Former NSW water minister defends exclusion of driest years from sustainable water calculations

New water-sharing plans use data that ends at 2004 to calculate extractions from major tributaries in the Murray-Darling system

The former NSW water minister Kevin Humphries has defended controversial legislation that effectively excludes some of the driest water years from figures used to calculate sustainable water allocations for irrigators, towns and the environment.

Humphries, who confirmed he had been referred to the Independent Commission Against Corruption over unspecified decisions he took as water minister, told a NSW parliamentary committee that the 2014 legislation he introduced was to give greater certainty to all water users.