Graham Perrett (Moreton, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

I thought he was going to accuse me of 'jumping the shark' with my lines there, Mr Deputy Speaker. Obviously, this is all about the supertrawler, but I just wanted to give a bit of context. That is why I am proud to be on this side of the House: we are committed to protecting our ocean environments through the world's largest network of marine reserves and also by having legislation to respond to this supertrawler. That is a lesson in the history of the fishing industry as well. These reserves, which seem to be largely opposed by the LNP members of Queensland, will protect some of Australia's most precious ocean ecosystems—for the last time in the history of humanity that we can do this. We have done so on land. Admittedly there have been some retrograde steps, particularly in Queensland, as now we have shooting and fishing and motorbikes and all sorts of things going back into national parks. How that can be preserving things for the future, I have no idea. It is back to the old Joe Bjelke-Petersen days—the attitude to sandmining on Fraser Island and the like. How Premier Newman, whose father fought to protect Fraser Island, can oversee a government that steps in and wrecks some of our national parks is beyond me.

I am particularly passionate about the Coral Sea. It is globally recognised as an extremely important marine region, both because of its biodiversity and because of its World War II history. I was up in the Solomon Islands recently. I was able to go to some of the battle sites, to Alligator Creek, which is famous, especially if you have seen the HBO series The Pacific. Minister Clare wrote an article about Milne Bay and some of the battles there. This is a unique part of the world that we should be preserving. International studies have highlighted how the Coral Sea is one of the last remaining areas of the world's oceans where large-scale and biologically rich ecosystems remain relatively intact. Its reef systems support tropical ecosystems rich in hard and soft corals, sponges, algae, fish communities—such as clownfish, like Nemo, if you have seen the movie—and other sea creatures. Many globally threatened corals and other marine animals are known to live there. Many species are known to occur only there—nowhere else in the world. That is why it is so important that we should be grasping this opportunity for our generation and this parliament. Instead, we have the politics.

As stated earlier, I think the opposition's position is a little bit flaky. One day they want to stop the trawlers but they are simultaneously opposed to protecting the Coral Sea and other marine reserve areas. I note, being married to a North Queenslander, that the Coral Sea is a critical habitat for black marlin, which is important for tourism, because they undergo seasonal movements through the Queensland plateau area. It also has important nesting and foraging sites for a wide range of seabirds. The new marine reserves take the overall size of the Commonwealth marine reserves network to 3.1 million square kilometres, which would be the largest represented network of marine protected areas in the world. Those in the 43rd Parliament could sit back on our rocking chairs in the future and say, 'We did that.' I am hopeful that everyone in this chamber would want to be on the right side of this opportunity in history.

Together the Great Barrier Reef Marine Park and the Coral Sea, which abut each other, will become the largest adjoining marine protected area in the world, covering 1.3 million square kilometres. Unfortunately, the day after the Newman government was elected, almost the first thing that Deputy Premier Seeney—good old National Party roots—said was that he wanted to decrease the size of the Great Barrier Reef Marine Park. Unbelievable! He was particularly focused on the Gladstone Harbour area. I looked for the member for Flynn's speech to see if he stood up and said, 'We actually think pretty highly of the Great Barrier Reef Marine Park.' It is pretty iconic. Most people in the world have heard of the Great Barrier Reef at some stage or have seen it in movies and the like. The member for Flynn, on this topic, was totally silent.

Obviously, whenever we are going to make decisions about fishing there will be some impact on local jobs and perhaps on some of the people who love to fish. As I said, the marine parks are 400 kilometres offshore, but it will have some impact. For those fishermen—just like the Howard government—the Gillard Labor government will be delivering an adjustment package. We have already had a commitment of $100 million, which will be worked through on a case-by-case basis to help the fishers who need it. So, for those people who read those fantasy emails put out by Dean Logan—they are almost like a fantasy novel—what he is suggesting to people is a total red herring. Too often, responsible, sensible people have swallowed this line. The Cairns Regional Council responded to his suggestions and said, 'This is going to have a great impact on the Cairns economy.' The reality is that Cairns is doing it a bit tough at the moment. Between the high dollar, the GFC, tourism and a few other things, Cairns is doing it tough. The report the Cairns council relied on was riddled with errors and inaccurate assertions. ABARES, which has empirical data, found that commercial fishing makes up only two per cent of the Cairns economy and the city will be able to adjust. In fact, there will be opportunities to benefit if we have some Coral Sea protections. Cairns could become a centre for managing the marine reserves. The $50 million national management budget will flow through the Cairns economy over the next few years and there will be some great opportunities.

I would suggest that people like those in the Cairns Regional Council should read the article by Tim Winton. I think it is available if you google it. Tim Winton is the famous Australian author of Cloudstreet, Breath and other books that often deal with the Western Australian marine environment. He wrote a wonderful article dealing with this. It is basically a transcript of the speech he gave here at Parliament House a few weeks back.

The bill currently before the House will go one step further to protect our marine life. To borrow a phrase from my learned colleague the member for Fremantle, who called this supertrawler the 'Godzilla of the sea', this will be a great outcome. It is incumbent on this parliament to provide legislation that enables us as a nation to stay out in front and give proper consideration to proposals about new technologies and techniques.

At the time the Commonwealth Fisheries Management Act came into force in 1991, supertrawlers the size of the Abel Tasman were not on the horizon. As the second-largest trawler in the world it has a storage capacity around four times that of other fishing operations in Australia, and there is a large amount of uncertainty as to what the size and capacity difference means in terms of impacts on the environment. As Minister Burke pointed out, the big difference is that it can stay out at sea because it chills the catch. That is not something that we had considered previously.

Our fisheries and marine management is world class. People from around the globe look to us for the lessons we have learnt. Nevertheless, we must ensure that we are not asking our fisheries managers or environmental assessors to enforce out-of-date legislation that is not keeping up with significant changes in fishing practices or environmental conditions and vessels such as the Abel Tasman. This bill will keep fisheries management mechanisms at pace with the changing industry. The effect of a rushed decision now may have unacceptable and unintended consequences for threatened or endangered species for which we are accountable to future generations.

If I wanted to talk about protecting our environment I could talk about the cuts that Campbell Newman has made to the Department of Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry and the 220 jobs cut from the Department of Environment and Heritage Protection, which will have a significant impact, but I do not have time. (Time expired)

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