Basin Authority plan should prioritise water quality as well as water recovery targets. Communities in south-west Queensland are calling for greater attention to water quality as the Murray-Darling Basin Authority undertakes the first major review of the Murray-Darling Basin Plan. In St George, the Balonne River supports drinking water supplies, tourism, recreation and irrigated agriculture, while also holding deep cultural significance for the Kamilaroi people. Kamilaroi elders Sam Saunders and Ron Waters said they had hoped the basin plan would restore the health of the Condamine-Balonne catchment but were disappointed by what they described as limited progress over the past decade. Introduced following the Millennium Drought, the basin plan aims to manage the river system as a whole and recover more than 2,000 gigalitres of water for environmental purposes through projects and water licence buybacks. Local leaders argue that future reforms should place stronger emphasis on improving the ecological and cultural health of waterways, rather than focusing solely on the volume of water recovered.