Ted O'Brien (Fairfax, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Climate Change and Energy) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

For a number of reasons, I welcome the opportunity to speak on the Nature Repair Market Bill 2023, and the Nature Repair Market (Consequential Amendments) Bill 2023. Foremost among those reasons is that, with a few exceptions, to which I'll return shortly, this legislation is clearly based on work that was undertaken by the coalition when we were in government.

Early last year, the coalition brought to the parliament the Agriculture Biodiversity Stewardship Market Bill 2022. That followed considerable consultation with a wide variety of individuals and groups, including farmers, environmental groups, industry, the finance sector, Indigenous Australians and representatives of the states and territories. As minister for agriculture at the time, the member for Maranoa told the House on 9 February 2022 that the content of that bill was predominantly designed to give greater recognition to the role played by farmers across Australia in cultivating and maintaining healthy ecosystems across approximately 60 per cent of the country's land mass. It was a well-crafted bill that sought to right the wrong of those farmers' stewardship of their land not being adequately honoured.

It did this by seeking to give expression to a biodiversity stewardship market that rewarded landholders financially who had restored, protected and enhanced their local environment. It's not entirely apparent why the Labor Party thought it was necessary to spend around 10 months and something in the order of $11 million to largely replicate that work which had already been undertaken by the coalition government. It also begs the question of why Labor has brazenly claimed, as they have done on a number of occasions, that their legislation is a world first when, in truth, the legislation before us today is not even an Australian first.

It's also worth adding that long before the Albanese government arrived on the scene policymakers in a number of other parts of the globe had also been working towards establishing these kinds of markets. For the coalition's part, we have believed for some time now in the potential for a voluntary biodiversity market in Australia. We have believed there may be merit and value to such a market, as it can, potentially, offer new financial incentives for environmental conservation and restoration.

We therefore welcome the general thrust of Labor's approach, which is now to try to introduce such a market from the second half of 2024. And we commend them on adopting a continuation of our general approach and, in effect, for agreeing that the former coalition government's approach was correct. However, it needs to be stressed that there are a number of stark and consequential contrasts between the legislation of the former coalition government and that legislation of Labor, which is before the House.

The most critical of those differences is Labor's decision to extend the remit of the market beyond purely agricultural land. By widening the market to, potentially, cover all land tenure and water, they're almost inevitably going to bring more stakeholders and many different kinds of scenarios into the marketplace. In the early days, at the very least, that's likely to lead to confusion, particularly for first-time entrants into a biodiversity market and also for anyone trying to determine who's specific consent will be needed, in each case, for projects to proceed. Just like with their recent changes to the safeguard mechanism, this risks making government an active player in the market, with all the dubious and unintended consequences that that entails.

These bills allow potential participants in the market to define and apply their own idiosyncratic methodologies for their projects. That's probably going to take on a life of its own and won't be likely to have the same integrity and controls as our proposed scheme did. The coalition's scheme was based strictly on the application to potential projects of the carbon plus biodiversity and enhancing remnant vegetation assessment models, on which we work in collaboration with the ANU.

Based on our experience, we have serious reservations about it opening up the parameters and methodologies for which projects can be assessed and certificates can be traded. Further, there also remains uncertainty about what criteria and evidence will be used in relation to: the exclusion of projects; the precise role of a native title body corporate and, indeed, how native title considerations will be made more broadly; what standards or controls will exist, in relation to biodiversity assessment instruments; and to what extent changes made to offset regimes in other areas of Albanese government laws, regulations and policies might or might not apply here.

It is therefore appropriate that the bills have been referred to the Senate Environment and Communications Committee. A number of technical aspects of the Nature Repair Market Bill 2023 also require more detailed scrutiny. We hope that the committee will be adequately informed of the reasoning behind the changes being proposed in these bills. We also hope that the committee process highlights what both the coalition and Labor have gotten right and, indeed, how we might be able to improve the operation of the market even further, especially in laying the groundwork for government spending on environmental measures being much better targeted.

We know that groups like the Greens think money grows on trees and that they want billions of extra dollars to be spent by governments—and, therefore, by taxpayers—on their favourite conservation and environmental projects long into the future. But, clearly, it's an impossible ask. What makes things even harder for future governments are the various dirty deals that can be done between the Greens and the Labor Party, such deals that have the effect of putting the budget under more and more pressure. In light of such constraints, there is an imperative to try to foster and encourage more private sector involvement and better recognition of responsible private landholders' actions.

In closing, I think anyone closely following this debate will not be surprised to see the coalition reserve our final position on these bills until after the Senate committee process concludes. It may also be that we seek to encourage the government to make changes to the bills or that we seek to make some amendments of our own when the bills reach the Senate. In principle, at this point, and in keeping with all the work we have previously done in this area, the coalition cannot support the passage of either of these bills. There are too many gaps. There is too much missing detail. Accordingly, there are too many concerns from a number of key stakeholders for the bills to receive our endorsement.

Anne Stanley (Werriwa, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise to make my contribution to the Nature Repair Market Bill 2023 and the Nature Repair Market (Consequential Amendments) Bill 2023. This bill will deliver on the Albanese government's commitment not just to halt the decline of Australia's environment but to turn it around and to begin the complex and difficult job of repairing our natural environment.

Unfortunately, we know the task before us is vast. The 2021 State of the environment report highlighted the dire state that Australia's unique ecosystem is in and the threats that it faces, especially from the increasing impacts of climate change. Australia has lost more mammals than any other continent, and we continue to have one of the highest rates of extinction in the world. There are now 1,918 animal and plant species listed as threatened. That's an increase of 202, or eight per cent, since 2016.

We now have more invasive and foreign plant species than native species. Worse still, the impact of the 2020 Black Summer bushfires, which is estimated to have killed between one and three billion animals, will take years to fully account for, and the state of our environment may be even worse than we think. In our waters, reefs around the country are in poor condition, with the Great Barrier Reef experiencing mass coral bleaching in 2017, 2020, and 2022. We have waterways and rivers in incredibly poor condition, with native fish populations in decline and mass fish killings exacerbating the issue. The status quo is clearly not working, and more must be done.

The Albanese government has prioritised our environment, and, under the Minister for the Environment and Water, we know how important it is. The Albanese government has already committed to protecting 30 per cent of Australia's land and water to bring us in line with global efforts. In the October budget, we invested $1.8 billion in our environment, including a record $1.2 billion for the Great Barrier Reef and funding to implement the Threatened Species Action Plan.

This bill is the next step in protecting Australian's ecosystem. It will connect investment with those groups and people on the ground to put plans in place to make real improvement and support the environment. Maintenance is not the answer to improve the situation. We need to actively repair the damage already done so that species can return and thrive. Working together with First Nations peoples and groups who know the land better than anybody else will be part of the positive path for improvement. The nature repair market will promote and enable prior consent for projects in the lands and the waters of First Nations people, as well as working with them to design projects that reflect the knowledge and connection to country they've had for thousands of years.

The focus of this market will be to encourage landholders, whether they be farmers, government entities, private businesses, conservation groups or First Nations people, to undertake projects that will repair and protect our environment, generating a tradable certificate that can be then sold to philanthropists and businesses. This will create economic opportunities for First Nations people, who have vast and unique knowledge about caring for our environment, and for farmers who understand their land. We know businesses are increasingly looking for ways to demonstrate their environmental credentials, as shareholders and everyday Australians alike and market forces require further action to protect our unique Australian environment.

A recent report by PricewaterhouseCoopers estimated the market for biodiversity in Australia could unlock $137 billion in financial flows by 2050. That is money protecting rare habitats for endangered species, removing invasive species, improving water quality, reviving nature corridors so that animals can travel and for planting a mix of local native flora. It creates an entirely new income stream and employment pathways for regional Australians and allows businesses to invest in our environment. The fact that Australia has over half a million different species means that there is no one-size-fits-all approach and the types of projects that could be undertaken are incalculable and incredibly complex. The purpose of the bill is to make it as flexible as possible for all parties while also creating a well-regulated market.

The Albanese government is aware of the integrity issues that surrounded carbon credits, and with these biodiversity credits running alongside them, we are making sure there is confidence in these systems. That's why the government has appointed an independent panel to review carbon credits and has accepted in principle the 16 recommendations to strengthen the carbon credit system. The lessons learnt from the carbon market and the review have informed the development of these biodiversity credits. It is vital that these projects and the certificates issued are held to the highest integrity and transparency standards, as well as to the best available science, so that our environment can get the best possible outcome. It is fundamental in providing the certainty and confidence that investors need to participate in this new market.

A key integrity measure will be the establishment of an independent expert committee that will be responsible for ensuring projects deliver high-quality, nature-positive outcomes and that will provide advice to the minister. It will be a committee with five to six experts with substantial knowledge and experience in areas including agriculture, science, environmental markets, land management, economics and Indigenous knowledge. The advice of the independent committee will be made public to ensure a high level of transparency between government, businesses and all Australians. Additionally, the certificates will be issued through the Clean Energy Regulator, an independent statutory authority that will monitor and publish information about projects on a public register. This will allow citizens to publicly track projects, ensuring an extra layer of scrutiny in addition to the oversight of the regulator and the parliament. Australians expect these certificates to represent actual investments and the restoration of our environment, and the department will work with the ACCC and ASIC to ensure that they are not victims of greenwashing claims.

Australians also expect that this market is not used solely to offset the destruction of habitats elsewhere. The legislation we are debating today commits to offsets being the last resort. The government is already designing and consulting on new national standards for matters of national environmental significance and environmental offsets. These new standards, which will be legislated under the new nature-positive laws, will strength biodiversity offsets and ensure that they no longer rely on averted loss but on protecting and restoring ecosystems, providing a nature-positive outcome. Projects under this scheme will not be used as offsets unless they meet the new standards. These measures are another way the Albanese government is ensuring certainty, confidence and transparency in the new market.

The nature repair market is one piece in the incredibly complex puzzle required to repair and protect our environment after its neglect for far too long. This legislation is the first of its kind in the world. To make the difference the environment needs to improve, it must be done correctly. The Albanese government is committed to public investment and effective national environmental laws, but we must use every available option to help repair the damage already done. The nature repair market will work alongside public investment in our environment and will not replace it.

The Minister for the Environment and Water has been working to ensure that there has been consultation with stakeholders from across the country and that strong transparency and accountability measures will be included. I thank and recognise the minister for her work on this legislation. Creating a market that is the first of its kind is a difficult task, but we owe it to future generations, our environment and ourselves to do whatever is necessary to put us on a path to a nature-positive future. It is time that we not only protected our natural environment but repaired it for future generations. I commend the bill to the House.

Kate Chaney (Curtin, Independent) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The State of the environment report released last year was a huge wake-up call for so many of us who knew that our environment and nature were degrading but didn't realise the extent of the crisis. There's been a lot of focus on decarbonisation in recent years. Biodiversity has been the poor cousin, despite the fact that, as Ross Garnaut told me, we only have one scalable technology that can pull carbon out of the air; it's called the tree.

The South West of WA is one of the 25 original global hotspots for wildlife and plants and the first one identified in Australia. In fact, about half of south-west WA's 8,000 species are found nowhere else. Overlaid with this is the fact that WA has one of the highest extinction rates in the world. So it's no surprise there are so many people in my community who care so much about restoring and protecting biodiversity.

Australia has signed up to the United Nations Convention on Biological Diversity, which commits us to protecting and restoring 30 per cent of the land for nature by 2030. This means 30 per cent of every kind of habitat. It can't just be deserts and salt lakes, for example. And suddenly that's only seven years away. This urgent environmental crisis requires money, resources and planning. It requires a government-led, holistic response to try and preserve and rebuild all we have lost and are still losing.

To be really clear, this bill, the Nature Repair Market Bill 2023, is not that response. This bill is a small piece of the puzzle. It sets up a framework for a new nature repair market so the private sector can voluntarily participate in nature repair. It has limited detail, and we're told that the critical detail will be developed in later standards, rules and methodologies. It's not a bad idea, but despite its good intentions I have some real concerns about it. At a high level, my concerns are in three areas: timing, purpose and the appropriateness of a market mechanism.

My first concern is in relation to timing. This scheme should not be a substitute for strong legislative protection for biodiversity. The Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act is the main mechanism for protecting nature. It's currently being reviewed, and significant once-in-a-generation changes are anticipated. Many in my community and across Australia are waiting with bated breath to see the new EPBC Act. Under the EPBC Act, we need legally enforceable standards of national environmental significance and a national environmental protection agency. Any trading of nature-positive certificates should complement the standards established under the EPBC Act. A national EPA would be better positioned to regulate a nature repair market and ensure it's delivering on its objects. For this reason, it would make much more sense to amend the EPBC Act first, implementing the Samuel and Chubb recommendations in full, and then create a complementary nature repair market. So this is a bit 'cart before the horse'.

My second fundamental issue with this bill is its object. Its stated object is 'to promote the enhancement or protection of biodiversity in native species in Australia'. At the very least, this needs to be changed to 'and'. We need to promote protection and also promote enhancement. We have to prevent further damage and make good on damage already done to the extent that it's possible. We must set a fixed baseline, not a trajectory of decline, and define 'nature positive' as an improvement, not slightly better than the terrible decline we're expecting.

This fundamental difference shows up in one big question about the bill: the extent to which its longer-term purpose is to set up a market for offsets. It has all the hallmarks of a future offset mechanism. The difference between offsets and credits is that offsets are a specific response to the destruction of nature and should only be used when all other mitigation efforts are exhausted. Voluntary credits make something better than it would otherwise be, without there being commensurate damage. Offsets are hard enough to make work in a carbon market, with a relatively simple concept of emitting gas and avoiding emitting gas. But a nature market is so much more complex that the concept of offsetting damage to koala habitat by improving frog habitat makes very little sense.

The New South Wales Biodiversity Offsets Scheme is referred to as leading practice in Australia, but a recent Audit Office of NSW assessment found significant flaws in terms of integrity, strategy, transparency, sustainability, implementation and delivery of gains. The Samuel review said immediate changes are required to the Commonwealth environmental offsets policy to ensure that offsets don't contribute to environmental decline. We currently assume that this will be addressed in the EPBC Act, which reinforces the timing issue that I've already raised. If the NRM is to be used for offsets, it will need to be based on strong national standards and create a clear hierarchy to ensure it drives changed behaviour, rather than creating an expectation that you can just pay your way out of environmental damage. I'll be supporting any amendments that make it clearer in this legislation that the current purpose is voluntary credits rather than offsets.

My third fundamental concern is whether or not a market mechanism is in fact suitable for efficient and effective outcomes on nature repair. In principle, I'm supportive of markets as an efficient way to deliver outcomes. Markets can achieve the lowest-cost solutions, access new capital and drive innovation through experimentation. Market participants can develop and implement solutions that are beyond the innovative capacity of the state. There are some environmental markets that already work with some degree of effectiveness, including for water and carbon. But characteristics of the proposed nature repair market make it a bit different and will require very sophisticated structuring to ensure that it delivers on its objects. Turning a million-dimensional object, the biodiversity of Australia, into a market is really hard.

There are commonly accepted characteristics of effective markets, and each of them raises issues for the nature repair market. The basic characteristics of an effective market are well-defined and assignable property rights; a sufficient number of sellers and buyers to enable a market price to develop; equitable access to information, and trust among buyers and sellers; ease of entry and exit; and effective regulation. I want to go through these in turn and look at whether these characteristics exist in the proposed nature repair market, the potential consequences of them being a bit shaky, and what we need to do to deliver on the objects.

Firstly: well-defined and assignable property rights. The framework proposed creates a new type of property right called a biodiversity certificate. Biodiversity certificates will be issued on a project basis, with impacts measured based on an accepted methodology and a forecast counterfactual—for example, a quantified increase in the number of a specific species on a property compared with a no-intervention approach. The carbon market, by comparison, seems simple: one unit of carbon will always equal one unit of carbon, regardless of where it originates. Defining a marketable biodiversity unit is much, much harder. Each biodiversity certificate will be different. It will be almost impossible to compare one certificate with another. In order to deliver meaningful nature repair, there must be a nuanced framework established to guide priorities, standards, monitoring and validation.

The second criterion for an effective market is a sufficient number of sellers and buyers to enable a market price to develop. The bill relies on the assumption that the private sector will voluntarily join the market and that Australian biodiversity certificates will be a marketable and desired property. There are some factors supporting the development of demand. The international Taskforce on Nature-related Financial Disclosures, in which Australia plays a key role, is publishing its final report in September. This is likely to contain recommendations that support a shift in global financial flows away from nature-negative outcomes and towards nature-positive outcomes—that is, companies may increasingly be seeking nature investments that they can tell their shareholders and other stakeholders about. But it still seems a stretch to think that there will be enough liquidity in the market for meaningful repair, especially in the early days. And it's hard to believe that international capital, seeking projects under a voluntary market, would be attracted to Australian projects when in competition with those in equatorial, island and lower GDP countries where they may get better bang for their buck. Global shareholders may feel that Australia should be in a financial position to solve its own biodiversity problems. To address this liquidity problem, as with the Emissions Reduction Fund, government may need to step in and create demand by underwriting certificates to drive widespread adoption and early wins. This is required to meet the immediate needs of a rapidly degrading environment and tackle Australia's extinction crisis.

The third characteristic of an effective market is equitable access to information and trust. In its high-level form, the proposed market mechanism does not have sufficiently robust integrity provisions and doesn't identify any consequences for nondelivery. Markets have inbuilt incentives for both proponents and buyers to seek out projects with the lowest possible costs. Without clear provisions to ensure otherwise, a market will drive towards projects that lack integrity or cut corners. The NRM will need a way to differentiate between different levels of difficulty in restoration. Restoring a hectare of grassland is much simpler than restoring a hectare of banksia woodland. It's difficult to believe that this nuance will be recognised through the market price in a voluntary market. Again, this will depend on the priority, standards, monitoring and validation that's put in place.

The next characteristic of an effective market is the ease of entry and exit. Barriers to entry include the complexity of methodology determinations and the time lag between registering a project and being able to sell a biodiversity certificate. Intermediaries may emerge, and it's unclear whether a secondary market in biodiversity certificates is anticipated or desirable. A secondary market would return no additional funds to projects and create no nature repair outcomes. These barriers to entry make it more important that government invests initially to create a liquid market.

The last characteristic of an effective market is effective regulation. This is very broad, but the issues I've illustrated so far show that the regulatory environment will need to be nuanced, sophisticated and adaptable. Market outcomes are only efficient and effective if the guardrails drive the right behaviour. Given the complexity, it seems unlikely that we'll get this regulation right from the start. We're putting the cart before the horse by proceeding with a nature repair market before the EPBC Act and the full implementation of the Chubb and Samuel reviews. The purpose is not entirely clear, with the likelihood that it is used for offsets driving a race to the bottom.

The idea of creating a voluntary market is not a bad one, but many things will need to line up to make it an effective mechanism to actually repair nature. In this context, the government will need to proceed with three approaches. Firstly, I think government investment is going to be required upfront to kickstart the market. Unfortunately, we don't have years to waste waiting around to see if a market emerges organically. Secondly, regular and robust review of the effectiveness and integrity of the market will be key. We'll not get this right the first time, and the regulator will need to be able to respond nimbly to the way the market is emerging, and I'll be supporting any amendments that improve the review mechanism.

Thirdly, the development of the standards and mechanisms that create the guardrails for the market will need to be done by experts. My electorate, Curtin, is full of biodiversity expertise. In fact, four of the 12 members of the Threatened Species Scientific Committee live in Curtin, including botanist Professor Kingsley Dixon of City Beach, who was appointed yesterday as an Officer of the Order of Australia. The University of Western Australia's School of Agriculture and Environment is educating future biodiversity experts, and, although Kings Park is on the edge of my electorate, we'll also claim the WA seed bank.

Ensuring that this market actually delivers outcomes will mean that the committee overseeing the market will need biodiversity and restoration ecology experts like those who live in my electorate, not just lawyers and economists. I'll be supporting amendments to this effect. Supporting and expanding this type of expertise will be vital to the success of the NRM. One very practical suggestion is for the Commonwealth to provide Austudy support for students to undertake postgraduate qualifications in biology, biodiversity and conservation across the country.

In conclusion, the idea of creating a voluntary market to repair nature is a small but useful part of the government response. It will need to tie in with the very important EPBC Act and be guided by clear national standards. Getting it to work effectively will require clear objectives and carefully drafted regulation, guided by experts, and may also require investment from government to kick-start the market.

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

The Nature Repair Market Bill 2023 will see the introduction of a world-leading voluntary market framework supporting landholders to protect, restore and repair nature, and I thank Minister Plibersek for this exciting initiative.

This is all part of the Albanese Labor government delivering on its Nature Positive Plan, a modern version of the ancient tradition of caring for country. This new market framework will make it easier for Australian businesses, organisations, local and state governments and individuals to invest in projects to protect and repair nature. The Australian government has committed to protect 30 per cent of Australia's land and seas by 2030. This is the same goal that has been adopted globally under the United Nations Convention on Biological Diversity. This goal reinforces the findings of the 2021 State of the environment report and its sorrowful tale of environmental degradation, loss and inaction. After a lost decade of neglect, this big, brown beautiful land needs significant investment in conservation and restoration for a nature-positive future.

The Commonwealth government can't do it alone, obviously. There's a role for farmers, citizens, businesses and private sector investment that can contribute to reversing this environmental decline. This was highlighted in the finding of the Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act review by Professor Graeme Samuel AC. Private companies, conservation groups, farmers and other landholders are increasingly looking for ways to achieve positive outcomes for nature, not just because it's the right thing for any patriotic Australian to do but also, increasingly, because it's good for business. A recent independent report estimates that the market for biodiversity in Australia could unlock $137 billion in financial flows by 2050. So the demand is out there and the Albanese government will respond to it.

Importantly, this new nature repair market will be driven by science. Unlike the previous Abbott-Turnbull-Morrison governments, we won't be ignoring the signs. Unlike those Luddites and dinosaurs, we will allow science to lead the way as the nature repair market sets up and begins to work its restorative magic. The nature repair market will enable First Nations people to promote their unique knowledge of caring for this country, ancient wisdom held today that stretches back more than 65,000 years. Our nation is fortunate to have access to this knowledge and lived experience—information that can't be found anywhere else. For this nation's sake, it's imperative that we tap into this knowledge to achieve the best possible outcomes. It will enable participation and create employment and economic opportunities for First Nations people all over this land. And it will be done on First Nations people's terms. It will promote and enable free, prior and informed consent for projects on the land or waters their people have cared for for more than 100,000 generations. There will be opportunities to design projects that reflect the knowledge and connection to country of our First Nations people, and to utilise their skills and knowledge for a nature-positive future. That's a win for everyone.

Establishing the market in legislation will ensure its ongoing integrity, encourage investment in nature and drive environmental improvements across Australia. The bill will enable the Clean Energy Regulator, an independent statutory authority with significant experience in regulating environmental markets, to issue Australian landholders with tradeable biodiversity certificates. Certificates can then be sold to businesses, organisations, governments and individuals. All landholders, including farmers, First Nations people and other organisations—conservation groups et cetera—can participate in this market. Projects will deliver long-term nature-positive outcomes through activities such as weeding, planting native species and pest control. These can be undertaken on land or water, and so will include lakes and rivers as well as marine and coastal environments.

This will be a boon for regional Australia, yet another example of the Labor Party looking after the bush. This will be a boon because it will open participation and expansive opportunities for project locations which would then support jobs and nature-positive economic activity. The market will operate in parallel with the carbon market, facilitated by having the same regulator. This alignment will encourage carbon farming projects that also deliver benefits for biodiversity. There'll be administrative efficiencies in this approach and, more importantly, clear and accurate oversight of claims being made in both markets, because, as we know, there's been some dodgy accounting in the past. Our government acknowledges the recent review of carbon crediting, led by Professor Ian Chubb, which pointed out much of this.

Lessons learned from the carbon market have informed the bill and will continue to be reflected upon as environmental markets develop. The bill provides for biodiversity certificates to have integrity and represent an actual environmental improvement. Buyers can then invest in such a market with confidence. A key integrity measure is an independent expert committee responsible for ensuring projects deliver high-quality nature-positive outcomes, underpinned by a consistent approach to the measurement, assessment and verification of biodiversity.

The integrity of environmental outcomes is also enabled through assurance and compliance requirements. This includes monitoring, reporting and notification on the delivery of project activities and progress on the environmental outcome. The regulator will have monitoring and enforcement powers to ensure that projects are conducted in accordance with the rules. As we know, good governments prepare for the rogues.

The Nature Positive Plan reflects our commitment to restoring public accountability and trust. Consequently, transparency will be a core element of the scheme. Comprehensive information about projects and certificates will be available on a public register. Additional information will be regularly published by the regulator and there will be active release of relevant data by the Department of Climate Change, Energy, the Environment and Water. This will enable parliament and the public to monitor the scheme and provide opportunities for citizen oversight of what is taking place in the community. It will support certainty and value to the market and build trust back into the system.

The department is committed to working with the ACCC and ASIC to ensure that certificates issued in the nature repair market are not victims of greenwashing claims, that the statements made about certificates accurately reflect the projects and investment they represent, and that projects in the carbon and biodiversity markets are not affected by misleading claims.

Our government is committed to consultation and engagement on our environmental reform agenda. We have listened and will continue to listen to feedback on the design and operation of this market. We are working with First Nations people on a co-design approach for developing priority methods and supporting appropriate incorporation of traditional knowledge and management practices. The bill before the chamber mandates public consultation on methods and the instrument for measuring and assessing biodiversity.

The draft legislation also establishes the Nature Repair Market Committee. This committee will be responsible for providing advice to the minister following public consultation on the submission and their advice. It will have five or six experts with substantial experience and significant standing in one or more areas of expertise, including agriculture, science, environmental markets, land management, economics and Indigenous knowledge. The Nature Positive Plan represents a different approach to biodiversity offsets. It commits to offsets being the last resort, which we will enshrine in legislation.

The Albanese government is already designing and consulting on new national standards for matters of national environmental significance and environmental offsets. These will be legislated under the new nature-positive laws and will provide certainty and confidence in the use of biodiversity offsets under Commonwealth laws. They will no longer rely on averted loss but on the protection and restoration of ecosystems that provide a nature-positive outcome where avoidance and mitigation cannot prevent a significant impact.

Projects under the nature repair scheme won't be used as offsets unless and until they meet the new standards. The nature repair market will be an opportunity to create a supply of projects certified through purpose designed offset methods. The register will be a comprehensive and public source of information on these projects and the biodiversity that they are protecting.

This bill will establish a new market for investing in nature-positive outcomes. It will support Australia's international commitments to protect and repair ecosystems and reverse species decline and extinction—long overdue. It will generate investment and job opportunities for a nature-positive economy and create new income streams for landholders, including First Nations peoples and farmers, and I commend the legislation to the House.

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

The Australia state of the environment 2021 report found that our biodiversity is declining and that the overall state of our environment is poor. The Nature Repair Market Bill introduces a nature repair market, in effect, a biodiversity market, the aim of which is to encourage private sector investment in long-term nature repair. This market should, in theory, enable proponents to undertake projects which protect or enhance biodiversity on land, in aquatic environments and in our oceans. Projects will be rewarded with biodiversity certificates tradable in the market and regulated by the Clean Energy Regulator.

There is no doubt that we need legislation to prevent biodiversity. Australia has large swathes of degraded land. We've lost at least 100 species to extinction since European colonisation. Nineteen Australian ecosystems are already collapsing, including the Murray-Darling Basin and the Great Barrier Reef. For Australia to reverse the distressing environmental decline, we have to drive real benefits from legislation like this. We have to support landowners to restore degraded landscapes. We have to increase biodiversity.

We have signed up to the United Nations Convention on Biological Diversity, which commits us to protect 30 per cent of our land to nature. This means 30 per cent of every kind of habitat. We're not just talking deserts and salt lakes; we're talking native forests, farms and grasslands. This can't be just about nature protection; it's also about habitat restoration. The scientists, the environmentalists and the farmers have all told us that these are areas that need serious investment.

We know that it will cost $2 billion a year to protect Australia's natural environments and to reverse our biodiversity decline. Just for reference, $2 billion is about one-fifth of what we're spending this year to subsidise fossil fuels. We spend just 15 per cent of what is needed to prevent extinctions and to recover threatened species, even though half of our GDP has a moderate to very high direct dependence on ecosystem services. With this legislation, we're proposing to hand that great responsibility for the protection of ecosystem services dependent on nature to the private sector. We should, in fact, be taking the lead, not passing the baton.

This bill does not guarantee effective action on nature repair. There's far too little detail to it. It is a framework legislation. The most significant elements of the scheme are still to be provided via a series of legislative instruments to be made by the minister. These elements include the rules of the scheme, details of the instruments to be used to assess biodiversity and the scheme's methodology determinations. The bill is a revamp of a previous iteration prepared by the Morrison government and introduced to this House in February 2022. At that time, the Senate committee which assessed the bill identified a number of issues with it, including but not limited to its broad deletion of administrative powers and immunity from liability. Those concerns have not been addressed by this bill.

External reviews have suggested that measures for monitoring, auditing and compliance provisions delineated by this bill are insufficient. There are no provisions regarding the frequency or scope of committee meetings requiring regular audits by the regulator. The Senate committee reviewing this legislation will not report until August. This all feels premature, undercooked and ill formed. On paper, the Albanese government's stated goals are a zero extinctions target and the protection of 30 per cent of Australia's lands and seas by 2030. However, this Nature Repair Market Bill lacks clarity on the conservation outcomes it will achieve. It doesn't actually define the nature or the scope of its objectives, other than describing them as 'enhancement or protection of biodiversity'. We're being asked to trust the market to value biodiversity and to act effectively on conservation, while not doing so ourselves. Landholders are not being guided as to what projects the government sees as more or less valuable, as higher or lower priority.

In reality, businesses' desire to voluntarily purchase enough biodiversity certificates for corporate social responsibility remains uncertain. Worldwide, less than nine per cent of biodiversity conservation funding comes from offsets, nature based solutions, carbon markets and philanthropy combined. This bill does not identify any regulatory levers which the government could implement should there be insufficient voluntary investment to create a functional nature repair market. We're just going to put it out there and we're going to hope for the best.

The problem is that we have seen biodiversity markets before, both abroad and domestically. Their effectiveness rests on whether they reward stewardship that really benefits biodiversity or whether they rely on offsets which can harm biodiversity elsewhere. There is concern, with good reason, about commodifying nature, about this scheme's integrity and about its interaction with our national environmental laws.

Environmental offsets are meant to compensate for unavoidable impacts on environmentally significant matters, to offset losses at one site with like for like at another site. In practice, though, we know that the governance of such schemes is often poor and that they can have the perverse effect of giving tacit approval to destruction and biodiversity loss. This bill should therefore ensure that biodiversity certificates cannot be used to meet offsetting obligations under Commonwealth, state or territory legislation. We need certainty regarding the extent to which the environmental credits given accurately represent the environmental outcomes gained. This means that the proposed biodiversity certificates have to reflect actual biodiversity gain which would not have occurred in the absence of the project.

The bill allows for certificates to be issued for projects which act to protect sites, but an obvious concern with this absence of additionality is the potential for over-inflation of perceived biodiversity benefits. It's proposed that we will have prescribed biodiversity assessment instruments which will dictate the methodology relating to measurement or assessment of biodiversity and its protection or enhancement, but we don't know what these instruments are and we don't know how the assessments will operate.

The potential for comparison between different species and ecosystems is concerning. If we lose all our koalas, can saving a moth species or the greater glider compensate? What are the relative benefits of interventions to save numbats as opposed to Gouldian finches? This bill assigns the government's responsibility for species preservation to a market. The government should, in fact, establish robust measures of biodiversity and it should delineate how direct benefit from projects assessed under this scheme will be established. We urgently need the EPBC Act reform to be brought to this House, such that we can establish a national environmental standard for our environmental offsets. Without that, this bill is putting the cart before the horse.

We have to have concerns about the proposed involvement of the Clean Energy Regulator, given the governance issues relating to the Clean Energy Regulator identified by the recent Chubb Independent Review of Australian Carbon Credit Units. This bill proposes additional functions for the CER in an area in which it does not have specific expertise, and before those broader governance issues have been addressed. Concerns persist generally about governance and compliance, not only as administered by the Clean Energy Regulator but across the spectrum of government agencies dealing with environmental matters.

Just last August the Minister for the Environment and Water, in discussing this scheme—the scheme in front of us today—claimed:

… maybe one day Australia will house its own Green Wall Street: a trusted global financial hub, where the world comes to invest in environmental protection and restoration.

They're lovely words, but these are words from a government which has approved the Isaac coalmine and which this month allowed removal of the Murujuga rock art from the Burrup Peninsula in breach of the globally accepted Burra Charter for international best practice in heritage conservation. These are words from a government which has given $1.5 billion to the Northern Territory government to build the Middle Arm facility, three kilometres from the Darwin suburb of Palmerston, to support fracking of the Beetaloo basin and development of the Barossa gas field and pipeline. Sadly, we have seen already that we cannot trust this government on important issues relating to environmental protections. We need legislation on these matters to be absolutely watertight, and this bill is not that.

These examples underscore the importance of transparent, accountable and robust governance in all of our environmental agencies. The credibility of our environmental efforts hinges on trust. Trust can only be cultivated by maintaining the highest standards of governance and compliance. We need strong environmental protection legislation with clear enforcement. If it is to proceed, the nature repair market scheme must be administered under the forthcoming independent Environmental Protection Agency or the proposed extinction prevention hub, not under the Clean Energy Regulator. It's time for Australia to lead the way out of the climate crisis. We can't approve a scheme that, rather than creating a nature positive market, could have the perverse effect of increasing nature destruction. It's time to stop kicking this can down the road. This bill in its current form is undercooked and underwhelming, and it is very difficult to commend it to the House.

Susan Templeman (Macquarie, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I'm very pleased to be standing here to support the Nature Repair Market Bill 2023 because it offers something new, and I think we so desperately need that. The World Heritage listed Greater Blue Mountains area, which covers an enormous part of my electorate of Macquarie, is a unique place. It's more than a million hectares of sandstone plateau, escarpments, gorges and waterfalls. It's covered in temperate eucalypt forest in most parts, with more than 90 species, which represents 13 per cent of the global total. There are 152 plant families in total, with 484 genera and around 1,500 species. These are wonderful numbers and a significant proportion of the Australian continent's biodiversity. It includes primitive species from the Gondwana age, like the Wollemi pine. The diverse plant habitat supports more than 400 vertebrate animals, with 52 mammals, 63 reptiles, more than 30 frogs and about one-third of Australia's bird species. We have platypuses, echidnas and, of course, koalas. There are at least 120 butterfly and 4,000 moth species—and the list goes on. Much of the natural bushland is high wilderness quality, and until the Gospers Mountain bushfire it remained close to pristine in an extensive, largely undisturbed matrix which is still free of things like earthworks, structures and other human interventions. But it is fragile to fire and vulnerable to climate change, so we have a responsibility to improve our protection of this internationally recognised land.

This matters because, while that land does have protections, this bill before us provides an opportunity to further protect the integrity of this World Heritage listed area where it's bordered by private and public lands. We're establishing a nature repair market to make it easier for businesses, organisations, governments and individuals to invest in projects to protect and repair nature, and the lands of the Blue Mountains and Hawkesbury that are not national park strike me as an ideal place for this work. We know there's already an appetite. A few weeks ago, I attended a forum with close to 50 landowners, wildlife carers, the Bilpin and Colo valley Landcare groups and other community members who gathered in the Hawkesbury to learn about the Great Eastern Ranges initiative, which is partnering with the Hawkesbury-Nepean Landcare Network and WIRES to support wildlife by restoring and creating glideways, flyways and stepping stones. This involves projects to improve, expand and protect habitats and track recovery, restoring private lands and installing nest boxes for a host of animals, including greater gliders, spotted-tail quolls, powerful owls and koalas.

The Sydney Basin Koala Network estimates that 80 per cent of koala habitat in the Hawkesbury was destroyed in the Black Summer bushfires, so safe habitat on the peri-urban interface has become critical to their survival. Science for Wildlife research shows that the koala population had been vastly underestimated in the region until recently, and they're tracking the recovery of this highly genetically diverse bunch of koalas. Many of us realise the importance of the Hawkesbury and the Blue Mountains for koala survival, and the meeting at Kurrajong Heights showed there is a desire by private landowners to improve the integrity of the bush they have on their land, and this Nature Repair Bill provides an even more ambitious pathway.

The 2021 State of the environment report tells a story of environmental degradation, loss and inaction across the country. We're supporting landowners, including farmers and First Nations communities, to do things like replant a vital stretch of koala habitat, repair damaged riverbeds or remove invasive species, and we're making it easier for businesses and philanthropists to invest in these efforts.

So how does it work? Under the nature repair market landholders, like farmers, and conservation groups can undertake projects to enhance or protect existing habitat, as well as projects to establish or restore habitat. All landholders, including Aboriginal people and Torres Strait Islanders, can participate in the market. Projects can be on land, lakes and rivers or in marine and coastal environments. The market will operate in parallel with he carbon market, facilitated by having the same regulator. Projects will be issued with a certificate that can be sold on to another party. Certificates will provide a range of standardised information like area size, threatened species protected and a project description that will enable the market to compare and value projects. As the regulator, the Clean Energy Regulator will have monitoring and enforcement powers to ensure that projects are conducted in accordance with the rules. This includes monitoring, reporting and notification on the delivery of project activities and progress on the environmental outcome. The regulator will make sure that projects are being implemented according to the rules and that certificates accurately describe what's happening on the ground. So, essentially, the nature repair market will operate in parallel with the carbon market. Certificates and credits won't be duplicating each other. Aligning the two markets will encourage carbon farming projects that also deliver benefits for biodiversity, which is a good outcome for the environment and for interested and passionate Australian landholders.

There are certainly administrative efficiencies in having the one regulator, and more importantly, it provides clear and accurate oversight of claims made in both markets. People might recall that we recently did a review of carbon crediting, led by Professor Ian Chubb. The lessons learnt from the review about the carbon market have been applied to this bill and will continue to be applied as it moves forward. Before the trading scheme operates, an independent committee will provide advice to the minister about the methods that set the rules for projects. Certificates, their status and their ownership will be tracked via a public register. This is not about having secrets; this is about it being public. This will help certificate owners show their shareholders, customers and employees how they're supporting nature repair.

There are a really wide range of things that might be possible under nature repair projects. For instance, in a rural environment, removing drainage ditches and excluding livestock and feral herbivores to restore a natural marsh which will create critical habitat for native frog, fish, turtle and wetland bird species might be one project. Indigenous Rangers might undertake feral animal exclusion, buffel grass removal, feral cat control and cultural burning in the Central Desert, for instance, and the certificate generated for the project could support Indigenous Rangers working in on country activities for many, many years. It might be restoring a seagrass meadow permanently lost from historic poor catchment water quality to provide habitat for sea turtles, dugongs, marine fish and seahorses. Monitoring could be provided by local commercial and recreational fishers who foresee increased local fish stocks. There is a wide variety that we can apply and people can do.

The plan for the scheme is that it's up and running in 12 months from the passage of the legislation. It does need that time to allow for the establishment of the independent advisory committee, the development of the legislative rules and the development of the project methods, including the time for public consultation. The Clean Energy Regulator also needs to develop the processes and systems that are needed to manage the scheme.

The one question I know people have already asked me about this is: just how are the certificates tradable? Is it actually a market? The nature repair market will enable landholders who protect, manage or restore local habitat to receive tradable biodiversity certificates which can then be sold to businesses or philanthropic organisations wanting to invest. A certificate holder can onsell a certificate to another holder through a contract, but we're not expecting that to be a regular occurrence. There will be guidelines published, and we'll work with the ACCC to make sure that any claims made about investments in nature are credible. We don't want any double counting or any other forms of greenwashing that could undermine investment in nature.

I look at my own electorate and I think people will want to be a part of this, but there is more evidence around the broader reasons for delivering this approach. A recent PwC report found:

A biodiversity market could unlock $137 billion in financial flows to advance Australian biodiversity outcomes by 2050.

Australian Ethical Investment, Australian Sustainable Finance Institute and the Australian Banking Association have expressed their support. Demand for the market is expected to come from a number of sources, including carbon market participants seeking to add biodiversity values to their projects; philanthropic investors responding to the biodiversity crisis; and businesses wanting to demonstrate their environmental credentials to their staff, consumers and shareholders.

This is a different approach to biodiversity offsets. I'm really conscious that Western Sydney has lost all but six per cent of the Cumberland Plain Woodland, and you'd be hard-pushed to find an offset program there that's considered truly effective. The Nature Positive Plan commits to offsets being the last resort. The approach in this bill creates a new market to spur positive investment in positive results for nature. It will help protect ecosystems, it will help repair ecosystems and it will help reverse species decline and extinction. It will generate investment and job opportunities in a nature economy and create new income streams for landowners.

It also has the potential to change the dynamics of private land in regions like the Hawkesbury, where keeping and creating the corridors and stepping stones for native wildlife that takes them from one safe bush area to another through a very inhabited land is becoming more and more difficult. It isn't helped by the Hawkesbury council adopting the New South Wales Rural Boundary Clearing Code, which has given a green light to anyone with a large property who wants to clear 25 metres of land along their boundary under the pretext of improving fire management. The Liberal state government thought it would be a good idea to give councils in my electorate the chance to opt in to this code, and I note that Hawkesbury was the only council to do so, with the Liberals on council ramming through the adoption of the code last year.

Now, I am all for science based fire management. For a start, there is a question as to whether clearing 25 metres around the boundary of a large property does provide any extra protection from intense bushfires. As we experienced in the Gospers Mountain fire, there were ember attacks kilometres from the front of the fire. And the only obligation on landowners is a self-assessment on a range of complex factors, including 11 vegetation categories, legally protected areas, protection of Aboriginal culturally modified trees and other cultural heritage, riparian buffer zones, soil erosion and landslip risks, right through to harm to native and introduced animals. That's all it is—self-assessment. There is no science used and there are no real checks and balances on the landowners. Already there are reports that it's leading to land clearing that actually has nothing to do with fire management and, significantly, the destruction of corridors and habitat used by native animals, including koalas. Such is the concern about the effect that the Total Environment Centre and Sydney Basin Koala Network recently declared, and I quote:

The Council's action facilitated clearing on rural land when the law requires such land to be protected if it has koala habitat.

They went on to say:

The desire to not know about koala presence will also feed into other damaging clearing proposals and as a precursor to urban development.

They also warned:

Hawkesbury Council will become known as the Koala Killer Council.

We, who are the custodians of fragile, unique habitats, have an obligation to do what we can to protect them. So let's hope that this legislation has a smooth passage and that the Albanese government can show a better way, not facilitating the destruction of habitat the way that Hawkesbury Council has but preserving it, improving it, and helping native animals to arrive.

Allegra Spender (Wentworth, Independent) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I move the second reading amendment circulated in my name:

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

"whilst not declining to give the bill a second reading, the House:

(1) notes the devastating damage to nature that was identified in Australia's most recent State of the Environment Report;

(2) acknowledges the welcome commitments the government has made as part of the Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework, the Threatened Species Action Plan, and the Nature Positive Plan;

(3) notes the feedback from environmental organisations, businesses, and community groups, that significantly stronger environmental laws are a necessary prerequisite for a successful Nature Repair Market;

(4) calls on the government to:

(a) explain clearly how it will meet its objectives of preventing new extinctions and protecting and conserving at least 30 per cent of Australia's land mass;

(b) prioritise critical reforms to the Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation (EPBC) Act, as well as the establishment of the new Environmental Protection Agency, before trading of certificates begins in the Nature Repair Market; and

(c) urgently clarify how biodiversity offsets will be treated in the Nature Repair Market and confirm that no offsets will be traded until reforms to the EPBC Act have been legislated".

Our country is blessed with an incredible natural environment, from wallabies to the wombat, from the koala to the kangaroo and from the dingo to the Tasmanian devil, Australia is home to amazing animals, unique plants and diverse aquatic life. In my own electorate of Wentworth, I feel privileged to be able to watch the annual whale migration from Bondi Beach, swim with the seahorses in Parsley Bay and walk the shores of the Sydney Harbour National Park.

Nature in Australia is unparalleled, but it is also in crisis. The most recent State of the environment report pulled back the curtain on the devastating damage that is being done to our natural world. We have the highest rate of deforestation in the developed world. We have the highest rate of animal extinction of any country. We are doing irreparable damage to the Great Barrier Reef. Add the existential threat posed by climate change, and our environment has never been in greater danger. We have a responsibility and an imperative to act, but our actions so far have been inadequate. Our environmental laws are weak and ineffective. We're investing just 15 per cent of what is needed to avoid extinctions, and we continue to use taxpayers' money to subsidise destructive activities like native forest logging. The government's ambition to address these challenges is welcome.

I know the minister shares my passion for conserving our environment. I welcome the commitments made at COP 15, the new Threatened Species Action Plan and the desire to reform our environmental laws. The minister is also right to point out that the scale of the challenges ahead means we need action from more than just government. This brings me to the legislation before the House, the Nature Repair Market Bill 2023. The objective of this bill, to increase private investment in conservation, is a good one. As an economist, I see value in finding ways to use market mechanisms to achieve our policy objectives. But despite this optimism, the prioritisation of the government's environmental policy remains confusing. As the Hippocratic oath says, 'first, do no harm', so, before we embark on untested ways of funding environmental protection, we could stop actively supporting environmental destruction by ending native forest logging for good.

Native forest logging destroys our environment, accelerates climate change and, over the last two years, has cost taxpayers in New South Wales $29 million in bailouts to the loss-making state Forestry Commission. I commend the actions of the Labor governments in Western Australia and Victoria, who have agreed to bring this destructive practice to an end. But native forest logging shows no sign of stopping in New South Wales and Tasmania, so the federal government must step in. The commitments made by the minister to me in question time last month are very welcome, but they're not sufficient. We need to end native forest logging across the whole of Australia for good. The community is ready to back this. The crossbench is ready to back this. Even the minister's backbenchers are ready to back this. Now is time the time to show courage and act decisively.

After ending native forest logging, the government's second priority must be to do what is promised and legislate critical reforms to the EPBC Act. We have had over a year of Labor government, and these reforms seem only a little closer than they were when they first took office. I acknowledge that the EPBC reforms are complicated and will take time, and that is why they must be a priority. Only having done this, and only when a strong environmental protection agency is established, should we allow trading in this new market.

Let me turn now to the specifics of the bill and outline some of the areas where I would like to see the legislation strengthened. These come from the experts I have consulted but also from the people in Wentworth, many of whom attended my recent community forum on this bill, and I'd like to pay tribute to the Environmental Voices of Wentworth, particularly Brooke, Daniela, Chloe and James, for their advocacy on these issues.

The biggest concern raised with me is the potential for a new market to be a vehicle for further environmental destruction through the trading of low-integrity biodiversity offsets. Let's be clear, whilst high-integrity offsets make sense for carbon emissions biodiverse ecosystems are fundamentally not transferable. It is simply not possible to fully offset the harm caused by damage to one habitat by pumping money into another. The damage caused by mass clearing of koala habitat in the forests of New South Wales cannot be mitigated by planting trees in WA. Only if biodiversity loss is unavoidable and reasonable steps have been taken to avoid and minimise loss are offsets appropriate to consider, and if they are used they must be of the highest integrity. Unfortunately, that is just not the case in Australia today.

The Samuel review made clear that offsets currently used under the EPBC 'contribute to environmental decline rather than active restoration'. This is the offsets currently under the EPBC Act, and they contribute to environmental decline rather than active restoration. A similar picture has emerged across various state level offset schemes. The government has acknowledged this. They have committed to developing a national environmental standard for environmental offsets, and they have committed to a clear hierarchy to, first, avoid and, then, reduce and mitigate and only to offset when there is a net gain for the environment and payment for conservation.

These are absolutely critical reforms, and yet before they are implemented the government is embarking on creating a new market that facilitates the trading of offsets and creates a new form of environmental certificate that may be used as an offset in the future. This has left many in my community confused. The government says there's no need for concern and that the standards in this new market will be even higher than under a reformed EPBC. This may be the case, but I would like to see the proof.

At a minimum, we need to see some guardrails. First, the government must clearly communicate its intention regarding how offsets will be used in this market. Second, the government must fully implement its reform to the EPBC Act before any offsets can be traded in this market. Third, if project proponents do not want their projects to be used for offsetting, the legislation should allow them to specify this.

The amendment I will move during the latter stages of this debate will achieve that third objective. It has the support of environmentalists, who don't want their projects to be used to compensate for nature's destruction, and it has the support of investors, many of whom want to invest in conservation but are worried about being accused of greenwashing. This is a commonsense amendment. It empowers those who engage in conservation work, it provides additional clarity and assurance for business and it is aligned with the government's intentions for the market. I urge the government to accept it.

There are several other challenges that my constituents have raised with me and which are reflected in submissions to the Senate inquiry made by the financial sector, environmental groups, leading academics and many others. Firstly, there is an absence of clear guidance from the government on the road map for meeting our 30 by 30 goals, how the new nature repair market will support these goals and what the priorities are for investment. Without a clear plan and without certainty for business, the much touted $130 billion in Australian biodiversity outcomes that this bill is supposed to achieve are, at best, wildly optimistic and, at worst, completely fanciful.

Secondly, there is a lack of clarity on where the demand for certificates in this market will come from, beyond environmental offsets. The government has touted future obligations under the Taskforce on Nature-related Financial Disclosures as a source of demand, but any meaningful and mandatory obligations are many years away. We also don't know whether the government itself will participate in the market. I also have regulations about whether the Clean Energy Regulator has the capacity and skill set to effectively regulate the market. It is particularly confusing that when the government is setting up a new environmental protection agency to be the tough cop on the beat it has chosen a different regulator for this new market.

It is clear that we need vastly increased investment in nature if we are to protect and preserve our natural environment. It is also clear that we need to try new and innovative ways of achieving this, because the status quo is just not working. I'm not opposed to the idea of this market in principle, but there are improvements that should be made to this bill. Even more importantly, before we experiment with trading in this market, we must legislate reforms to the EPBC and put an end to native forest logging.

Ross Vasta (Bonner, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Is the amendment seconded?

Helen Haines (Indi, Independent) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I second the amendment.

Libby Coker (Corangamite, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

In my first speech in this place, I spoke about my very first experience of activism almost four decades ago. It was environmental activism sparked by land clearing in a precious coastal rainforest, which sent koalas fleeing for safety into my parents' front yard in Port Macquarie, New South Wales. Today, the koala is endangered, along with many other native species across our nation. With over 500 of our iconic wildlife species at risk of being erased forever, it is time to act. That's why I rise with much passion to support the Nature Repair Market Bill 2023. This bill gives us all hope for the future of our environment and is a reminder that we've waited too long under the former Liberal government for action—action to better protect and nurture our flora and fauna. If successful, this legislation will establish the mechanisms to bring landholders, businesses and conservation groups together to achieve better environmental and economic outcomes.

In places like my electorate of Corangamite, where there is rapid growth all along our coastline, this bill is particularly important. It will enable landholders to work with conservationists to remove invasive weeds and feral animals as well as clean up our waterways. This is important work. It builds on work that people of my community, including all those who work with Landcare, have championed for many years, because, all in all, the people across my region love our environment, and together we are prepared to fight for it. From the Surf Coast to the Bellarine and the Golden Plains and right across my region, we know there is so much to cherish. Corangamite is home to some of the most iconic surf beaches in the world, including Bells Beach, Fairhaven Beach and Thirteenth Beach on the Bellarine Peninsula, just to name a few. These are truly spectacular spots and, as we drive along the heritage listed Great Ocean Road, we're all reminded of just how lucky we are to live in Australia.

Often in this place we debate matters that may seem abstract, but what's at stake in this debate is all too clear. It's our parks. It's our lush rainforests. It's our fertile plains. It's our World Heritage sites. It's where our red cliffs meet the rolling surf. It's the ancient sacred sites of our First Nations people. It's our native animals. It's our communities. And it's our livelihoods. They're all at stake, and in the time of climate change, with the intense development pressures on our coastlines and our open green space, the Albanese government recognises that we must do better. This bill, the Nature Repair Market Bill, will make it easier for businesses, organisations, governments and individuals to come together and invest in projects that protect our environment and nurture our native flora and fauna, because at its core this legislation is about connecting people who want to invest in repairing our nation's environment with the people who can do the work on the ground.

As the State of the environment report made very clear to all Australians, our environment is under extreme pressure, and it is only going to get worse if we do not act. That's why the environment minister has introduced this significant and long-overdue bill. Through this bill, the minister is continuing a tradition, a proud Labor tradition, of stepping up and delivering environmental reform. It was our former prime minister Gough Whitlam who declared in 1974 that our nation's federal government must lead the way when it comes to environmental preservation. Gough Whitlam said:

We are the first generation of Australians to become sharply aware of the conflicting demands between growth and preservation of the environment. Our government is the first Australian Government to attempt to develop sound environmental policies to reconcile these demands, to ensure that growth and development are not bought at the price of the destruction of the nation's natural and historical inheritance.

This bill carries the spirit of Gough Whitlam's call. It recognises the need to balance growth and conservation and, importantly, it recognises that our First Nations people have seen forests, waterways and oceans decline for almost 250 years. It acknowledges that we need to think bigger and better. We cannot restrict our efforts to national parks and places of sanctuary. We must focus on private land because currently more than 60 per cent of this country is owned by farmers and First Nations people. It is where most of our endangered animals live, so we must work with our landowners to get better environmental outcomes.

So this market bill, the Nature Repair Market Bill 2023, makes absolute sense. It will support projects on private land that enhance or protect existing environments. It will also support those who establish or restore habitats for our native species, helping to end our extinction crisis. Through the bill these projects will be open to all landholders, from farmers to First Nations and from conservation groups to businesses and local councils. All will be eligible to apply. The scheme will see landholders issued with a tradeable certificate when they take on a project to repair or protect nature. This certificate will reinforce their credentials as supporters of our environment. The certificate will provide a range of standardised information about the size of land repaired, the kind of work conducted, the threatened species protected and the length of time actions will take. Importantly, it will mean our landholders will potentially get extra income through environmental action that improves the quality of their land. It will also greatly help conservation groups and philanthropists achieve their missions and, most importantly, it will repair and restore our nation's environment.

This bill will achieve this by solving two major problems with our current system. Firstly, the scheme will help landholders who want to contribute to the nature repair effort by partnering them with groups and individuals to achieve their environmental visions. The minister presented some fantastic examples of how this work will look, including Indigenous rangers who want to control a feral species across a flood plain to protect native birds and sea turtles and improve water quality for marine life. This will be supported under the scheme. Our business investors can enter into an agreement with a landowner to improve water quality in a river system. The nature repair market will cover such restoration projects and reward those who are involved. This means more money for farmers, more jobs for First Nations communities, more homes for Australia's native animals and plants, and healthier waterways.

Secondly, this bill will introduce oversight, transparency and assurance. I've spoken with many local Landcare groups and landowners, and they want to know whether our framework can really deliver their vision for nature repair. They know that, without oversight, a legal framework or a national regulator, businesses and the public could fall victim to greenwashing. This bill addresses these concerns by establishing a register to make sure that the details of projects are open and transparent, because we're all in this together and we have to keep each other accountable. To achieve this, the independent Clean Energy Regulator will monitor and publish landholder reports on the delivery of projects, including the progress being made towards environmental outcomes. The regulator will ensure nature repair projects are delivered according to the rules. The regulator will also publish information on projects and on the ownership and use of biodiversity certificates. It will allow parliament and people from all across the country to scrutinise the scheme, and, as the minister said, we welcome this scrutiny. We welcome it because we want to repair our environment at a time when immediate action is critical.

In summary, we've never had a better opportunity in this country to revitalise our environment. We now have the technology, and we have the willpower. Under this legislation, we will have the capacity to harness local partnerships and passion, to repair our environment and reshape our economy. The people of my electorate of Corangamite understand that our local economy would not be the same without the incredible natural environment around us. We know it sustains jobs in our region. We know it brings people to our region, to work, to visit and to live. This is just one reason why we need to see our environment better protected through government action and private sector cooperation, and that's why this bill is so important. We want to restore our environment. We want to revive our coastline. We will work with our First Nations communities and act in partnership to achieve the regeneration of traditional lands and waterways. I would like to take a moment to shout out to the Daniel Andrews government in Victoria for its commitment to the Distinctive Areas and Landscapes Program that will protect special landscapes from development, including residential land development, like the Spring Creek valley in Torquay and key areas in the Bellarine that are home to migratory birds and are near Ramsar wetlands.

In closing, this commitment is a commitment to our communities. It gives hope for our nation's conservation and to environmental groups who have championed this cause for so long. I look forward to working hand in hand with all my local groups, including the Corangamite Climate Alliance, Geelong Sustainability, and local farmers and businesses, to support them in embracing this opportunity. For those who remember Whitlam's time as Prime Minister, who recall the work done and the opportunities missed and who share similar memories of activism in years gone by, be assured that through this bill, together, we will continue the fight to protect our native species and their habitats so they can be enjoyed for generations to come.

Elizabeth Watson-Brown (Ryan, Australian Greens) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

-BROWN () (): The Nature Repair Market Bill is version 2.0 of legislation that was cooked up by the former agriculture minister, the member for Maranoa. No-one in this House should be surprised that the coalition will be supporting this bill because it's virtually a carbon copy of theirs. It's almost as if, after spending a decade in opposition, Labor decided to simply morph into the Liberal Party to form government. As the former government was hardly well known for environmental protection, what can we expect of this bill and the associated legislation?

It's a bit embarrassing that the first major piece of environmental legislation to come before this parliament is a recycled coalition bill. There's no environmental protection agency and no repair of our clearly broken environmental laws. This is after the Minister for the Environment and Water on national radio used the excuse that she was constrained by law as the reason she approved a new coalmine. I asked her about it in question time recently, and she couldn't answer then either. So who makes laws in this country? Shouldn't it be the first priority of the environment minister to change the law to allow rejection of coalmines on the grounds that they will damage the environment and make the climate crisis worse? Apparently not. The environment minister instead proposes this bizarre scheme that, rather than facilitating environmental repair, actually facilitates endless opportunities for greenwashing and for a few landholders to make a buck. It's no wonder the environment minister termed this 'green Wall Street'. I couldn't quite believe it when I heard her use that language—from a self-described progressive Labor government. That language clearly demonstrates, yet again, the comprehensive capture of this government by their corporate friends—prioritising, yet again, their interests over the needs of everyday people and the environment.

In another sign of a government very beholden to private corporations, this bill actually privatises environmental protection, thereby ensuring that it will absolutely fail. It shouldn't be news to the environment minister that the market is profit driven. The market doesn't care about koalas and the market doesn't care about protecting our reefs or our precious mangrove habitats. Why can't the government just take responsibility to actually govern—to actually provide for and support everyday Australians, rather than forever handing everything over to the private market? It's happening across the board with this government. They won't build housing, they won't address the climate crisis directly and they'll outsource our aged-care and disability-care sectors. They just turned everything over to private corporations, and now the environment minister is very happy to let private corporations profit from trade in bogus offsets, to spruik, advertise and benefit commercially from their supposed environmental credentials instead of the government actually doing the work of a good government and investing directly in the future of the environment.

This bill sees no direct government investment in protecting our environment for future generations, but we do seem to have plenty of money to invest in nuclear submarines and plenty for financing fossil fuel projects and subsidising fossil fuel use. But there's no direct funding for environmental protection. As with the housing bill, they're really hoping that the private market will do their work for them. I think that's a lazy sort of abrogation of government responsibility. Is it a good idea to hand over this particular important responsibility of protecting our environment, holus-bolus, to the private market? Without watertight regulations, obviously, corporations will purchase these biodiversity certificates for greenwashing, and this bill will provide the perfect cover for their continued environmental destruction. Under this bill, Santos, for example, will be able to claim they're protecting the environment while continuing to pollute, to destroy sacred First Nations sites and to desecrate the environment. Under this bill, Woodside, for example, will be able to purchase a few of these biodiversity certificates and run a glossy PR campaign to try to repair their image, benefiting only Woodside and their marketing team, and clearly not the environment. Under this bill, our banks will be able to continue investing in fossil fuels while claiming they care about the environment. The problems with carbon offsets are well known, and there's absolutely nothing in this bill to suggest that these biodiversity certificates will function any differently. In fact, the original version of this bill, proposed by the member for Maranoa, took its crediting framework almost exactly from the Carbon Credits (Carbon Farming Initiative) Act. Those offsets were so questionable that they had to be put under independent review.

The Greens are not alone in opposing this bill. Many environmental groups have raised their concerns, only to be ignored by the government. The Wilderness Society has urged the government not to pass the bill in its current form, describing it as a market in the absence of clear objectives or any caps or limits on environmental damage and, at best, a scheme for habitat loss trade-offs. In fact, a similar scheme in New South Wales has been the subject of a scathing review, describing it as having no strategy for making sure it delivered the environmental outcomes required. Despite the clear failure of this in New South Wales, the Labor government is showing no signs of deviating from the market based path to failure with this bill.

Labor's Nature Repair Market Bill is a bizarre joke. It says, 'Okay, let's give certificates to huge private corporations so they can make money greenwashing while actual native habitat and crucial carbon sinks are destroyed.' Huge, nature-destroying corporations are the problem, so why has the government decided all of a sudden that they should be trusted to be the solution? They need to be reined in and regulated, not given a new market to play around with and to make more money from.

I'm sorry, but Labor's nature repair market will see an increase in habitat destruction in pursuit of profit. It is going to see an increase in extinctions of our endangered species, it will see an increase in the decline of our reef and, perhaps most importantly, it will see an increase in the number of coal and gas projects approved in this country, making the climate crisis worse. You can't offset your way out of environmental catastrophe, just like you can't offset your way out of the climate crisis.

Luke Gosling (Solomon, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

OSLING () (): I rise to speak about the Nature Repair Market Bill 2023, and I'm very happy to do so. It's a pretty exciting initiative and policy that we're very proud of. I came in a bit late and didn't hear the first part of the contribution from the honourable member from the Greens. However, I did want to speak on this because it has relevance to my electorate and it has relevance to our neighbours. I'm really glad to have the opportunity to speak on it. Delivering our nature-positive plan and establishing the nature repair market is obviously a high priority for our government. This market is going to make it a lot easier for businesses, organisations, governments and individuals to invest in projects and to repair nature.

We all know that our natural environment is under great pressure. The Australian government is committed to protecting 30 per cent of Australia's land and seas by 2030. I note that those same goals have been adopted globally under the United Nations Convention on Biological Diversity. These goals reinforce the findings of the 2021 State of the environment report and its shocking story of environmental degradation, loss and inaction. We need significant investment in conservation restoration for a nature-positive future. Business and private sector investment can contribute to reversing environmental decline if there's a way for that to occur, and that is what this provides. This was highlighted in the findings of the Environmental Protection Biodiversity Conservation Act review by Professor Graeme Samuel AC.

Private companies, conservation groups and farmers and other landholders are increasingly looking for ways to achieve positive outcomes for nature. A recent report prepared independently by PricewaterhouseCoopers estimates that the market for biodiversity in Australia could unlock $137 billion in financial flows by 2050. We are responding to that demand with this bill.

The nature repair market will be based on science and enable Aboriginal people and Torres Strait Islanders to promote their unique knowledge on their terms. Establishing the market in legislation will ensure its ongoing integrity, encourage investment in nature and drive environmental improvements across Australia. The bill will enable the Clean Energy Regulator, an independent statutory authority with significant experience in regulating environmental markets, to issue Australian landholders with tradable biodiversity certificates. Those certificates can then be sold to businesses, organisations, governments and individuals. All landholders, including First Nations landholders, conservation groups and farmers, can participate in the market. Projects will deliver long-term nature-positive outcomes through activities such as weeding, planting native species and pest control. They can be undertaken on land or water, including lakes and rivers, as well as marine and coastal environments. Open participation and extensive opportunity for project locations will support regional Australia, like where I am from, which will provide jobs and nature-positive economic activity. It will be good for the environment, and good for the economy.

The nature repair market will enable participation and create employment and economic opportunities for First Nations people. It will promote and enable free, prior and informed consent for projects on their lands and waters. There will be opportunities to design projects that reflect the knowledge and connection to country of our First Nations people and to utilise their skills and knowledge for a nature-positive future.

The market will operate in parallel with the carbon market, facilitated by having the same regulator. That alignment will encourage carbon-farming projects that also deliver benefits for biodiversity. There will be administrative efficiencies with this approach and clear and accurate oversight of claims made in both markets—the carbon market and the nature repair market.

Our government acknowledges the recent review of carbon crediting led by Professor Ian Chubb. Lessons learnt from the carbon market have informed the bill and will continue to be reflected upon as environmental markets develop. The bill provides for biodiversity certificates to have integrity and represent an actual environmental improvement. Buyers can then invest in the market with confidence that's it's not, as we would say in the Territory, gammon; it's real. A key integrity measure is an independent expert committee responsible for ensuring projects deliver the highest quality nature-positive outcomes underpinned by a consistent approach to the management, assessment and verification of biodiversity. The integrity of environmental outcomes is also enabled through assurance and compliance requirements. These include monitoring, reporting and notification on the delivery of project activity and progress on the environmental outcome—that is, it's proper; you did what you said you would do, and the outcome for the environment is real. The regulator will have monitoring and enforcement powers to ensure that projects are conducted in accordance with the rules.

The Nature Positive Plan reflects our commitment to restoring public accountability and trust, which has been damaged during the last 10 years under the former government. Transparency will be a core element of the scheme. Comprehensive information about projects and certificates will be available on a public register. Additional information will be regularly published by the regulator, and there will be active release of relevant data by the Department of Climate Change, Energy, the Environment and Water. This will enable parliament and the public to monitor the scheme and will provide an opportunity for citizen oversight. It will support certainty and value to the market. The department is committed to working with the ACCC and ASIC to ensure that certificates issued in the nature repair market are not victims of greenwashing claims, that the statements made about certificates accurately reflect the projects and investments they represent, and that projects in the carbon and biodiversity markets are not affected by misleading claims.

Our government is committed to consultation and engagement on our environmental reform agenda. We have listened, and will continue to listen, to feedback on the design and operation of this market. We are working with First Nations people on a co-design approach for developing priority methods and supporting appropriate incorporation of traditional knowledge and management practices. The bill mandates public consultation on methods and the instrument for measuring and assessing biodiversity.

The draft legislation establishes the Nature Repair Market Committee. It is the committee that is responsible for providing advice to the minister following public consultation on the submission and their advice. The committee will have five to six experts with substantial experience and significant standing in one or more areas of expertise, including agriculture, science, environmental markets, land management, economics and Indigenous knowledge—First Nations knowledge.

The Nature Positive Plan presents a different approach to biodiversity offsets. It commits to offsets being the last resort, which we will enshrine in legislation. Our government is already designing and consulting on new national standards for matters of national environmental significance and environmental offsets. These will be legislated under the new nature-positive laws. The standards will provide certainty and confidence in the use of biodiversity offsets under Commonwealth laws. They will no longer rely on averted loss but on protection and restoration of ecosystems that provide a nature-positive outcome where avoidance and mitigation cannot prevent a significant impact.

Projects under the nature repair scheme won't be used as offsets unless and until they meet the new standards. The nature repair market will be an opportunity to create supply of projects certified through purpose designed offset methods. The register will be a comprehensive and public source of information on these projects and the biodiversity that they are protecting. The bill will establish a new market for investing in nature-positive outcomes. It will support Australia's international commitments to protect and repair ecosystems and reverse species decline and extinction, which we all know is happening. It will generate investment and job opportunities for a nature-positive economy and create new income streams for landholders, including First Nations landholders and farmers. But, as I said, all landholders, including First Nations peoples, conservation groups and farmers, can participate in the market.

The rights and interests of First Nations people are recognised on approximately 50 per cent of Australia's land area. First Nations people have cared for country for thousands of years, and the biodiversity we enjoy today is a product of their stewardship and custodianship. The nature repair market is designed to enable participation by First Nations people and ensure, as I've mentioned, free, prior and informed consent to projects on their land. Projects could include traditional land management to protect and improve biodiversity, as well as land restoration. Landholders can undertake projects that improve or protect existing habitats as well as projects to establish or restore habitat. So it's not just about repairing what is broken but also protecting land that is in good condition. A lot of First Nations land has never been cleared but still benefits from management activities and protection. These projects can be on land; in inland waterways, like lakes and rivers; or in marine and coastal environments. There are many examples of projects, but some of them could include improving or restoring existing native vegetation through fencing or weeding, planning a mix of local species on a previously cleared area or protecting rare grasslands that provide habitat for endangered species.

I began by saying that caring for land and nature is a core priority for our Labor government, and I'm particularly proud of two commitments Labor made in my electorate of Solomon that clearly demonstrate this instinct. The first was our urban river commitment for catchment restoration projects across Darwin and Palmerston. The $3.82 million commitment was part of Labor's $200 million Urban Rivers and Catchments Program. Funded activities include revegetation, improvements in water quality, weed and invasive species management, the establishment of gross pollutant traps, native plantings, landscape rehydration and soil erosion mitigation works. I am incredibly proud that Labor is helping restore the health of Australia's urban rivers and catchments in Darwin and Palmerston, where we celebrate the value of our stunning natural landscapes and, in particular, our urban streams and creeks. These are exactly the types of activities that the new market will incentivise right around Australia.

The second commitment which I'm particularly proud of is the $9.8 million over four years that Labor promised to contain and eradicate dangerous gamba grass, which infests itself in the Northern Territory. Gamba grass is one of the greatest environmental threats in the Northern Territory. Part of Labor's $9.8 million commitment is going to be scaling up the already successful work of the Northern Territory Gamba Army to remove the grass, which presents a fire risk to lives, homes and infrastructure, from public lands. This commitment is helping keep gamba grass out of Kakadu National Park as part of federal Labor's ongoing commitment to protect Kakadu from the threat of invasive species. With these commitments, as with the nature repair market that will be created if this bill passes, and I hope it does, our government is showing that it has a clear, nature-positive plan and that it is getting on with the job of delivering it.

Finally, I'd just like to highlight the great work of Tierra Australia, which has been driving a proposal to deliver a scoping study and pilot project for restoring the natural functions of the landscape in our dear friend and neighbour Timor-Leste. Not only will nature-positive be good for jobs and economies in my electorate and around Australia; it's also being embraced by our friends and near neighbours, who have similar challenges. I really hope that they will benefit from the great bonuses that will come from nature capital.

Zoe Daniel (Goldstein, Independent) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The government has committed to a Nature Positive Plan to incentivise conservation and protection of our precious ecosystems. The plan acknowledges the fact that Australia's environmental laws are not fit for purpose and the need for their reform. This is an intention that I support, especially given the stark findings of the State of the environment report, showing the list of threatened species is getting longer and longer. The Nature Positive Plan has several goals: goal 1, better environment and heritage outcomes; goal 2, more efficient and effective decision-making and priorities; and goal 3, accountability and trust. These are all principles that I agree with, and this is why it's so important to get this legislation right.

Concerns have been expressed, though, that the nature repair market will be used for offsetting. Instead of stopping destructive activities, biodiversity certificates may be purchased in an attempt to make up for the damage. This is the risk with allowing offsets: a zero-sum game where, rather than a nature-positive outcome, we have a nature net-zero neutral outcome at best. At its core, the focus of the market should be on reducing harm, not protecting the reputations of companies in the business of causing climate and environmental damage. Therefore, I am concerned that this legislation—the Nature Repair Market Bill 2023 and Nature Repair Market (Consequential Amendments) Bill 2023—does not rule out the use of biodiversity certificates for the purpose of offsetting.

There exists an additional challenge when it comes to offsetting for the environment. This challenge is that it's difficult to get like-for-like offsetting right. In other words, obtaining an offset from a project that is so similar that it can be said to virtually represent the biodiversity lost is a very tough thing to achieve. In practice, one would be hard pressed to find an example of a biodiversity market that has been successful in producing a net-positive outcome for biodiversity.

The nature repair market is modelled on the carbon market. Similarly, parallels can be drawn with flaws found in that market that may be repeated here. The Chubb review highlighted many issues with the carbon market, with recommendations to improve its integrity to play an actual role in climate action rather than allowing polluters to account their way to zero. By accepting the Chubb recommendations and agreeing to reform of the carbon market, this government has accepted the imperfections of the carbon market. It is absolutely essential, therefore, that flaws that we know to be flaws in that market, because the Chubb review has said so, are not repeated in the nature repair market. Why would we intentionally replicate a flawed system? Unfortunately, it's not possible to conclusively say that integrity in the carbon market is currently a given, especially because the Chubb recommendations have still to be implemented. Yet here we are launching headfirst into another similar market model.

The government is also in the process of implementing recommendations made in the Samuel review of the Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act. These commitments include introducing national environmental standards, including standards on environmental offsets and a federal environment protection authority, all needed measures. I look forward to working with the government to ensure our environmental laws do indeed produce the best outcomes for biodiversity. But new environmental legislation may come only late this year or early next year. This creates a situation where the nature repair market is likely to be operational before our environmental laws are fit for purpose. In fact, it risks undermining public trust in the nature repair market due to a lack of accountability to meet environmental best practice, which is yet to be defined. Accountability and trust are supposedly central to the government's Nature Positive Plan. This is putting the cart before the horse and driving it straight to the market.

I support the basis of the member for Wentworth's second reading amendment calling for the government to implement its promised reforms to the EPBC Act and to establish a federal environmental protection authority. I believe that a nature repair market must be accompanied by the best environmental laws, regulations and governance structures to ensure the best possible outcomes for the environment and biodiversity. The best way to ensure that the nature repair market is regulated with integrity is to have those powers sit with a body dedicated to ensuring biodiversity and conservation outcomes. This body would be the independent federal environment protection authority, the establishment of which was committed to by this government.

To that end, I move a second reading amendment to the member for Wentworth's amendment:

That the following words be inserted after "Agency":

"to perform the role of the regulator for the nature repair market".

This calls for the established environment protection authority to act as the regulator of the nature repair market. Currently the legislation prescribes the Clean Energy Regulator to be the regulator for the nature repair market. However, with pending reforms as recommended by the Chubb review and the fact that the Clean Energy Regulator's core business is carbon, a very different deal to biodiversity, I am concerned that it's not the best vehicle to perform this role.

I acknowledge the government's argument that as projects that may generate biodiversity certificates available to the nature repair market may also deliver carbon outcomes, with the possibility of generating carbon credits too, it may be onerous for landholders having to deal with two different regulators, particularly for small landholders and First Nations people. My understanding is that there will be other detailed amendments from the member for Warringah, requiring that the regulator support participation by First Nations people and small landholders. I support these amendments.

However, at the core of this legislation, this nature repair market should be an approach that ensures the best possible overall outcomes for biodiversity and conservation. When habitat loss and degradation impact nearly 70 per cent of threatened species, everything else is secondary. I am concerned that having the nature repair market regulated by a body which in itself has pending reforms will not yield the better environment outcomes goal of the Nature Positive Plan.

In addition to my second reading amendment, I intend to also move several detailed amendments that are intended to improve the regulation of the nature repair market. While the consequential amendments bill does attempt to equip the Clean Energy Regulator for the purpose of regulating the nature repair market, it introduces two new fields of expertise into the Clean Energy Regulator Act: agriculture and biological or ecological science. However, there is at present no requirement for the Clean Energy Regulator to have members who have such expertise. In other words, the nature repair market could be regulated by a body which doesn't have specific expertise in the areas most pertinent to it in designing methods and assessing projects. Therefore I will be moving amendments that require the Clean Energy Regulator to comprise membership including the fields of expertise introduced by the consequential amendments bill.

My second consideration in detail amendment has to do with the delegation of powers to the regulator. I would particularly like to point to the provision in the bill that allows the government's power to purchase biodiversity certificates to be delegated to the regulator. The same body in charge of ensuring integrity of these certificates is simultaneously tasked with finding the best deal on behalf of the government to buy such certificates. This is a conflict of interest if ever there was one, and a familiar conflict of interest at that. The Chubb review recommended that this power to purchase carbon credits should not be attached to the Clean Energy Regulator in the context of the carbon market. This is a recommendation the government has already accepted. Again, why legislate an existing flaw that we are already aware of?

The regulator is meant to regulate, to ensure that carbon credits have integrity and that the market operates with the best outcomes in terms of reducing emissions. If it is also tasked with finding the best deal on carbon credits on behalf of the government, the risk is that it undermines the integrity of the carbon market and the independence of the regulator. Acknowledging the Chubb review's recommendations, and to ensure that the nature repair market does not repeat the mistakes of the carbon market, this amendment removes the provision that allows the government to delegate the purchasing of biodiversity certificates to the independent regulator. Not closing this gap in the legislation may undermine trust in the regulator to effectively do its job.

Given the concerns I've expressed so far, my third amendment calls for a review into the regulator of the nature repair market before 2025. The review would assess the effectiveness of the Clean Energy Regulator as the regulator for the nature repair market. The review would consider how the market has met, or not met, relevant recommendations made by the Chubb review of the carbon market, and its interactions with new and improved environmental legislation. The amendment aims to achieve three goals for the nature repair market to be fit for purpose: first, that the market is continually improved alongside reforms in environmental legislation; second, that the issues with the carbon market are not repeated in the nature repair market, by implementing the reforms recommended in the Chubb review; and third, that the market is regulated effectively by the best independent authority to regulate it. The legislation already includes a review process. The review in this amendment will be an additional one-off review to ensure that the nature repair market operates consistently with environmental best practice of the day.

On the review in the legislation: my final consideration-in-detail amendment reduces the legislative reporting period from five years to three. A reporting period of three years strikes a reasonable balance between collecting reliable data and how time sensitive it is to address biodiversity loss, and the need to ensure the market is delivering the best outcomes. In addition to improving the regulation of the nature repair market there are also a number of opportunities to ensure that the market achieves the best possible environmental outcomes. For example, through technologies and artificial intelligence; collecting data on how the market is delivering for biodiversity; and doing so in a way that protects the privacy of landholders and First Nations' data sovereignty. At a broader level, there are questions about whether it is at all possible to accurately capture the value of biodiversity in the form of certificates.

I support the goals of the Nature Positive Plan, and I support the government's pursuit of getting us on track to protect and restore Australia's environment. I believe that these modest amendments will go some way to improve the shortcomings of the carbon market and the government's functions of the nature repair market.

Ian Goodenough (Moore, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Is there a seconder for the motion?

Kylea Tink (North Sydney, Independent) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I second the amendment and reserve my right to speak.

Brian Mitchell (Lyons, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I want to thank the member for Goldstein for her contribution to that. I must say, it's a real pleasure to hear a contribution that is considered, articulate and constructive. I'm not sure we'll end up agreeing with your amendments, member for Goldstein, but the tenor of the debate, I think, is improved by the way in which you've delivered your address. So thank you.

Australia's unique flora and fauna is a wonder of the modern world and the pride of our nation. Across our vast continent, species have adapted to our harsh and rugged landscapes and their environments over millions of years. They play a vital role in maintaining biodiversity and distinctive ecosystems. Our natural environment's significance extends to cultural significance, in particular for our First Nations people. There is an Aboriginal saying, and I'm sure there's a reference: if you look after the land, the land will look after you. Am I right, member for Lingiari? This is exactly what the Nature Repair Market Bill 2023 is seeking to achieve. If you look after the land, the land will look after you.

Under this bill, the Albanese Labor government makes it easier for people to invest in activities that help repair nature. We want to support our landowners, including farmers and First Nations communities, to plant more native species and remove invasive or adopted species. We want to invest in projects that protect and repair. We will enable farmers and communities to repair damaged riverbeds and make it easier for businesses and philanthropists to invest in these efforts. It's an all-in approach that ensures every person shares the responsibility of protecting and repairing our diverse environments.

The Australian government, through the passage of this bill, is delivering on its Nature Positive Plan with the establishment of the nature repair market. The market will be based on science and will enable Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people to promote their unique knowledge and culture in this space and on their terms. The nature repair market will encourage businesses, organisations, governments and individuals to invest in projects that protect and repair our natural environment by providing a market where anybody can participate, delivering long-term nature-positive outcomes through activities such as weeding, planting native species and the management of pest control. These activities can be undertaken on land or water, including in lakes and rivers as well as marine and coastal environments.

The market will be particularly important for regional Australians, a cohort of people I'm very proud to represent. This bill will support the regions by providing opportunities through participation and the creation of jobs and economic growth but also, of course, by repairing the environments throughout our regions. Operationally, the market will operate in parallel with the carbon market, which will be facilitated by having the same regulator. This alignment will encourage carbon farming projects that also deliver benefits for biodiversity and ecology. This approach will provide administrative efficiencies and a clear and accurate oversight of claims made in both markets, because our government is committed to listening, learning and improving both the new and existing mechanisms.

Integrity is non-negotiable. We are ensuring that this mechanism implements compliance requirements on the delivery of project activities and the progress of environmental outcomes. As a government, we have already committed to protecting 30 per cent of Australia's land and seas by 2030, and this same goal has been adopted globally under the United Nations Convention on Biodiversity, ensuring that we meet our obligations as a global partner and a leader in environmental protection and repair. Everyone has a role to play in environmental protection, care and repair, and this was highlighted in the findings of the Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act review by Professor Graeme Samuel AC.

Increasingly across Australia, private companies, conservation groups, farmers and other landholders are looking for ways to achieve positive outcomes in nature, and there are a number of groups across my electorate involved in this, from the North East Bioregional Network to the Derwent Catchment Group. All the way through my electorate there are groups that are weeding rivers, taking out the weeds, trying to repair the environment and looking for ways to re-establish nature in old disused paddocks, and it's only right that a good government actively engages with them to ensure that these ambitions are turned into a reality.

In late April, visitors from around the globe make the journey to Tasmania to visit some of the most stunning sites on earth, including Mount Field and Lake St Clair national parks. The pilgrimage to these locations at any time of the year ensures the witnessing of stunning scenery, but in April visitors get to experience the turning of the fagus, Australia's only cold-climate deciduous tree. The leaves of the fagus at this time of year turn from a bold, burnt red to a stunning, shimmering gold. It's something you must add to your bucket list and witness firsthand. A visit in April will coincide with the Derwent Valley Autumn Festival, a must-visit in its own right. Another marvel of my electorate is the pandani, which is the world's tallest heath plant. It's a firework of thin, grass-looking leaves that can grow up to a metre in length, with the shrub growing up to a 12-metre tree.

Of course, I can't speak about the wonders of Tasmanian flora without a special mention of the Tasmanian pepperberry, a cool-climate plant producing berries that, once dried, have a pepper taste, as you'd expect, and are being more and more used as a pepper replacement. New recipes are on the way, and I suggest Ashgrove's pepperberry cheese, which is made in my electorate in the Meander Valley. Of course, pepperberries are also being put in chocolates to make a sweet but spicy snack. The advertisement is over, but try the pepperberries from the electorate of Lyons.

Tasmania is not only home to beautiful flora, there are also unique fauna which call our island state home. The eastern quoll, considered extinct on the mainland in 1963, is safely at home in Tasmania. If you're lucky, you can spot one while tramping through the bush across our state. And if you're careful at dusk, one will scoot across in front of your car—hopefully, in front of your car. And, of course, there's our state's most famous and well-recognised marsupial, the Tasmanian devil. Extensive conservation work has occurred across the state to protect our native mascot, to ensure that it doesn't face the same fate as the thylacine, the Tasmanian tiger. There has been very encouraging progress in combating the facial tumours that have afflicted our gruff little marsupial.

Despite these unique species of flora and fauna, the 2021 State of the environment report, which the previous government hid under a carpet and was only brought to light after Labor came to government, set a very sober analysis of the environmental issues we face across Tasmania. Lyons, my electorate, has about half the landmass of the state and is home to 194 threatened species. These include flora such as the miena cider gum and the Midlands wattle, and fauna on the list include much-loved bird species such as the Oriental plover and Gibson's albatross, and other icons such as the pygmy right whale and the Tasmanian giant freshwater lobster. It's heartbreaking, frankly, that my electorate has the 10th-most-listed threatened species in Australia. That's why this bill is so important, and I commend the minister for bringing it forward. We must work to improve the environment and to ensure that threatened species in my electorate and across the country are protected.

Natural disasters in Tasmania have become more frequent, and it would be remiss of me not to reflect on the impact that events such as bushfires and flooding have had on our natural heritage and ecosystems in Tasmania. Indeed, just a couple of years ago, we had the bushfires that raged through the Central Highlands of my electorate, up in the alpine regions. There were places up in the highlands that had never experienced bushfire in recorded history. Flora was burnt—mosses and other low-lying plants—that had never known bushfire. There were very rare species that were absolutely decimated, and they have not yet recovered because they have never evolved to recover from bushfire.

Last October, flooding affected much of our state, including communities in the Meander Valley, Kentish, Northern Midlands, Central Highlands and Break O'Day councils in my electorate. These flooding events impacted communities and ecosystems, with chemicals and debris swept down rivers; trees and other plants torn from banks; and, of course, livestock drowned. This is why speedy recovery and repair after an event are so integral, and that's exactly what this bill and the subsequent nature repair market will ensure. It's also worth noting the excellent work being done by emergency services minister, Senator Murray Watt, whose agencies have provided rapid relief to communities affected by disaster. He is, rightly, well regarded across the parliament for his leadership in the challenging portfolios of agriculture and emergency services. There is a segue between them, of course, with biosecurity, and he is doing an absolutely stellar job. In Tasmania we're still recovering from the floods of October last year. It may take years to fully repair the environment, but I know the job will be made easier once the nature repair market is established.

As a government, we have already taken strong steps to improve our environment. In the 2023-24 budget, the Albanese government invested $1 billion in biosecurity. This investment is integral to protecting what we have and to ensuring that invasive species and diseases, such as foot-and-mouth, are kept off our shores. I know this concerns everyone in the agriculture sector, and I note that the Leader of the National Party is in the House; I know that foot-and-mouth is of particular interest to him. Investments such as this and our investment in the nature repair market through this bill have the added bonus of unlocking previously untapped markets for our economy which could be worth $137 billion by 2050.

Our government is taking the strong action that's needed to seize this great economic opportunity. The goals of these bills to increase investment in environmental protection and repair, and to meet our global obligations, reinforce the findings of the 2021 State of the environment report, which told a story of environmental degradation, loss and inaction. It showed Australians, as many have known for years now, that for a decade the Liberals completely failed the environment. We are committed to ensuring a strong future with a clean environment for our children and grandchildren, and we will ensure a healthy environment right across Australia. I commend the bill to the House.

David Littleproud (Maranoa, National Party, Shadow Minister for Agriculture) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise tonight as the Leader of the Nationals to advise the House that we're unable to support the Nature Repair Market Bill 2023 and the associated legislation. This bill has diverged far too far from our biodiversity bill, which was introduced in this parliament in February last year. There are significant differences in this bill. Disappointingly, this government has let their ideology take away the practical reality and the safeguards that are required for Australian agriculture and farming families in regional communities.

There is a place for a biodiversity market. Markets internationally will ask for this not just in relation to carbon abatement but in relation to biodiversity into the future. The bill that our government sought to put in place ensured that there were protections against those who want to come out and exploit regional communities and prime agricultural land in order to pollute in other areas. We can't support it. It won't reward farmers. It will tear away at communities. It will tear away at the very fabric of what our bill was about, which was rewarding farmers for the stewardship of their land. That didn't relate only to carbon. That was a world first in paying a 'halo' credit for biodiversity but not so that it could be used as an offset for big polluters to come out and buy large tracts of land, lock it up and, effectively, destroy agricultural landscape and destroy communities.

There is a huge difference between the bill that we put in place last year and the one that this government is seeking to put in place now. We can't support it because it fundamentally goes against the very architecture that we put in place to reward the stewardship of our land, which would have been a world first. We should be proud. It was the National Party that came up with the biodiversity stewardship program. It was a world first. We are the first country in the world that can measure an improvement in biodiversity. It was the National Party that created that mechanism, and, in fact, we had around the country a number of pilot programs that validated the science that ANU put in place. That gave us the opportunity to create a marketplace. In fact, that marketplace was already started. Within those pilots, some of those certificates would have been able to be traded once this legislation went through, but this bill has deviated too far from ours and puts at risk the Australian agricultural landscape and our production systems.

Disappointingly, this was taken away from the department of agriculture and given to the department of environment. Not only did this government destroy the department of agriculture by stripping away all its money and giving it to the environment department but they took this program with it. They let the ideology of the environment department take over the intent that was at the heart of our bill, which was rewarding farmers not just for carbon abatement but also for biodiversity improvement. Making provision for that offsetting mechanism opens up too great a risk, particularly since this government has introduced legislation around the safeguard mechanism. That legislation means that the 215 big polluters in this country will now have to go and buy offsets. That's because the safeguard mechanism was about allowing polluters to adopt technology to be able to cover their emissions. However, because this government has brought that forward to 2030, these emitters have nowhere else to go. The technology is not available and cannot be adopted, so they must buy offsets. This really significant change by the environment minister and by this government opens up real risk to our communities. It's disappointing. Even the Australian Greens support us: that speaks volumes.

This government is using the ideology of the environment department rather than the practical reality of what we've seen out in our communities. With carbon farming in western Queensland, we're seeing those from the city come out and buy large tracts of land at $20 or $30 an acre and then simply walk away. There's no management. Effectively, the families have left and the communities die. And this will only lead to it. Our bill was about rewarding those people who wanted to have stewardship of their land, not just in carbon abatement but in improving biodiversity. We are proud of that world first. But this bill trashes that legacy and for that reason alone the Nationals can't support it. It goes a step further, beyond just agricultural land owned by farmers, to Crown leasehold land and beyond and to our seaways.

This government has failed to consult properly with the timber industry and the fishing industry so that they appreciate the complexities and risk that they will be imposing on them. That is a real risk and goes well beyond the intent of our biodiversity stewardship bill. For that reason, again, the Nationals cannot support a bill that does that without proper consultation and without proper understanding of the impact on the jobs that are out there and the stewardship that is already taking place within the forestry and fishing industries.

Even the name of the bill—the nature repair bill—says that our farmers and our stewards of the land in forestry and fisheries have damaged it. We should be proud of the stewardship of the land and of the seas in which our farmers, our foresters and our fishers are undertaking their noble pursuits of feeding and clothing us. It's disingenuous of this government in how they have named this bill and how they have framed it around the stewards of our land. We are world leading. Our farmers are world leading. We should be proud of that and we should never let anyone forget that. Unfortunately, this government has failed to understand that.

There are further complexities within this bill around the methodology. They are allowing a whole range of methodologies to come into this. The biodiversity stewardship bill had a very tight framework to the methodology that we were adopting. Professor Andrew Macintosh was at the heart of that. He's an eminent professor who designed this for the National Party to ensure that there was integrity to the system, that there was validity and currency to those biodiversity certificates that farmers could create and sell.

Unfortunately, this government has opened it up and taken away the integrity of that system. When you take away the integrity of the system, you tear away at the very marketplace and the price people can actually ask for those credits. That, in our mind, goes very much against the very heart of the intent of our original bill. I'm also concerned about the reach. It needs greater explanation around the involvement and whether there is, in fact, any veto power, any reach of Indigenous Australians in the design, not only of the methodology but of individual projects, particularly on land that Australian farmers own and manage. For that reason, we also have serious questions that need to be answered by this government in what would probably be nutted out in a future Senate committee.

It's important that we understand that our record as a government in the last parliament is one that we're proud of. We're proud of our environmental credentials, not about virtue signalling but about practical actions, and the biodiversity stewardship bill actually achieved that. This bill tears away at the very fabric of what we were achieving for Australian farmers in rewarding and acknowledging what they already do.

It's important that this government goes back to the drawing table and actually reflects on what they're trying to do here, and the vast implications, particularly around the other environmental policies that they put in place, particularly around the safeguard mechanism and, potentially, what could be further put to this parliament around the EPBC Act changes. This will have implications around regional Australia, which will again do the heavy lifting for this country to meet its international commitments on carbon emissions. We've done our bit. We will continue to want to do more, but we've got to be rewarded for it. This bill will actually tear away at that and will tear away at our farmers' ability to participate in what is a changing market, in terms of their carbon footprint and their biodiversity footprint. Markets will ask for this.

Markets will ask for this, but this shouldn't be an outlet for big mining companies around the country to roll in and buy large tracts of land to lock up, buying their social licence at the expense of regional and rural Australia, particularly those communities that have supported this country during one of our most trying times—COVID-19, one of the biggest challenges we've faced since the Second World War. It was regional Australia that footed the bill through agriculture and resources, and it's for that reason that we should give them support, not tear away the very opportunity that we tried to create for them.

It's disappointing that the government didn't respect and acknowledge the biodiversity stewardship bill that I put in place in February last year. It was an opportunity for some bipartisanship. It was an opportunity for this government to acknowledge the stewardship of our farmers. It was an opportunity for them to participate and be rewarded for their stewardship with a world-first that we, the National Party, created. It's a legacy that I want to see continue, but only with good policy around it. For that reason, the federal Nationals cannot support this bill.

Carina Garland (Chisholm, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise in support of this important piece of legislation. The Nature Repair Bill 2023 is groundbreaking legislation that presents a significant milestone in our mission to protect and repair Australia's precious natural environment. This legislation establishes the framework for the world's first nature repair market in Australia, which will connect individuals, businesses, philanthropists and organisations wanting to invest in activities that restore and protect nature with those on the ground who can carry out the critical work. As the Minister for the Environment and Water has already stated in this place, the purpose of this legislation is to establish the machinery needed for a nature repair market, that being the register, the rules and the regulator.

The urgency of this legislation is enormous. Our environment, as I imagine everyone in this place knows, is deteriorating, with Australia now holding the shameful title of being the extinction capital of the world. We're losing more mammal species than any other continent. I know how much people in my electorate of Chisholm want urgent action to protect our unique, precious environment. I've met with many groups and individuals who've expressed their care and concern for the environment and, indeed, do so much to protect the local creek areas and parks in our community, planting trees, promoting conservation and cleaning up rubbish. I've had the pleasure of joining them in undertaking these activities on a number of occasions. This is something people in my community in the suburbs of Melbourne are really passionate about. We're witnessing the endangerment of iconic species like koalas, the erosion of our beautiful beaches and the loss of soil fertility. The time to act is now.

The Nature Repair Market Bill is not just about protecting nature from future harm; it's also about healing the land and the water that have suffered the consequences of human actions. This bill complements and reinforces existing government efforts by mobilising private investments in nature protection and restoration. In December last year, the Albanese Labor government unveiled our Nature Positive Plan, which outlined our ambition to reverse the decline of Australia's natural environment. Private land plays a crucial role in achieving this goal, because over 60 per cent of our country's landmass is privately owned. We know that farmers and First Nations people are the owners and custodians of most of this land, and that land harbours critical habitats and precious and endangered species. Our conservation efforts therefore must extend beyond national parks. We must encourage and support nature repair across all land in Australia, and this bill provides the means to do that and to do so with that private land, which, as I said, is the majority of Australia's landmass.

I said earlier that the primary objective of this legislation is to establish the infrastructure required for a nature repair market, being the register, the rules and the regulator. This market will encompass projects that enhance or protect existing environments, as well as those that establish or restore habitats. Importantly, it will operate on a voluntary basis, allowing landholders, including farmers, First Nations people, conservation groups, businesses and local councils, to participate. By undertaking projects to repair or protect nature, landholders will be issued tradable certificates that provide standardised information about the project. Once approved by the regulator, these certificates can be sold to third parties, providing additional income for landholders and opportunities for responsible businesses and individuals to invest in nature repair.

Transparency and accountability are key principles of this legislation. Our public register will track these certificates and allow buyers to make informed decisions and demonstrate their support for nature repair. A regulator will oversee the implementation of projects and ensure compliance with the rules. This framework will ensure that the nature repair market operates in a fair and transparent manner, generating confidence and trust among participants. It's not just that we're taking action here; it's how we're taking action that's really, critically important, too. Significantly, this legislation emphasises the involvement and recognition of Indigenous people and their traditional knowledge. Indigenous landholders and communities will be actively engaged in project development, implementation and decision-making processes. We know that Indigenous people's stewardship and wisdom are invaluable in the restoration and protection of our beautiful natural heritage.

This bill fosters partnerships and collaborations between landholders, conservation organisations and the private sector. This collaboration will mobilise the resources and expertise needed for effective nature repair initiatives. It will encourage innovation and research, leading to the development and adoption of new and sustainable practices in nature repair. Monitoring, evaluation and reporting mechanisms will provide essential data for future decision-making and assessment of the market's effectiveness. It will create a clear and tangible pathway for all Australians to contribute to the restoration and preservation of our natural environment.

We understand that concerns have been raised during the consultation process. Some stakeholders have expressed cautious optimism, recognising the urgent need for increased investment in biodiversity protection. Others have voiced different kinds of apprehension. These concerns are valid, and we must address them thoughtfully and thoroughly, but it is very important that we allow this urgent bill to pass through this House to ensure that our environment is protected and that we are able to start shaking off all of those bad things that have led us to be named the extinction capital of the world, which is a pretty shameful mantle for this nation to bear. The Nature Repair Market Bill is a significant step forward, and we have the opportunity to shape and refine it as we move forward.

This bill is a historic piece of legislation, and it sets the stage for transformative change in this nation's approach to environmental conservation. This legislation will assist in positioning Australia as an investment partner of choice as it relates to nature repair. This bill represents our unwavering commitment to protecting what is precious, repairing what is damaged and managing nature better for future generations. By establishing a nature repair market, our government is creating avenues for all Australians to contribute to the restoration and preservation of our natural environment. We will incentivise landholders to become custodians of our ecosystems, generating income while fulfilling their responsibility to protect nature. The time to act is now, and this bill provides us with the tools to do so.

Keith Pitt (Hinkler, National Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

This bill is about paying landholders and farmers to produce koalas and not cattle, to produce possums and not protein, and I think these are some of the fundamental challenges about this proposal that every Australian should be concerned about. Ultimately, there is one set of land in Australia. They are not making any more. That is all there is. In terms of the numbers, there are some 426 million hectares of that land devoted to agriculture, cleared and partially cleared land that produces the food, the protein, that we use to sell overseas and to sustain our own population. Right across Australia, the impact of this bill has the potential to decrease how much land is used for agriculture, because landowners will be paid not only for these biodiversity offsets but also for carbon offsets under the safeguard mechanism. I will have more to say on that matter.

For those out there who might be listening, to give some context around the size of the land that is impacted and the potential impact upon Australia, I'll mention a couple of simple agricultural products. This is a rough and ready figure. It depends on production, weather and irrigation. Australia produces about 1.1 million tonnes of potatoes on just over 29,000 hectares. There are 1.3 million tonnes of rice—this moves around a lot, depending on water availability—off about 150,000 hectares.

An example put forward by those opposite—about shining lights for things that have happened already—was in the recent press: the Munda Munda project in south-west Queensland. It is 24,000 hectares of acacia wooded grassland, which has now been taken up under what is the equivalent of the Emissions Reduction Fund through the state government. It is not the same location. It is not the same application. It doesn't have the same access to water or good quality soil. But, to give an example, 24,000 hectares, in a rough and ready number, would produce 2.4 million tonnes of sugar cane on the coast. That is enough for one very large mill or two smaller mills to sustain hundreds of direct jobs and, literally, tens of millions of dollars into the local economy. The alternative, which has been put forward by those opposite, is to lock it up for biodiversity offsets. These are some of the significant challenges.

Part of the bill introduces another committee, the Nature Repair Market Committee, and the period for locking up this land in Australia can be 25 years, 100 years or some other nominated length of time. I'd ask you to turn your mind back to what happened 100 years ago. In 1923 this country had just come out of World War I. We saw the Federation Drought destroy most of Australia's agriculture—in particular, cattle and sheep. And to think that we would lock up Australia's land base for a century—a century!—to be paid for, potentially, by taxpayers or others on the basis of biodiversity. You would have to ask exactly what it is that Labor is trying to achieve.

This land can be Torrens land, it can be Crown land, it can be relevant Australian waters, including lakes or rivers. Freehold land should be freehold land; there is no argument about that. If you buy freehold land in this country it is yours. Unfortunately, we see continually not only at the federal level but also, particularly, at the state level more and more overlays and zoning and biodiversity and reef legislation, which is impacting directly on the landholder but with no support whatsoever. They are taking away freehold rights, so I think this is an incredibly important issue.

A secretary can also purchase biodiversity certificates, and they can do that outside of the Commonwealth Procurement Rules. That is quite an extraordinary thing for the Commonwealth to put into a piece of legislation, that you will enter into an agreement for purchase outside of the standard Commonwealth Procurement Rules. The regulator can force audits by a third party. If you look at the minister's second reading speech, the large part of this application will be on private land because it is in private hands. There are hundreds of millions of hectares of Australian land but there are only 426 million hectares currently dedicated to agriculture.

If we look at the reason for it, it is because those opposite, in December 2022, signed up to the Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework, which agrees that 30 per cent of terrestrial and inland water, coastal and marine areas will be protected by 2030—some 60 million hectares! The only way these applications can be applied, particularly for carbon offsets, is through cleared and partially cleared agricultural land. There is no benefit in terms of a carbon offset otherwise, absolutely none. If we go to the Bills Digest, there are some issues that I think the opposition should be concerned about. The Australian people should be concerned as well. The bill does not appear to address circumstances such as:

That sounds like a pretty critical part of what has been proposed, but this legislation has no answers on how that application would come about. It is incredible, the idea that you'll now produce a property—which is what this bill will do—which can be sold and transferred and purchased on freehold land for a biodiversity agreement. Do I think there are farmers out there who will want to do this? Absolutely. If you would have lined up when I was a landholder and said: 'Hey, have I got a deal for you! The taxpayer will pay you for a century to not farm, to not produce and to not employ people. You've got to pay your rates and you've got to maintain some fences, maybe; you've got to pay an auditor and you've got to pay the Commonwealth, but you'll be paid not to produce food.' Well, of course, I would have jumped at it. If it made economic sense, you would be all over it. But our job in this place is to ensure that the decisions taken are in the national interest. It is not in the national interest to take away potentially hundreds of millions of hectares of food-producing land in this country.

Look at the potential around overlays on carbon offsets. I spoke on the safeguard mechanisms in this place not that long ago, and here are some of the numbers around. No-one's really pinned them down on this, but Labor's proposal is somewhere north of 200 million tonnes of CO2 to be reduced by 2030—and that is in law. The CSIRO report looked at every available current protocol, how much could be applied in a dreamscape and a realistic approach and exactly what impact you could get. They thought you could get 480 million tonnes of CO2 reduction under a methodology that requires 63 million hectares of ag land. But even the CSIRO says that is actually not that reasonable and is pretty unlikely. So then they looked at some of the other options. Commercial plantations and farm forestry could technically produce 42 million tonnes of CO2 reduction but would require five per cent of existing land. The CSIRO report, at the outset, said that existing land has to be cleared or partially cleared agricultural land.

Every single landholder in this country should be terrified of bills like this one, because it takes away their potential to earn a living, to drive the local economy, to employ people, potentially their own kids, to give them a future because their land will be locked up for 100 years under these types of agreements and protocols—a century! Imagine what will happen in 100 years. Imagine the population of this country. Imagine the population of the world. Imagine what will be needed to feed them. They will look to Australia for clean, green and safe produce. The idea that you will tie up this much land for this outcome is the wrong choice, the wrong decision. In fact, the CSIRO report said that the only viable way for up to 227 gigatonnes of CO2 reduction, would you believe, is carbon capture and storage. But that has been ruled out by the Minister for Climate Change and Energy, and yet around the world it is something that is being utilised by those who know this is really the only option. There is nothing more valuable in Australia than Australia's agricultural land and the farming land that produces the food that we all rely on.

I say to those opposite: you need to look at this much more closely, because the impact is not in the national interest. You've signed up to some international agreement that wants to tie up 30 per cent of Australia's country. If we look at the application in coastal areas, the only thing you can do for biodiversity is to stop fishing. There have already been significant impacts on the fishing industry, particularly in Queensland. In recent weeks, we saw gillnet closures, without any consultation—they were just announced—which will impact jobs and the economy, and the ability for Australians to access clean, green Australian seafood produced by Australian businesses is gone. I know the time is coming to an end, so, in conclusion, I say to those opposite, as I said at the outset: this bill is about growing koalas, not cattle. This bill is about producing possums instead of protein. We all want to protect the environment, but we have to protect the Australian people first.

Debate interrupted.