Tom French (Moore, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

I rise in strong support of the Environment Protection Reform Bill 2025 and the six associated bills. This is a once-in-a-generation opportunity to fix laws that are failing the environment, our economy and our communities. These bills are about balance and progress—protecting the natural heritage that defines us as Australians while enabling the clean energy industries, homes and infrastructure our nation desperately needs. The truth is simple: the environment and the economy are not at odds. If we get this right, they grow together—cleaner energy, stronger regions, more jobs and a healthier planet.

Labor has always been the party of the environment—as the member for Bennelong said, from saving the Franklin River and protecting the Daintree and Kakadu to building the world's largest network of marine parks and leading the national effort to tackle climate change. Today, Labor is leading once again, modernising our environmental laws to meet the urgency of the climate crisis and seize the opportunities of the clean energy transition.

The current Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act is not delivering. Professor Graeme Samuel's independent review said it plainly: our laws are failing the environment, business and the community. Five years after that review was handed to the then environment minister, now the Leader of the Opposition, the environment is still in decline and major projects still take too long to get approval. That's why these reforms matter. They're about ensuring our environmental protections actually protect and our approval system actually works.

These bills deliver on the three pillars recommended by the Samuel review: stronger environmental protection and restoration; more efficient and robust project assessments; and greater accountability and transparency in decision-making. It's a balanced, pragmatic package—better for business, better for the environment and better for the Australian people. We can't build a future made in Australia on a foundation of environmental decline. Our unique species and landscapes, from Ningaloo to the Great Barrier Reef, are irreplaceable.

This bill introduces national environmental standards, legally enforceable benchmarks setting out in plain language what must be protected and what cannot be lost. Those standards will cover matters of national environmental significance, offsets, First Nations engagement and data transparency, providing clarity for investors and certainty for communities. A key safeguard is the 'no regression' clause. Future governments cannot weaken these standards without improving environmental outcomes. That's an enduring legacy. This bill also defines unacceptable impacts, creating clear, up-front criteria for what simply cannot be approved, because some things, once destroyed, are gone forever.

Protection statements will ensure that decision-makers know exactly what they must consider when assessing risk to threatened species and ecological communities, cutting ambiguity and strengthening protection. For those who break the rules, penalties will be tougher, linking fines to the value of any illegal gain so no-one can treat environmental harm as just another cost of doing business. If you damage our shared natural heritage, you will pay for it properly. Most importantly, this bill replaces the weak notion of 'no net loss' with a higher bar: net gain. Every approved project must leave the environment better than before. That's a fundamental shift from merely avoiding damage to actively delivering restoration.

Through the new restoration contributions network, proponents can either deliver their own offsets or contribute to a national restoration fund that supports large-scale strategic recovery—less piecemeal rehabilitation and more genuine renewal. When we restore landscapes, we restore confidence. If we want to hit 82 per cent renewable electricity by 2030, we need environmental laws that are strong and streamlined. Right now, too many renewable and critical minerals projects are stuck in duplication between Commonwealth and state systems. This bill fixes that, reducing duplication by accrediting state and territory systems that meet our new national standards and maintaining protection while cutting red tape.

A new streamlined assessment pathway will fast-track quality proposals, reducing average assessment timeframes from 70 days to as little as 50 and saving the economy up to $7 billion a year, because time is money and delay is costing jobs, investment and progress towards our renewable targets. We'll also make bioregional planning a cornerstone of the system, mapping regions to identify both development zones and conservation zones. Projects in development zones can proceed with certainty about what's required. Those in conservation zones face a clear no. That gives industry clarity, gives communities confidence and gives ecosystems breathing space. Strategic assessments will complement this approach, allowing governments and proponents to plan across whole landscapes rather than project by project. This is smarter regulation—stronger at the environmental level and simpler at the project level.

The bill also strengthens the National Interest Framework, creating a transparent, limited mechanism if the project is of demonstrable national interest, such as emergency infrastructure or essential renewable transmission, to proceed with published reasons and conditions. It also mandates emissions disclosure. Proponents must report their scope 1 and scope 2 emissions and show how they'll manage them, aligning environmental approvals with the safeguard mechanism and national climate goals. That means every major project must be part of the decarbonisation story, not an obstacle to it. Australia is in the midst of an energy transformation unlike anything since the industrial age. The global shift to renewables is not a choice between the environment and prosperity; it is prosperity.

As of this month, our government has approved 111 renewable energy projects, generating enough electricity to power more than 13 million homes; 69 are already producing clean power, 15 provide grid-scale storage and 29 more, including four major hydrogen hubs, are building the backbone of a renewable energy superpower. In October, half of all electricity in the national grid came from renewable sources, the highest monthly share on record. Coal generation has fallen to 46 per cent, and renewable output is up by around 30 per cent since Labor came to government. That's progress, powered by the Capacity Investment Scheme, Rewiring the Nation, and the Cheaper Home Batteries Program.

But, to keep that momentum, we need planning laws that move as quickly as our ambition. If we don't pass these reforms we'll slow down the renewable rollout, the transmission lines, windfarms and community batteries already cutting across regional Australia. This bill clears the path, with faster approvals, better coordination and stronger investor confidence to build here in Australia. It replaces an outdated system that too often said, 'No, because it's hard' with one that says, 'Yes, if it's responsible.' That distinction matters, because the climate crisis doesn't wait for paperwork. We need transmission lines that connect regions, solar farms that power industry, and wind and battery projects that stabilise the grid.

The world is moving fast. Investors are voting with their capital. Communities are demanding action. Labor's reforms make sure Australia can lead, delivering renewable jobs, regional development and secure, affordable power to households and businesses. This bill gives the renewables sector the certainty it's been asking for: clear standards, faster time lines and integrity in decision-making. That's how we build confidence and momentum in the clean energy transition. Strong laws work only if Australians trust them.

That's why this bill delivers the third pillar: accountability and transparency. It establishes the National Environmental Protection Agency, our first truly independent national environmental regulator. The EPA will consolidate regulatory functions, ensure compliance and enforcement, and have the power to issue environmental protection orders when harm is imminent. For the first time, Australia will have an independent watchdog to hold rule breakers to account and restore public confidence. The EPA won't duplicate state agencies; it will complement them, setting consistent national standards and ensuring that accredited processes live up to them. Alongside it, we'll establish Environment Information Australia, a statutory body to improve the quality and accessibility of environmental data, because we can't manage what we don't measure. High-quality data means better decisions for government, businesses and communities alike. It means transparent, state-of-the-environment reporting and an end to the data gaps that have undermined trust. Together, the EPA and EIA will make our environmental system not only stronger but smarter.

The bill also deepens First Nations involvement in decision-making, embedding the Indigenous Advisory Committee at the heart of environmental governance. It requires consultation with First Nations peoples in developing standards and ensures that cultural knowledge informs species listing and conservation planning, because caring for country has always been about partnership—learning from the world's oldest continuous culture to protect Australia's oldest living landscapes.

These reforms also provide certainty for industry, reducing duplication, speeding up approvals and creating a level playing field that rewards responsible operators. When the rules are clear and consistent, investment follows. That means more renewable projects, more local manufacturing and more jobs, particularly in regional Australia. It means faster delivery of housing and infrastructure projects that communities desperately need. And it means that businesses can plan with confidence, knowing that their proposals will be assessed on transparent criteria, not politics or delay.

Environmental groups support this reform, because it strengthens protection. Industry supports it, because it streamlines approvals. That's the definition of balance, and it's exactly what this parliament should deliver. We've talked about reform for a decade. We've had review after review, report after report, while our natural environment keeps declining and the approvals pipeline keeps clogging. Every day we delay, another threatened species edges closer to extinction and another renewable project that could lower bills and emissions sits waiting. The Samuel review laid out the blueprint. This bill delivers it.

Now the choice belongs to this parliament: will we act in the national interest or let another five years pass while our laws fail both nature and the economy? I say to the opposition: you were handed the Samuel review five years ago and did nothing. Now is your chance to fix what you broke. Will you really vote against the faster approvals that industry has been calling for and against a system that cuts red tape and boosts productivity? And, to the Greens, will you oppose stronger standards, tougher penalties and the new EPA you've long demanded just to make a political point? Australians are tired of ideological gridlock. They want progress, not pointscoring. They want us to get on with it. Our door is open to anyone from any party who wants to protect the environment and deliver the projects Australia needs.

These reforms will unlock billions in clean energy investment, much of it flowing into regional communities. They fast-track transmission projects under Rewiring the Nation, create skilled jobs for electricians, engineers and apprentices, and open new opportunities for regional manufacturing through Future Made in Australia. They'll ensure environmental approvals support housing construction and renewable supply chains, the twin foundations of sustainable growth. They'll restore confidence in a system that too often divided Australians between environmental protection and economic development. In truth, those goals were never in conflict. Healthy landscapes sustain agriculture, tourism and regional economies. Clean energy underpins competitiveness and cost-of-living relief. This bill unites these priorities, protecting what makes Australia special while powering what makes Australia strong.

These reforms are about responsibility to future generations and the country we love. My electorate, like many others, is home to people who want practical action on climate and the environment, not slogans. They want to know that the wind farms on our horizon, the solar panels on our roofs and the nature reserves in our suburbs all form part of a coherent national plan. They want a government that can walk and chew gum, protecting the bush and building the future at the same time. That's what this bill does. It brings together environmental integrity, economic growth and climate responsibility into one clear framework. It restores trust that environmental decisions will be made on evidence, not ideology, and ensures that we decarbonise and also regenerate.

Australia's environment is one of our greatest national assets. It deserves laws that are modern, effective and capable of meeting the challenges this century. This bill strengthens protections, streamlines approvals and ensures accountability, all while accelerating the clean energy transformation. We can get this done to deliver on what the Australian people sent us here to do. Every day we delay, our environment degrades further, and every day we delay is one we could be building the renewable energy and housing our future demands. I commend the bill to the House.

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