Water flows to parched New South Wales wetlands where an urgent rescue mission to save dying wildlife unfolded are a step closer to resuming after legislation passed the state parliament’s upper house. The water minister, Rose Jackson, told the parliament on Thursday night the impact of a halt to environmental flows in the internationally significant Gwydir region had been “devastating” as she introduced legislative amendments she said would allow flows to resume. It came after NSW experienced its second driest April on record. A former senior environmental bureaucrat called for an investigation into separate revelations of repeated delays of environmental watering in favour of farming by the NSW environment and water department. WaterNSW stopped flows to the Gwydir region in March after concerns were raised about flooding of private land.…