"Trust", Treasurer Josh Frydenberg said this week, "is at the core of our financial system and, as we've seen, once it's lost, it's not easily regained."

He has made clear that the federal government's response to the banking royal commission will be very much driven by the need to restore faith in the banking system, and its regulation.

And while all attention will turn to the commission's findings when they are handed down on Monday, politicians seemed to be doing their utmost on Thursday to miss the important point about trust when they responded to another royal commission.

Bret Walker, SC, was appointed by the former Weatherill government in South Australia to examine the Murray-Darling Basin Plan — which oversees water usage in this massive water system — after allegations of water theft were aired on Four Corners in 2017.

Mr Walker laments, right at the start, the two opposite impressions he gained from his review of this crucial bit of public policy: one of "admiring praise" for the fact governments actually came together to develop the Water Act in 2007, and "with crucial qualifications", the 2012 Basin Plan which was supposed to put it into practice.

The second impression is one of "deep pessimism whether the objects and purposes of the Act and Plan will be realised".

"There are many ways in which study of the grand national endeavour in question leaves a decidedly sour taste", said Mr Walker.

Muted response from pollies

Findings that Commonwealth officials committed gross maladministration, negligence and unlawful actions are the obvious headlines. But the public might be just as shocked by the political reaction to Commissioner Walker's findings.

For apparently, there isn't really anything to see here, folks.

Mr Walker wrote that current senior management of the Murry-Darling Basin Authority and its board showed "gross negligence" and "maladministration" in failing to ensure the basin plan was lawful with respect to addressing what could be "catastrophic" climate change.

He also found that they failed to act on the best available scientific knowledge when determining how much water should be recovered for the environment across the basin, saying the decision was based on "politics rather than science".

And the MDBA failed to disclose modelling used to make its decisions.

The clear fury behind the recommendations was met with a sedating blanket of nothingness on Thursday, even some bipartisan agreement that, in fact, there was nothing wrong with what had happened, and not all that much even wrong with the Basin Plan.

Now, maybe we should rejoice in some rare bipartisanship, and in politicians saying they would like to read and contemplate the report, rather than just taking cheap political shots.

But against the backdrop of the shocking images — and unanswered questions — left by this summer's mass fish kills in the river system, some sense of urgency might be a little reassuring.

The Darling River at Menindee is blanketed with dead fish again. ( Supplied: Rob Greggory )

Don't just blame the bureaucrats

The Royal Commission's most colourful language may have been directed at the water bureaucrats, but it left no doubt that they were doing the bidding of their political masters.

So the political response on Thursday should have reflected an obligation to take some responsibility for the findings, not just leave the MDBA swinging in the breeze.

But Agriculture Minister David Littleproud emerged to talk about "learnings" and "continuing on this journey":

"Can I put my hand up and say to [Opposition spokesman] Tony Burke, while we didn't always agree, and while we negotiated hard, we believe that it was important that we made our decisions predicated on the science that's been done before, and we predicate our decisions to give certainty to those two million Australians. We provided that," he said. "What comes out of this commission's report is something that is always learnings. We're not afraid to have a look through it."

What the actual …?

Asked by a reporter whether the government would take up the South Australian Premier's call for a meeting of premiers of basin states, Mr Littleproud ventured:

"The reality is, I don't think that's a bad idea. I think we've shown leadership at ministerial level, the basin states and the Commonwealth have shown leadership."

To be fair to Mr Littleproud, the most contentious changes to the plan occurred under his predecessors, including Barnaby Joyce. These changes included a cap on water buybacks.

Mr Burke told the ABC's Anna Henderson on Thursday that a pool of an additional 450GL of water for the environment "was bipartisan until Barnaby Joyce threw it all under a bus".

"Under David Littleproud that has started coming back on the table."

But none of this language suggests any sense of urgency among our politicians, either about the environmental problems in the river system, or anything reassuring for the communities living with uncertainty.

A map of the Murray-Darling Basin in Australia. ( ABC News: Ben Spraggon )

Trust has been shattered

The crucial issue here — beyond the actual complex balancing act of how much water goes to the environment versus how much goes to people and agriculture — is about trust.

Trust in the basin plan, and in the people who administer it, has been shattered.

The Royal Commission says there is a fundamental difference between what the Water Act says needs to happen and the basin plan — a difference which politicians seem to be denying.

And the risk is that all the attention will focus on letting the bureaucracy take the blame, rather than collectively acknowledging that, despite the good intentions which underpinned the original legislation, things aren't quite working out as they should.

Former Commonwealth Environmental Water Holder, David Papps told the ABC's AM program on Friday that there had to be "an honest appraisal of who all the decision makers are and how we fix that".

"If at the end of the day another bureaucrat is taken out and shot, we haven't achieved anything", he said.

That doesn't mean that there aren't issues of an apparently secretive culture at the MDBA that must be addressed.

But the central issue is a very political one: that is, that to build faith in the basin plan, stakeholders must feel that the many issues raised in the Royal Commission report, and the way water is shared out, has been frankly addressed and re-assessed.

Mr Walker has essentially said the plan must be overhauled to bring it into compliance with the Water Act.

That's going to be hard with a state election in NSW and a federal election both imminent and the prospect of changes in government at both levels.

On the other hand, there may never have been a better time for a new start.

Laura Tingle is ABC 7.30's chief political correspondent.