Monique Ryan (Kooyong, Independent) Share this | Hansard source

I rise to speak to this amendment to the EPBC Act. The Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Amendment (Board of Management Functions) Bill 2025 extends the existing arrangements for management of several jointly managed Commonwealth reserves, the Kakadu National Park, Uluru-Kata Tjuta National Park and Booderee National Park—all of which are located on Aboriginal land. These reserves are managed by the Director of National Parks under a lease with Indigenous people and through a board of management with majority traditional owner management representation. Each of those boards of management is currently chaired by a traditional owner. The management plans for these reserves are about to expire, which is why we're addressing it with this amendment to the EPBC Act 1999.

As the minister has said, it's very appropriate that we legislate to continue the critical role of the traditional owners in the decision-making processes around the management of their land. However, the House needs to note that this amendment is necessary only because the Albanese government has not yet addressed the broader reforms to the EPBC Act as it promised in its last term. The current Environmental Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act is failing on all fronts. It does not adequately protect our environment, and its uncertain and unpredictable assessment and decision-making processes are hindering investment. The Clean Energy Investor Group recently reported on major bottlenecks in environmental assessments under the EPBC Act, finding that many projects now wait more than two years for federal decisions—projects which might only take 18 months to build. The uncertainties of these approval processes can mean that there's no reliable pipeline of work for communities or for traineeships and apprenticeships in important and related industries. These bottlenecks are delaying the transmission projects which are required to support renewable energy projects and to facilitate the clean energy transition. These delays in EPBC reform have become the single biggest barrier to timely, environmentally responsible renewable energy development in Australia. This is why, in recent years, in the face of the escalating impacts of climate change and rapid loss of biodiversity, we have seen industry, community and environmental organisations all uniting to call on the Albanese government to deliver this once in a generation opportunity to reshape the laws around our environment and nature as a matter of urgency.

These laws need to enable faster, more efficient and more transparent assessments to improve nature protection. They need to build greater confidence and trust within our communities, including within Indigenous groups, in decision-making around our land, air and waterways. They have to include a real commitment to the protection of our extraordinary cultural heritage, particularly with respect to that of Indigenous Australians, who represent the oldest continuing civilisation on this planet. Meaningful reform of the EPBC Act has to include the establishment of an environmental protection Australia as an independent regulator with power to oversee national environmental laws. It must include national environmental standards with more transparent and reliable data collection to inform community engagement planning, assessments and decisions and to direct adequate resources to agencies to enable faster, more transparent decision-making and monitoring.

The Commonwealth environment protection framework must take an integrated approach to the environment. The matters of national environmental significance listed under the EPBC Act currently include land and water. They must be expanded to include air.

The air we breathe affects every aspect of our health, our quality of life and our environment. The new EPBC Act has to establish air quality standards to protect public health, to prevent environmental degradation and to regulate emissions of hazardous air pollutants. The appalling revelations this week that huge quantities of hazardous methane have been leaking from a huge storage tank very close to Darwin for 20 years is all the demonstration that we need that Australia's environmental protections are failing.

The likely impact on human health and the surrounding environment of this and other forms of air pollution by gas fracking and storage in the Northern Territory and other sites around Australia is a deeply serious concern. Methane is a volatile organic compound. Volatile organic compounds are associated with a range of health problems. They irritate the mucous membranes of the eyes, nose, throat and lungs, leading to exacerbations of lung disease like asthma and COPD. Long-term exposure to VOCs causes injury to the liver and to the kidneys. It increases the risk of cardiovascular disease and of cancer. Methane is the major precursor of ground level ozone, which we generally refer to as smog, which is a toxic air pollutant that causes chronic irritation of the lungs. Just this week in the Medical Journal of Australia, researchers have described the significant public health impacts of mining in this country. They found that exposure to agents released during mining operations such as cadmium, iron, manganese, zinc, arsenic and lead are associated with neoplastic—that's cancer—and non-neoplastic diseases in adults and children. Mining of lead is specifically associated with a decrease in fertility for men and with intellectual disability and impaired immune function for children.

Asbestos mining is associated with higher morbidity and mortality due to respiratory and non-respiratory cancers. Recent analyses have a higher risk of severe respiratory and circulatory diseases in communities which are proximate to coalmines. Children and women in mining regions are especially vulnerable, with a higher risk of perinatal conditions and of respiratory, blood and immune diseases. Unconventional gas extraction, or fracking, is associated with a higher risk of hospitalisation of all courses and with circulatory, respiratory, blood and immune diseases—again, particularly affecting children.

And, as a potent greenhouse gas, methane acts to speed up climate change, which results in an increase in extreme weather events, decreased agricultural productivity and an increase in the global burden of disease. Climate change will increase the pressure on air quality. Bushfires like those in 2019-20 expose huge areas of Australia to dangerous levels of smoke, which has a really significant impact on the air that we breathe. It was estimated that we lost 445 Australians to smoke related lung injury in that black summer alone. A warming climate will also lead to increased smog in summer. Droughts will lead to dust storms.

Emissions and air pollution, smog and dust don't respect lines and borders on maps. They affect us all. Santos's addition of thousands of tonnes of the most damaging of all greenhouse gases to our atmosphere, unmeasured, unreported and unregulated is an immediate and emergent proof of the need for supervision and enforcement of air quality standards at a national level. The environmental impacts of greenhouse gas induced climate change are devastating. The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change has warned that, in the near term, forests and terrestrial ecosystems, fresh water, coastal coral reefs, kelp and seagrass, and marine ecosystems are all at high or very high risk of biodiversity loss and that continued and accelerating sea level rises will submerge low-lying coastal ecosystems, with devastating implications for our Pacific neighbours. Our coral reefs, our wetlands, our bushland and our unique wildlife are at risk. We cannot have meaningful protections for our environment if we do not include safeguards for air quality.

The world is watching. We've put our hand up for COP31, and it is a wonderful opportunity for us to demonstrate real commitment to global climate leadership and our value and strength in the region. But meaningful reform of our environmental legislation—to protect our land, sea and air—is vital to our international reputation, as well as to our national heritage. To that end, I commend the bill to the House.

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