Former top cop Mick Keelty releases long-awaited Murray Darling report
South Australia‘s river management is the best in the land, a long-awaited new report into the Murray-Darling says, but it’s also found the truth about water is far too murky.
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Former top cop Mick Keelty has handed down his long-awaited report into the management of Australia’s largest river system, and he says the truth is hard to come by.
Mr Keelty says there is no “single point of truth” across the government agencies tasked with overseeing the country’s largest river system.
But the new report into the Murray-Darling Basin has praised South Australia’s handling of water allocations for the past two decades.
Interim Basin inspector-general Mick Keelty was tasked with reviewing how water is managed after angry irrigators protested at Parliament House in Canberra last year.
In Mr Keelty’s report released today, the former Australian Federal Police Commissioner said he heard many complaints about how water was being allocated and used for the river.
“A single point of truth on many issues appears to be more challenging to establish than it should be,” Mr Keelty said.
“Misperceptions or misinformation may be part of the problem in some instances, but it is clear that this can be driven by a lack of confidence in the information provided by government agencies responsible for Basin management.”
Federal Water Minister Keith Pitt said Mr Keelty’s inquiry – that focused on the water sharing arrangements and how they work with state water allocation policies – highlighted the need for improvement.
“This report reinforces the need to improve the transparency, accessibility and availability of information about Murray-Darling Basin water matters,” Mr Pitt said.
He said he has directed the Department of Agriculture, Water and the Environment and Murray-Darling Basin Authority to take action to implement Mr Kelty’s recommendations.
Mr Keelty said South Australia had kept more water back for the dry times each year for the past 20 years.
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New South Wales had given a higher proportion of water away each year, he said.
“South Australia’s more conservative allocation policies therefore mean they have more water to allocate to irrigators in dry times.
“South Australian irrigators are currently on 100 per cent allocation for the 2019-20 water year,” Mr Keelty said.
“This is not because more water has been allocated or prioritised for South Australia, but because of the policies that the state has adopted.”
SA Environment Minister David Speirs said the report reaffirmed his position that water sharing arrangements which has stood the test of time were effective and it was up to each state to responsibly manage their allocation.