NSW Premier, Kristina Keneally, will not cave in to extra demands from South Australia for a bigger cut of flood waters expected to gush into Menindee Lakes this week, dashing any hopes the southern Premier might have of a major environmental win ahead of the State's election in March.
While water will more than likely be released from Menindee for South Australia in coming weeks, it will only be in line with an existing water sharing agreement between States with confirmation from NSW that it will be "no more, and no less".
In a special announcement on Tuesday, Ms Keneally said "we are all Australians and we must work together; this is the worst drought in more than 100 years".
She said the extra flood water would not just make a difference to irrigators and farmers in NSW, but there was now water available to be sent to the Ramsar-listed Lake Alexandrina and Lake Albert.
But NSW Water Resources Minister, Phil Costa, told Rural Press on Wednesday the NSW Premier had agreed with her South Australian counterpart, Mike Rann, to stick to a deal already in place.
He said despite pressure for extra water to be sent to the high-profile Lower Lakes and Coorong at the Murray mouth, it wouldn't be happening.
Mr Costa said water officials from the two States were meeting yesterday to work out the most practical way of getting the water to South Australia without incurring major losses.
This week's heat wave is also forecast to take a toll on flows and the amount stored in Menindee, but it's unclear whether authorities will factor in excessive evaporation before a release decision is made.
In the past week, more than 42,000 megalitres a day has been flowing through gauges upstream of Bourke and by Tuesday flows past Wilcannia, further down the Darling, were at a steady 19,000Ml a day.
On Monday morning the Darling River at Menindee was 1.58 metres and there had been no recorded flows there.
However, it didn't take long for the political argy bargy over the Murray-Darling to start after the big soak over much of north western NSW – which included falls of up to 250 to 500 millimetres - or 10-20 inches on the old scale - over about a week.
It started with a letter from Mr Rann to Prime Minister Kevin Rudd last week seeking a significant proportion of the floodwaters once they reach Menindee Lakes.
Mr Rann called for the release to support the Lower Lakes and Coorong, suggesting the Government help broker additional environmental flows out of NSW.
With the Lower Lakes regularly a political hot-potato, Mr Rann has been accused of political opportunism ahead of a State election in March.
Last week he made the embarrassing blunder of claiming his Government had negotiated an extra 170 gigalitres for South Australia, when that was in fact the amount brokered under the water-sharing deal and, it is now clear, was not additional water and there was no guarantee those flows would even eventuate.
Federal Minister for Water and South Australian Senator, Penny Wong, also put pressure on the NSW Government with her own calls for "reasonable discretion" to be applied where there is water available.
But Mr Costa said just how much is sent would be worked out according to a formula based on the amount of water which eventually reaches Menindee, and while too early to say what that would be, he confirmed it would be less than 100 gigalitres.
"South Australia will get what their entitled under our agreement between the States," Mr Costa said.
"We are conscious of the demand from South Australia, but they must understand that before we had sharing agreements their chances of getting water from these sorts of events would have been none.
"Under this agreement they get more than if we hadn't intervened.
"As important as that Lower Lakes system is, we've got our own families and communities to look after.
"We will do what we can to share resources, but farmers and communities in NSW have an equally demanding need."
He said Ms Keneally would not be giving in to pressure to boost the release, despite the boost it could give to Mr Rann in the lead up to the State election.
He said any sharing mechanisms to be decided among the two States must be mindful of the allocations to southern-basin farmers.
Mr Costa said he did not expect this deal would affect farmers, except in the case that South Australia bought or borrowed water to meet its needs on top of the agreed release.
National Farmers' Federation water spokesman, Laurie Arthur, said any deal must be fully transparent and stick to the existing sharing agreement.
He said to think that there was a "magic pudding" of excessive water available in NSW was false because there really was "no spare water in the system".
National Irrigators Council chief executive, Danny O'Brien, accused Mr Rann of "grandstanding" for a greater chunk of NSW's big northern floods before it was known just how much water will even reach the storages at Menindee.
Opposition spokesman for agriculture and food security, John Cobb, said the State Water Sharing Plans underpin irrigator property rights and must be adhered to, even during this big rain event.
"I doubt that much of the flood water will reach South Australia," Mr Cobb said.
"It won’t be because of irrigators in NSW, it will be because the rain fell in some of the most drought ravaged country in Australia and it will soak it up like a sponge."
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