What the farmer buys, the Government takes away: [3 All-round Metro Edition]
Stapleton, John. The Australian [Canberra, A.C.T] 22 Feb 2007: 4.
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Abstract
GIL Ackerly feels thoroughly ripped off. He grows lucerne for a living and after paying for water, the NSW Government first cut what it was giving him by 52 per cent and then refused to compensate him.
Mr Ackerly has lived on the 250ha property Kindillan in the Riverina district of southern NSW all of his 57 years. He began growing lucerne for the recreation horse market 12 years ago, with the rest of his property devoted to the wool and fat lamb trade.
The way Mr Ackerly sees it, the Government owes him $80,000 for the water he has paid for and they have refused to supply. On the basis of the water allocation he paid for, he negotiated with produce stores in Melbourne to buy his lucerne.
GIL Ackerly feels thoroughly ripped off. He grows lucerne for a living and after paying for water, the NSW Government first cut what it was giving him by 52 per cent and then refused to compensate him.
He is now in the middle of filling out a wad of forms courtesy of the NSW Government in an attempt to prove financial hardship, which he has been told is theonly way the bureaucrats will compensate him for the water he has already paid for but never received.
Mr Ackerly has lived on the 250ha property Kindillan in the Riverina district of southern NSW all of his 57 years. He began growing lucerne for the recreation horse market 12 years ago, with the rest of his property devoted to the wool and fat lamb trade.
The drought has meant many irrigators, including Mr Ackerly, are not receiving their water allocations.
On a zero allocation this year, when he normally gets more than 700megalitres, production on his farm is grinding to a halt. His current predicament began to develop in October when he bought 350 megalitres of water for $45,000 on the water market in an attempt to drought-proof his property.
That water is now worth about $800 a megalitre but the state Government stepped in late last year and cut the water he was still owed by 52 per cent -- or 100 a megalitre.
The way Mr Ackerly sees it, the Government owes him $80,000 for the water he has paid for and they have refused to supply. On the basis of the water allocation he paid for, he negotiated with produce stores in Melbourne to buy his lucerne.
"That 100 megalitres would have given me another two cuts of lucerne," he said. I would have made a decent living. Now I haven't got any water for my winter pasture for the sheep.
"This is impacting badly on the property.
"I haven't got any water, and the money that I have paid, I don't have the use of that either."
A spokeswoman for Murray Irrigation, Jennifer McLeod, said about 1100 of the body's irrigator customers had been affected directly by the 52 per cent reduction of available water from the Murray River late last year.
"The customers are frustrated and for some of them it has had quite a significant financial impact both on them and the operation of their properties," she said.
"The Government had no choice but to reduce the amount of water available because of the drought, but the issue which has frustrated farmers is this happened late last year and it has had a financial impact on them."
A spokesman for NSW Natural Resources Minister Ian Macdonald said farmers would get the water they had paid for when there was water back in the dams and rivers. He asked for farmers to be patient with the $20million rescue program.
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