Legal action is being launched over low water allocations in QLD. 

Water service provider Sunwater has announced that irrigators in the Burnett River scheme will only receive 22 per cent of their water allocations for the 2021–22 financial year.

Irrigators received 100 per cent water allocations in the previous financial year, following an average of 90 per cent every year since Paradise Dam, south-west of Bundaberg, was filled in the 2010 floods.

However,after the Queensland government revealed structural and stability issues with the dam's concrete in 2019, about 100,000 megalitres of water had to be released into the Burnett River to alleviate pressure on the dam wall.

At the same time, the spillway was lowered by almost 6 metres, reducing its total capacity to 42 per cent.

Farmers have had to reduce their stocks in response, pushing some operations into unviable territory. 

Bundaberg lawyer Tom Marland is preparing a class action against the state government, claiming the economic impact of the reduced allocations could be in the billions, affecting up to 700 individual farming enterprises.

“It's not just farmers, but all the subsidiary businesses and the Bundaberg economy that's going to suffer,” he told the ABC.

“Productivity losses with the reduction of crops … you're looking in the hundreds of millions.

“Once you start looking at properties that are losing value as a result of lack of water security, the number extrapolates into the billions.”

Mr Marland said legal proceedings should go ahead before the end of the year.