Murray-Darling authority accused of maladministration and ignoring best science

Royal commission counsel also says officials tried to lean on CSIRO to reduce water recovered for the environment

The Murray-Darling Basin Authority has been accused of maladministration, deliberately ignoring the best science on the river, leaning on the CSIRO to alter reports on the adequacy of the basin plan and ignoring the impact of climate change in its future planning.

In a scathing assessment of the authority, counsel assisting the South Australian Murray-Darling royal commission, Richard Beasley SC, has painted a picture of an organisation cowed by its political masters and too afraid to present its own scientific data to the greater scientific community.