Farmers angered by Newman's water bill Queensland farmers are concerned at rising irrigation costs. Photo: Jessica Hromas Farmers in three regional Queensland towns have written to Premier Campbell Newman, angry about paying more for irrigation water than his LNP promised during the 2012 election. Sixty farmers from the small mango town of Mutchilba on the Atherton Tablelands are paying between $10,000 and $14,000 extra on their irrigation water bills, equivalent to $38 a megalitre. Queensland Canegrowers on February 21, 2013, wrote to Mr Newman concerned that farmers using irrigation water-price increases are paying more than the extra $2 per megalitre, plus CPI, than they were promised by the LNP in March 2012. The farmers and Atherton Tablelands MPs met on Tuesday night in Mutchilba to press their concerns to Treasurer Tim Nicholls. The farmers' spokeswoman is Karen Muccignat, who is on the Mareeba-Dimbula Irrigation Board, and who fought and won the fight to get Mutchilba back on the map in 2012. Ms Muccignat said "relift farmers" were prepared to pay the government's promise of 2 per cent, plus inflation, but were shocked at being asked to pay $10,000 to $14,000 more. "Because we are not a big band of growers, like the Canegrowers Association, we are not in the ear of government," Ms Muccignat said. "Water Minister Mark McArdle seems to be on our side and our local MP, David Kempton seems to be on our side," she said. But she said farmers believed Treasurer Tim Nicholls was not listening. "I have been trying to work very diplomatically with this government," she said. "But to be honest - and I hate to say this - we would have been better off under the previous government," she said. About 60 farmers - who grow citrus fruits, mangos, avocados and lychees - rely on irrigation water that is pumped from Tinaroo Dam to storage dams closer to the higher farms. From there, the water is gravity-fed and pumped to their farms. A spokesman for Mr McArdle had heard the complaints and was working on a solution to drive down the prices by local management of the irrigation channels, run by SunWater. The backbone of the scheme would be to eliminate costs from the southeast corner of the state, which are increasing prices elsewhere in the state. "Under current pricing, the prices being charged are subsidised by the government through a payment of a Community Service Obligation (CSO) to SunWater," he said. The government is presently in stage 2 of the investigation into Local Management Arrangements (LMA) for SunWater's eight irrigation channels. That includes the Mareeba-Dimbulah Relift Scheme, and will give local irrigators more control over costs in the schemes.