* NSW Premier Dominic Perrottet:

"We should have done things better, mistakes were made, and a lot of those mistakes were structural mistakes that can be rectified and improved."

"The power of nature to swamp the beautiful Northern Rivers was devastating, and that will be matched by our commitment and dedication to rebuild and re-create our communities for the future."

"For some, this report will be hard reading, I accept that, but we cannot keep doing things the same way that we've done in the past, we need to do things differently."

"I will keep coming back again, until we implement all of these recommendations, until every single person in the Northern Rivers is back in a home. This will take time, but as far as I'm concerned as premier, this is the top priority for our government."

* NSW Deputy Premier Paul Toole:

"We know that emergency services, we know that the community, they tried their best but we need to rethink the way in which we respond to natural disasters, and that's why this report is making a number of recommendations that can better support communities and better support our response."

* Former NSW police commissioner Mick Fuller:

"These (28 recommendations) aren't in the weeds about low-level issues. Professor O'Kane and I were keen to keep the recommendations down, but look for structural change."

"The RFS over the last 20 years has grown into a full-time organisation and they are campaigners. We've seen what they've done through the bushfires, their ability to plan and use intelligence is well above even some of the other permanent agencies. To grow that in the SES would take years and years and years."

* Former NSW chief scientist Professor Mary O'Kane:

"One of things we don't know enough (is) how much of this was climate change?"

"What was unusual was the intensity of the rain and the fact that the rain stalled and unfortunately stalled right over Lismore, and we saw this again in the more recent floods in the Hawkesbury-Nepean, so this is a phenomenon that is probably, could be, there's more work to be done, climate change, but certainly something that we've got to be on the lookout for."

"There's a lot here about the planning system and about the needs for improvements to deal with disasters and particularly floods."

"One very important aspect of the environment is we say that the floodplain should be recognised as assets, but not assets that we live on."

* Lismore MP Janelle Saffin:

"When the premier got the report, I did approach him and say 'Premier, please release the report here'. We consider it our report, one of our experience, and we own it, yes the government will own the response of course and we hope the funding that comes with it, but we feel that it came from our experience."

"The recommendations speak to our experience, they speak to our community, and also, the premier and deputy premier made it clear that they've accepted those recommendations. We need to see those recommendations implemented."

Australian Associated Press