EXCLUSIVE: IRRIGATORS will be forced to deliver even more water to the Murray Darling.
This follows the Federal Government decision to secretly undercut the value of their water.
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The stroke of a federal bureaucrat's pen last month discounted irrigators' water entitlements.
Shocked irrigators only discovered this week federal Water Minister Tony Burke had slashed exchange rates on water bought under the Government's $3.1 billion purchasing program.
Bureaucrats cut the average annual volume of water irrigators' high and general-security entitlements delivered to the environment, but failed to notify irrigators or state governments.
The cuts in the environmental value of water ranged from 12 per cent for Murrumbidgee and 9 per cent for NSW Murray irrigators to 14 per cent on the Loddon irrigation system.
Irrigators and state politicians warned the decision not only eroded the value of water already recovered, but meant they must deliver even more to meet the basin plan of an extra 2800 gigalitres for the environment.
"It's like suddenly raising the basin target from 2800 (gigalitres) to more than 3000 (gigalitres)," NSW Irrigators Council chief executive Andrew Gregson said.
"Just like the Guide (to the basin plan), this was done entirely without consultation. Like the Guide, it will not be received well by the tens of thousands whose jobs rely on this, by the family farms that risk closure or by the fresh food buyer whose weekly shopping bill goes up."
Murrumbidgee Irrigation chairman Gillian Kirkup said she was furious at the Federal Government's actions.
"Our high-security water has delivered 100 per cent in all years, except once during the drought," Ms Kirkup said.
The Federal Government has cut Murrumbidgee high-security entitlement reliability from delivering an average 95 per cent of entitlement each year down to 83.5 per cent.
Ms Kirkup said the devaluation raised serious concerns for the Murrumbidgee, given its high-security entitlement was likely to be a prime target of future Federal purchases.
Victorian Farmers Federation water council chairman Richard Anderson demanded Mr Burke explain why the reliability of irrigators' water had been discounted.
Mr Burke said that "when the (Murray-Darling Basin) Authority updated their thinking on these factors, the department made a point of updating the website based on that latest information". He said the issue would be "settled" in the final basin plan.
But Mr Anderson said the Federal Government appeared to be manipulating exchange rates to strip even more entitlement out of the basin.
"It's like making horses in the Melbourne Cup run an extra 300m, only we're the nags being flogged down the home straight," Mr Anderson said.
The issue only boiled over this week after The Weekly Times obtained and compared copies of the Department of Sustainability, Environment, Water, Population and Communities register of "secured purchases" for August 31 and September 30.
On August 31 the register showed the Federal Government had purchased 174,811 megalitres of NSW general-security water (above the Barmah choke), delivering an annual average of 141,597 megalitres to the environment.
By September 30 the Commonwealth had increased its purchases of above-choke general-security water to 176,169 megalitres, but depreciated the exchange rate so that it delivered just 129,660 megalitres annually to the environment.
Similar discounts had been applied to other entitlements, with the Federal Government even devaluing $19 million of supplementary water it purchased in the Gwydir Valley and another $5 million in the Murrumbidgee to almost zero.
Victorian Water Minister Peter Walsh said he was extremely concerned the Federal Government was acting without consulting the states.
"It's an issue of sovereign risk," Mr Walsh said.
"I'm extremely concerned the Commonwealth is shifting the goalposts."
