A New South Wales minister has been forced to correct the parliamentary record on the number of prosecutions by WaterNSW for breaches of water laws, saying that his department had provided him with figures found “not to be accurate”.
The Guardian revealed last week that the New South Wales ombudsman was investigating whether WaterNSW – the body responsible for compliance with the state’s water laws – had misled the ombudsman when it provided data last year on the number of prosecutions and enforcement actions it had taken in the previous 15 months.
Niall Blair, the NSW minister for primary industries and regional water, said he has been told by the ombudsman, Michael Barnes, that there was “no intention to mislead” and that the water bureaucrats had not committed an offence under the Ombudsman Act.
The figures were relied upon last year by the ombudsman to conclude, in an otherwise damning report, that enforcement of the water laws in NSW was improving.
Blair said WaterNSW corrected the statistics and has apologised unreservedly to the ombudsman. “The information was provided in good faith with no intention to mislead,” Blair said.
But as Blair had also relied on the same numbers for answers in parliament, he too needed to correct the record.
The opposition spokesman in the upper house, Mick Veitch, said it was not satisfactory that the bureaucrats had provided inaccurate information.
“If parliament is to restore confidence in the administration of water in NSW, then there must be accurate information as a starting point,” he said.
Last year the ABC program Four Corners aired allegations of major water theft by irrigators in the Barwon Darling. But there have been no prosecutions.
A spokesman for WaterNSW told the Guardian this week it was still investigating breaches of the NSW Water Management Act.
“WaterNSW advises that while certain decisions may be conditional on further evidence being obtained, its expectation is that a decision on whether to commence prosecutions in a number of such cases will occur in coming days,” he said.
• On 7 March 2018 this article was corrected. A previous version named the opposition spokesman as Greg Donnelly.
