One of Australia’s most successful cotton irrigators has been charged with conspiring to defraud the commonwealth of more than $20m.

Queensland’s former cotton farmer of the year, John Norman, 43, was charged on Tuesday with six counts of fraud involving commonwealth funds allocated for water efficiency projects under the Murray-Darling basin plan.



A second man, Stephen Evans, 53, the chief financial officer for Norman Farming, was charged with four counts of fraud relating to his alleged involvement in the lodgment of fraudulent claims.

Norman owns an 18,000-hectare cotton aggregate outside Goondiwindi, near the New South Wales border.

Det Insp Mick Dowie said the arrests were the result of a long and complex investigation and police would allege fraudulent activity across six projects between 2010 and 2017.

If found guilty, the two men face extended jail sentences.

For nearly two years an expanding team of cybercrime experts and forensic accountants have sifted through thousands of documents and emails as well as evidence of alleged fraudulent invoicing provided by former Norman Farming contractors, and detailed accounting records from a former senior employee turned whistleblower.



Dowie said he expected 80-100 witnesses to appear in a trial, including up to 10 contractors who worked for Norman Farming between 2010 and 2017.

He said some contractors’ invoices were allegedly amended either by the contractors themselves or by Norman Farming later.

“Some contractors knew what was happening, some didn’t. Some of them knowingly changed their invoices on the request of the defendant, but not necessarily with the knowledge of what the invoices were going to be used for.”

The investigation went public last October when officers swooped on Norman Farming’s main office and several of the irrigator’s contractors.

“I am aware of the impact this will have on the small farming communities in the area and possible individuals. I encourage people to take advantage of the support services available,” Dowie said.

Between 2010 and 2017 Norman reportedly received up to $31m in grants under Queensland’s Healthy Headwaters scheme.



The money was provided for water efficiency projects to help the nation’s ailing river system, but under the conditions set by Queensland’s Department of Natural Resources, Mines and Energy there was virtually no checking of the projects during, or after completion.

John Norman’s immediate neighbours said they were relieved charges had been laid.

“It’s been a long time since I first went to authorities with my concerns,” said dry-land cropper Chris Lamey, who will be giving evidence about Norman Farming’s alleged fraud to South Australia’s royal commission in September.



Lamey and other neighbours have accused the irrigator of illegally constructing more than 50km of levees and banks on his massive farming operation. They say the levees have caught and diverted large volumes of floodwaters from the McIntyre river into Norman Farming’s expanded on-farm storage dams.



The charges against the two men coincide with the resumption on Tuesday of the stalled Senate inquiry into the Murray-Darling basin plan.



The Centre Alliance senator Rex Patrick, a member of the Senate committee, said the charges “send a strong signal to everyone that water compliance and enforcement is back”.

The charges are likely to ignite calls for an independent audit of the plan, already under pressure from the royal commission established by the former SA premier Jay Weatherill.

They may also prove to be a personal embarrassment to the local MP, agriculture minister David Littleproud, whose wife is second cousin to the irrigator. Littleproud has denied any personal conflict, saying the awarding of Healthy Headwaters grants was a state responsibility.

The Greens Murray Darling basin spokesperson, Sarah Hanson-Young, has called for a federal Independent Commission Against Corruption with powers to compel witnesses and investigate breaches across state boundaries. “Now that charges have been laid, the water minister, David Littleproud, should step aside to avoid any perceived conflict of interest,” she said.



