Murray-Darling water theft allegations: NSW to prosecute irrigators

WaterNSW has moved to prosecute a number of landowners on the Murray-Darling river system for water theft, eight months after the ABC brought the matter into the national spotlight.

Today’s announcement came on the day the state ombudsman released a scathing report on the regulator, criticising it for giving him grossly inflated figures on the number of enforcement actions and prosecutions it had initiated to enforce water laws in the past 15 months.

Those facing prosecution include Peter Harris and Jane Harris – the subject of the key allegations of water theft in a Four Corners program in July 2017 and who have been at the centre of further revelations in Guardian Australia since.

WaterNSW also announced it was moving to prosecute Anthony Barlow, Frederick Barlow and Margaret Barlow. Both offences carry a maximum penalty of $247,000.

Landholder Peter Harris has previously vigorously denied any wrongdoing, while Anthony Barlow has previously told the ABC they believed they had secured permission to take water.

WaterNSW said other matters were still being investigated and it expected to announce further enforcement action against other landowners shortly.

The matters will be heard in the New South Wales land and environment court.

WaterNSW said the announcement followed a lengthy investigation in the Barwon-Darling region but it comes amid growing criticisms of inaction by the regulator.

The regulator was today blasted by the state ombudsman for giving him figures on the number of enforcement actions and prosecutions it had initiated over a 15-month period when it had not taken any enforcement actions at all.

The stoush, revealed in the Guardian last month, has proved intensely embarrassing for the Berejiklian government and raises serious questions about the administration of the water portfolio in NSW.

WaterNSW’s responsibilities include running the state’s water infrastructure such as dams, plus overseeing compliance with the Murray-Darling basin plan.

Inaccurate data was also provided to the NSW minister for primary industries, Niall Blair, who used it in parliament to defend the performance of his agency and his administration of the portfolio.

He has been forced to correct the record but Labor has been asking why it took 22 days after he became aware to do so.

“The government has misled the ombudsman and the parliament. Blair claimed that after sacking the investigations unit he had fixed the problem of a lack of compliance and presided over hundreds of citations and 12 criminal prosecutions – the truth was they hadn’t done any,” said the opposition spokesman for water, Chris Minns, who called for his resignation.

The issue came to the attention of the ombudsman after whistleblowers and people who had dealt with WaterNSW queried the data. A final report into the handling of complaints within the water portfolio is due in June and is expected to be strongly critical of Water NSW.

But today’s report is particularly embarrassing because it points to serious cultural and systemic problems in the administration of water policy in the state.

The NSW ombudsman, Michael Barnes, said he was tabling the report to correct the record. “Prior to the tabling of the November report, WaterNSW provided updated enforcement figures and pressed for them to be included in the report in order to provide a fair and balanced picture of its performance” said Barnes. “Following some clarification of the numbers, the acting ombudsman agreed to this request.”

Shortly after the tabling of the November report, the ombudsman received information stating that the figures were “significantly incorrect and that there had in fact been no referrals for prosecutions and no penalty infringement notices issued in the relevant period, which is contrary to the data provided to us by WaterNSW”, Barnes said. The information prompted a separate investigation into WaterNSW.

After the ombudsman drew the incorrect numbers to the attention of WaterNSW, the regulator manually reviewed all actions taken which confirmed that the actual number of enforcement actions was in line with the much lower numbers initially provided to the ombudsman in June 2017.

The chief executive of WaterNSW admitted the error and apologised.

Barnes said he was satisfied the provision of incorrect information was not intentional.