THE state government has cut a program for monitoring the ecological health of the Snowy River.

Green groups say the decision suggests the government is not serious about plans to restore the river and instead plans to increasingly divert water flushed through the Snowy towards irrigators and power generation.

Teresa Rose, the last of four environmental scientists to leave the Snowy Flow Response Monitoring and Modelling Program, packed up her desk yesterday.

“They’ve cut water funding for scientific monitoring,” Mrs Rose said. ”Not only can we not collect the data, we can’t analyse it and we can’t report to the community or scientists.”

Mrs Rose was part of a NSW Office of Water team that monitored how the release of water from Jindabyne Dam through the Snowy River affected river quality.

The government did not respond directly to questions from the Herald about the cuts, but referred to comments made in Parliament last week in which it said “future monitoring of the Snowy River does not require the same level of resourcing”. The government said it could commission external monitoring.

However, the opposition spokesman for primary industries, Steve Whan, said it was vital the government performed its own monitoring.

“They seem to think they don’t need to monitor the long-term health of the river,” Mr Whan said.

”It’s a sign of the government’s lack of commitment for Snowy recovery.”

The Greens MP John Kaye said the government would no longer be able to ensure that the size and timing of future water releases would not damage the river’s delicate ecosystem.

He said cutting monitoring was further evidence the government did not intend to fulfil its legal requirement to convene the Snowy Scientific Committee to guide its river policy.