Stephen Bates (Brisbane, Australian Greens) Share this | Hansard source

I move the amendment to the amendment circulated by the member for Fairfax in my name:

That all words after "That" be omitted with a view to substituting the following words:

"The House declines to give the bill a second reading and notes the government is using the cover of the budget to rush through legislation that trashes environment laws instead of passing laws to cut student debt and triple the bulk billing incentive for GPs".

Yet again we have this Labor government rushing through a dirty deal with the coalition. This legislation seeks to trash our environment laws and push our precious native species to extinction. The Australian Conservation Foundation said today that this bill will mean nature is more poorly protected at the end of the Albanese government's three-year term than it was at the start of it. This prime minister came to office with claims that the captain's calls had ended. But today, with this bill, we see the Prime Minister rushing through legislation, all to placate polluting industries and lock in species extinction.

Australia is facing an environmental crisis. We have one of the highest rates of species extinction in the world and ongoing destruction of our natural ecosystems. There is no question about it; our current environmental laws are failing to protect our biodiversity. Despite promises from this government, critical reforms continue to be delayed, all while leaving species and ecosystems vulnerable to further degradation. If you want to halt the extinction crisis then saying, 'We will get to it later. We will do it next time,' is not going to cut it. We must implement stronger enforceable environmental protections as a matter of urgency. But instead, this proposed legislation has sidelined science and sends our wildlife into extinction. It undermines legal protections and has far-reaching consequences for our community and planet. Environment laws are supposed to protect the environment, not greenlight destruction and extinction. Rushing these laws through under the cover of tonight's federal budget without proper scrutiny or consideration is disgusting.

Australia is a country that is rich in biodiversity but poor in its protection. We are home to over 10 per cent of the world's biodiversity with unique species that exist nowhere else on earth. We have already lost multiple native species since European colonisation began, and hundreds more species are at risk of extinction, yet deforestation, habitat destruction and climate change continue largely unchecked due to weak environment laws and poor enforcement.

The Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conversation Act, the EPBC Act, is supposed to be our primary environment law designed to protect these species and ecosystems but, for decades, it's failed to prevent environmental destruction. Loopholes, weak regulation and lack of political backbone from both major parties have allowed industries like fossil fuels and logging to push full steam ahead with projects that harm biodiversity. This bill would limit the ability to challenge fast approvals of harmful projects, making it even harder to protect endangered species and ecosystems from destructive developments. And if passed, this bill could prevent the legal review of past approvals that have contributed to environmental decline such as the expansion of the salmon industry in Tasmania's Macquarie Harbour, which has devastated the critically endangered Maugean skate's habitat.

This Labor government came into power promising to strengthen environmental laws and establish an independent EPA to enforce them. But, of course, these critical reforms have been postponed or canned entirely and instead we have the proposed bill threatening to weaken environmental protections further. In what is expected to be our final sitting of this parliament, instead of working with the Greens and the crossbench to pass laws that will actually help Australians, Labor's working with the coalition to gut our environment laws. This bill could stop the Australian public from being able to demand coal and gas corporations be held accountable when their destructive projects are shown to be destroying nature. There would be no recourse or potential for course correction.

There is nothing in this bill holding back the expansion of fossil fuel projects that will be a disaster for the climate. This bill is deceptively vague in its detail, and there are no explicit provisions excluding coal and gas approvals from this weakening of the environment laws. The government simply does not currently know what environment approvals this bill will apply to, and it certainly has no idea of the true scope to which it may apply. The government has given us merely hours to review this shameful bill. The initial analysis shows that decisions on up to 100 projects, including coal and gas mines, could be impacted.

This bill is setting an unacceptable and destructive precedent to exempt polluting industries and actions from national environment law even when all the available scientific evidence shows those actions will likely send endangered species into extinction. Environment laws are supposed to protect the environment, not provide certainty to industries that they can continue to trash it. It's shameful that the Prime Minister is championing an industry that poisons our waterways and drives ancient wildlife into extinction. This proposed legislation that sidelines science will send the Maugean skate into extinction and likely will have far-reaching consequences way beyond Macquarie Harbour, all in the name of corporate profits.

What this government should be doing is closing the loopholes that allow bypasses of environmental protections and ensuring that all major projects undergo rigorous environmental assessment—strengthening the EPBC, not weakening it. Without urgent action, Australia's extinction crisis will only get worse. The government must fulfil its promise to strengthen environmental protections before more species and ecosystems are lost forever.

Now we have Labor promising they will fix our environment laws in the next term of government, after they promised to fix them in this term of government and now sit here in this chamber weakening them. If you're confused, it's because it's confusing. Australia needs stronger environment laws, not weaker ones. The government must abandon this bill and deliver on its promise to end the extinction crisis.

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