Achieving river integrity through natural resource management and integrated catchment management legislative frameworks.

This paper reports on a project which further refines a model legislative framework first identified in a Land and Water Australia project in 1999. This framework is benchmarked against legislative excerpts from within Australian jurisdictions, as well as the major policy initiatives of the Council of Australian Governments (COAG) water reform agenda, the Commonwealth's National Action Plan on Salinity and Water Quality, and others. The model framework has been heavily influenced by current thinking on ecological systems, good governance, and organisational management. Another important product of the report is a statement of model statutory objectives and principles, suitable for use in water resource legislation.