8 million for overuse, but The Weekly Times has not seen the penalty notice.
Water Communities SA spokesman Ian Penno said he had been notified of close to $15m of penalties, after just a week of inquiry.
“No clarification has been received from the authorities regarding the enforcement of these Penalty Notices,” Mr Penno said.
“Do these families, not knowing, walk from their properties, as is being considered, or continue on with the uncertainty, and stress of this financial burden.”
Many of the SA irrigators say they have been caught out by changes in the water rules, which traditionally allowed them to use water they did not hold in their accounts, as long as it was repaid by the end of the season on June 30.
But the SA Government banned the practice on July 1 last year, after repeated complaints from upstream irrigators and other Murray Darling Basin states’ water ministers that it was unfair.
NSW and Victorian irrigators had long argued the policy allowed SA irrigators to overuse or borrow water at the peak of summer, when demand and prices were high, then repay it at the end of the season when prices traditionally fell.
If the practice had been allowed to continue during the 2019-20 season SA irrigators would have been able to avoid paying more than $900/ML for water on the allocation market in the summer peak by simply overusing water and then repaying it in May when the price had dropped to $300/ML.
Lower Murray irrigator Stephen Noble, who’s business faces a hefty penalty, said the SA Department of Environment and Water had failed to adequately warn him and other irrigators of the rule changes, which required all accounts to be in balance at the end of each quarter.
Mr Noble said DEW sent irrigators a poorly drafted letter on July 30, last year, which outlined the new quarterly compliance approach, but gave no details of the penalties, just a weblink.
“There are some water users, who don’t even own entitlement, who didn’t get the letter,” Mr Noble said.
SA Murray Irrigators warned the SA Government last year that more needed to be done, with vice-chairman Richard Reedy approaching the Primary Industries and Regions SA and DEW in July and August urging them to run public forums to educate irrigators on the changes and the risks they faced.
“The response was no,” Mr Reedy wrote in a recent letter to DEW. “I subsequently wrote to Kym Walton (PIRSA), who stated no forums would be held, with staff at DEW not supporting my request.”
SA Water Minister David Speirs said: “If someone believes they have been unjustly penalised, they can apply to me and I can review their circumstances under very strict and limited criteria.
But Mr Speirs said “those who take more water than they are entitled to are effectively stealing from other irrigators as well as the environment and must be penalised.
“The penalties put in place take into account the national framework, the price of water and the risk to the resource.”
But part of the problem for SA’s Murray river pumpers is that none of their meters are linked up to telemetry, which would allow them to be remotely read.
Consequently they must manually read their meters at the end of each quarter and then lodge the results with the department. It has meant notification of overuse can take almost four months.
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