Murray River chief tries to calm the waters

Crusading Sydney barrister Richard Beasley SC has reassured farmers and irrigators they have nothing to fear from his new role as South Australia’s first River Murray commissioner.

Barrister Richard Beasley SC.

Crusading Sydney barrister and author Richard Beasley SC has reassured farmers and irrigators they have nothing to fear from his new role as South Australia’s first River Murray commissioner.

But he insists the full 450 gigalitres of water must be returned to the river as a matter of urgency as promised 10 years ago under the Murray-Darling Basin Plan.

Mr Beasley – whose most prominent recent role was as senior counsel assisting the Ruby Princess Inquiry – is a strident critic of what he sees as the pillaging of the Murray as an infinite water resource.

In a book released last year entitled Dead in The Water: A very angry book about our greatest environmental catastrophe, Mr Beasley says he is “fed up with the cowardice and negligence that have allowed Big Agriculture and irrigators to destroy a river system”.

He also once sent a colourful tweet to the CSIRO’s official Twitter account telling the nation’s peak science body “go f..k yourselves” after whistleblower scientists revealed it was downplaying evidence of the river system’s poor state.

Mr Beasley was lead counsel on the Weatherill Labor government’s royal commission into the Murray-Darling and his appointment as the new River Murray commissioner has been criticised by the SA Liberals as “jobs for the boys”.

Irrigators are also querying how Mr Beasley’s role will work and whether he will use his position to agitate for limited water allocations for people on the land.

But Mr Beasley told The Australian that his role was purely about being an advocate for the river and for the honouring of the Murray-Darling agreement.

Asked if irrigators and farmers should be worried about his role given his activism on the issue, Mr Beasley said: “No they shouldn’t. A lot of farmers are in favour of the basin plan. Your big irrigation trusts as a matter of obviousness want more water for themselves and their members to grow food and fibre.

“There is an obvious tension between the environment and some irrigators, particularly big ones. But with my South Australian hat on I would simply say this extra water was promised 10 years ago. It was part of the deal.

“Secondly, the water act is environmental law. There is no way around that. It was designed to save the environment, not just SA water assets but Victorian water assets and NSW water assets, so it already involves a compromise.”

The Albanese government has promised to return the promised 450GL even though the latest statutory review under the Water Act found it would cost $11bn and could not be delivered by the 2024 deadline.

Mr Beasley disputed that assessment and said he would act as an advocate to make the commonwealth examine all options to honour that deal by the existing deadline.

“In a nutshell, my role is to convince the feds that there has to be change,” he said.

“You will still have irrigated agriculture growing food and fibre in the basin, but the scientists will tell us how much can be taken that is environmentally sustainable.

“I am a lawyer, not a scientist. I wouldn’t make up how much water the environment needs so it doesn’t die. This is what science is saying. And South Australia is being ripped off of this extra water. So my job is to advocate for it and also try to get a result.

SA opposition water resources spokeswoman Nicola Centofanti said she feared Mr Beasley was too strident in his politics to achieve a consensus.

“A successful advocacy role in the Murray-Darling Basin requires having the confidence of the basin communities,” she said.

“I’m not convinced that appointing a Sydney lawyer, who believes water buybacks are the only way forward, will wash.”