Australia needs to take a closer look at carbon credits and offsets. The stakes are high. Like it or not, carbon markets now play a significant role in Australia's emissions reduction framework. Well over $1 billion flows through carbon projects in this country every year. Major industrial facilities rely too much on carbon credits to meet their obligations under the safeguard mechanism. Governments, businesses, farmers and investors all have a growing interest in the success of our carbon market. For Australians to have confidence in the role that carbon credits play as we transition our economy to net zero emissions by 2050, those credits must represent real, measurable and additional emissions reduction. Regrettably, however, that confidence is in short supply. For years, scientists, economists, environmental organisations and market participants have expressed concern about whether or not Australian carbon credit units, or ACCUs, generally represent the emission reductions that they are claimed to represent.

At the same time, many of Australia's biggest polluters have relied more and more heavily on offsets—more heavily, in fact, than they have tried to reduce emissions within their own operations. While offsets may have a role to play in Australia's transition to a clean economy, they were never intended as a pay-to-pollute scheme through which companies can continue polluting rather than undertaking meaningful onsite abatement. The basic principles which guide the use of offsets are well established and straightforward. First, reduce emissions wherever possible. Second, transition to cleaner technologies and energy sources. And third, and only then, offset residual emissions that cannot be eliminated.

But our biggest polluting companies are buying record amounts of carbon credits, while the heavy industry sector reduced climate pollution by just 2.3 per cent in 2024-25. Mining giant Rio Tinto was Australia's largest user of carbon credits under the safeguard mechanism scheme, surrendering 1.2 million credits in 2024-25. The company's published climate reporting shows that its global scope 1 and scope 2 emissions barely moved last year, reducing from 31.7 megatonnes of carbon dioxide equivalent to just 31.5. Several other coal and gas companies, like Woodside, Glencore and Peabody, are prodigious users of carbon credits, while the top 10 users account for almost 60 per cent of all credits surrendered. This pattern has contributed to understandable and rational public scepticism about the role of carbon credits in our climate framework.

Perhaps the most influential and respected body of work regarding ACCU methodologies has come from Professor Andrew Macintosh and his colleagues at the ANU, who have argued consistently that Australia's carbon credit regime has failed to deliver real and additional carbon abatement. Professor Macintosh has described the scheme as a fraud on the environment, a fraud on taxpayers and a fraud on unwitting private buyers of ACCUs, including private households who purchase ACCUs to offset their personal emissions. These concerns led to the commissioning of the Independent Review of Australian Carbon Credit Units, chaired by Professor Ian Chubb. The Chubb review concluded that the ACCU scheme was essentially sound but made 16 recommendations to improve its governance, transparency, confidence and integrity. The government accepted those recommendations in principle, but the review's central conclusion was not widely accepted. Scientists, climate advocates and environmental organisations argued then, as now, that legitimate concerns about the integrity of methodologies used to calculate the efficacy of carbon offsets have been consistently understated or overlooked. The central concern then, as it is now, was whether the credits being generated represent genuine emissions abatement.

The controversy surrounding the review itself reflects the broader challenge confronting this parliament as we debate this bill. For carbon credits to play a substantial role in Australia's race towards net zero we have to have confidence that every credit represents a real environmental outcome. Complicating this trust exercise is the reality that carbon credits will always be an imperfect solution. Besides the imperative that credits function as the option of last resort for companies and organisations to reduce their emissions after all other avenues have been exhausted, as climate scientist organisations like the Climate Council have emphasised, there is no guarantee that carbon stored in land based offsets will remain permanently stored there. Regenerated forests can be destroyed by fire, by flood and by drought, all of which are increasing in frequency and intensity due to climate change. This is the elephant in the room when it comes to carbon offsets.

It's also against this backdrop that the Chubb review proposed 16 very sensible recommendations to strengthen governance and transparency. This bill now seeks to implement many of them, and one of the most welcome elements of the bill is its focus on transparency and on public disclosure. While Australia's carbon credit methodologies are publicly available, confidence in the scheme depends on more than access to legislative rules. Australians should be able to access the data and the evidence needed to independently scrutinise project outcomes and assess whether carbon credit projects are delivering the genuine emission reductions that they claim. This bill takes useful steps in that direction. It strengthens independent oversight through the creation of a carbon abatement integrity commission. It expands publication and information-sharing powers. It establishes mechanisms to respond when carbon credit methodologies pose integrity risks. And it strengthens the compliance framework that underpins the ACCU scheme. All of these are good, but there's still a lot more to do. The Institute for Energy Economics and Financial Analysis, IEEFA, has argued that the transparency provisions could be further strengthened through the publication of facility-level measurement methodologies, greater visibility around methodological changes, and disclosure of baseline adjustments when reporting methods change. These are sensible proposals.

The bill also contains important reforms on First Nations consent and native title. Indigenous-led carbon projects can create meaningful opportunities for First Nations communities by supporting ranger programs and land management activities, generating employment and providing an ongoing source of income for traditional owners and Indigenous organisations. These opportunities have to be built on genuine consent and partnership, which is why I support the measures in this bill that strengthen free, prior and informed consent for projects affecting Indigenous land and interests. I also urge the government to strike a careful balance between First Nations participation and timely project approval. It's absolutely important that traditional owners participate meaningfully in decisions affecting projects on their land. But at the same time, governments must ensure that consent arrangements remain clear, practical and workable. Communities deserve meaningful participation, but project assessment processes must also remain sufficiently predictable to support investment and development.

While there's much to support in this legislation, there are also areas where further attention is required. The first concern is the proposed carbon abatement integrity committee. The creation of an independent integrity body is a step in the right direction. The Chubb review identified the need for stronger governance and enhanced independent oversight of the ACCU scheme. The establishment of the carbon abatement integrity committee will address some of those concerns. But as the Environmental Defenders Office has argued, stronger protections could further reinforce that committee's independence. These could include requiring methodologies to be reviewed on a regular and transparent basis so that emerging scientific evidence can be incorporated and integrity risks identified before they become entrenched.

The EDO has also advocated for stronger conflict-of-interest safeguards so that decisions about methodology, development and approval remain independent of commercial interests. It's argued that the committee should be able to initiate its own reviews of methodologies where integrity concerns arise, rather than relying solely on ministerial direction. Such reforms would help ensure that the integrity framework remains responsive, evidence based and capable of maintaining public confidence in the ACCU scheme.

A second area requiring attention is the new integrity risk method declarations framework. The creation of a mechanism allowing intervention where methodologies present integrity risks is a positive development. But experts have raised concerns about whether or not the framework relies too heavily on ministerial discretion. The Smart Energy Council argues that integrity risk method declarations should be anchored in science and independent technical advice, not political judgement. Others have similarly emphasised the importance of strong governance and of independent integrity oversight.

Where significant integrity issues arise, it's my belief that decisions should be guided by transparent evidence and independent expertise, and that public trust will be lost if decisions appear vulnerable to political judgements. While this bill focuses on improving transparency and streamlining administration of Australia's carbon crediting scheme, it's the integrity of the offsets themselves which most concern experts and Australian communities. A high-integrity carbon market has to satisfy several criteria: it must generate genuine emissions reductions; it must employ robust and evidence based methodologies; it must operate transparently and minimise conflicts of interest; and it must avoid and prevent greenwashing. This legislation represents an important contribution towards that goal, but it should not be regarded as the final word.

The government's legislative response to the Chubb review is only one step in a much larger process. There remains considerable work ahead. Questions remain—questions regarding methane measurement and reporting, regarding methodology development and regarding how ACCUs and Safeguard Mechanism credits are being excessively relied upon to meet compliance obligations under the Safeguard Mechanism. Most importantly, there is much work to be done to rebuild trust in carbon credits. Serious questions are still being asked. Until strong governance, public accountability and genuine environmental benefit can be demonstrated, those questions will persist. Most importantly, Australians expect a carbon offsets regime that treats credits as supplementary to deep and sustained emissions reduction, not a substitute for it.

For those reasons, I support the intent of this bill, while encouraging the government to continue strengthening the integrity, the transparency and the independence of Australia's carbon credit framework in the years ahead.

I rise to speak in support of the Carbon Credits and Other Legislation Amendment (Integrity and Transparency) Bill 2026. For a community like Newcastle, climate change is not an abstract debate. It's about the future of our coastline, the health of our environment, the jobs our kids will have, and whether a city that has powered Australia for generations can remain an energy powerhouse in a very different energy economy. Newcastle knows what transition looks like. We know that change can be difficult, but we also know that change creates opportunities and that standing still is simply not an option. For too long, Australia's climate debate was trapped between denial and division under the former coalition government. We cannot afford to go back there. We need to reduce emissions, protect our environment and build a clean energy economy that creates good, secure jobs in the Hunter. That's why this bill matters.

If carbon credits are going to be part of Australia's transition to net zero, Australians need to be able to trust them. They need to know that a credit represents real action, that the rules are transparent, that projects have proper oversight and that government can act when a method raises serious integrity concerns. But integrity and certainty can go hand in hand. Carbon projects can require significant upfront investment and, particularly in the land sector, long-term commitments. Businesses, landholders, project developers, investors and buyers need confidence that a credit represents genuine abatement and that the rules are transparent and predictable.

The Australian Carbon Credit Unit Scheme, ACCU, is an important part of Australia's climate policy framework, but no climate policy should be set and forget. The scheme has been subject to independent reviews, as it should be, including the Chubb review and reviews by the Climate Change Authority. Importantly, the Chubb review found that the ACCU Scheme was fundamentally sound, while also recommending improvements to strengthen its integrity, transparency and governance. That's how you would expect things to go. This distinction matters because you can and should be strengthening a scheme—we always want to strive for improvements in every policy framework—but you've got to be able to strengthen that scheme without creating the impression that the existing ACCUs or the framework itself is somehow inherently unreliable, because that is not the case.

This bill strengthens the integrity, transparency and administration of the scheme. It strengthens consent requirements for projects on native title and claimed native title land. It establishes a new Carbon Abatement Integrity Committee with stronger expertise, independence and transparency. It gives government new powers to manage methods where there are serious integrity concerns, and strengthens compliance and relinquishment requirements. It also makes targeted changes to the new vehicle efficiency standard to ensure the scheme operates as intended. This is all about making sure Australians have confidence in the system.

I know some people are sceptical of carbon credits. We often hear it in this chamber. But an offset should never become an excuse for a major emitter to simply keep polluting. Carbon credits should complement genuine emissions reductions, not replace them. The government's climate policy must continue to drive down emissions at the source, but there will be emissions that are difficult to eliminate immediately, particularly in sectors where technology is still developing. For those residual emissions, high-integrity carbon credits can have a role. A carbon credit should represent genuine, measurable and lasting abatement. It should not be a licence to pretend the pollution has disappeared. This bill strengthens the system that makes those judgements and gives government a mechanism to respond when a method no longer meets integrity standards. We should improve the system because we take it seriously.

Getting this framework right matters particularly for industries that are the hardest to decarbonise. We don't have to look very far in Newcastle to understand what that means. Take Orica on Kooragang Island in my electorate. Orica is one of Newcastle's major industrial employers, and its Kooragang Island facility produces ammonia, an essential input for agriculture, mining and manufacturing. Decarbonising a facility like this is a massive undertaking, but Orica is investing heavily in doing exactly that. Its $37 million emissions-abatement project at Kooragang Island has reduced nitrous oxide emissions from its nitric acid plants by 95 per cent, with the overall reduction in greenhouse gas emissions from the site expected to be close to 50 per cent.

The project has also been approved as eligible to generate Australian carbon credit units, and Orica is taking that next step. Backed by a $432 million investment from the Albanese Labor government, it's progressing a renewable hydrogen project that will install a 50-megawatt electrolyser on Kooragang Island. Once operating, that renewable hydrogen is expected to displace around 7.5 per cent of Orica's natural gas use. MCi Carbon's plant Myrtle, also backed by this Albanese Labor government, is taking CO2 captured from Orica's ammonia production plant next door and turning it into materials that can be used in concrete, plasterboard and other building products. The plant is expected to capture around 2½ thousand tonnes of CO2 a year and produce around 10,000 tonnes of new materials.

The emissions from one industrial process become the input for another. Waste becomes a resource. This is what industrial decarbonisation looks like in the real world. It's hard work, and it doesn't happen overnight. These industries are not sitting idle. They are investing, innovating and working to reduce their emissions. But the scale of the transition is enormous. Think about industries like cement, aviation, shipping and energy-intensive manufacturing. Many were built decades ago around infrastructure and processes that no longer fit for a net zero economy. That means replacing gas with electricity, transforming production processes, rebuilding infrastructure and developing technologies that simply did not exist when these industries were established. We need to support these industries to reduce emissions as quickly as technology allows while continuing to invest in the technologies that will help them go further.

That's where high-integrity carbon credits can have a role. They can help address genuinely residual emissions while businesses invest in cleaner technologies and processes, but that only works if the credits themselves are credible. A tonne of carbon pollution cannot simply disappear because someone has purchased a certificate. There must be genuine abatement, transparency and accountability. That's precisely why strengthening Australia's carbon credit framework matters. Importantly, the Chubb review recognised the strength of the ACCU Scheme and identified opportunities to build on that foundation through improvements to integrity, transparency and governance. That's exactly what good policy should do: build on what works, learn from experience and continuously strengthen our frameworks. We should be focused on building confidence in the scheme, supporting high-integrity carbon abatement and ensuring ACCUs continue to play a vital role in Australia's emissions-reduction efforts.

The ACCU Scheme is not simply about helping businesses manage their emissions. It also creates a commercial incentive for Australian businesses and landholders to undertake projects that avoid emissions or remove carbon from the atmosphere. In the land sector, that can mean environmental plantings, revegetation and changes in land management. Those projects require people—project developers, ecologists, foresters, nursery workers, contractors, carbon specialists, monitoring teams and land managers. The ACCU Scheme and the safeguard mechanism are helping create an Australian carbon industry, directing private capital into regional landscapes and supporting Australian jobs. In Newcastle, this emerging industry is already creating jobs. Businesses such as Carbon Neutral, based within the University of Newcastle's innovation ecosystem, are developing carbon projects right around Australia, bringing together carbon science, land management and private investment. Newcastle isn't only home to those traditional industries that are having to carbonise; it's also becoming home to businesses supplying the expertise, technology and projects that make transition possible.

There is an important connection here with investment certainty. The safeguard mechanism creates a durable domestic source of demand. For covered facilities, emissions baselines are generally declining by 4.9 per cent each year through to 2030. That provides an incentive for direct industrial abatement and for investment in high-integrity Australian ACCUs, where residual emissions remain. If we get integrity, confidence and investment certainty right, we can mobilise private capital into genuine abatement while supporting new industries and jobs. That's good for the climate, regional Australia and Australia's industrial competitiveness.

We should not be asking hard-to-abate industries to choose between pretending their emissions don't exist and shutting down. We should be driving and giving them a pathway to decarbonise. Newcastle is already showing what that pathway can look like. We have companies investing in emissions reductions, researchers developing new technologies, workers with skills to build and operate them and a growing ecosystem of businesses that can turn industrial decarbonisation into new jobs and industries. It's not about giving industry a free pass. This is about giving industry a pathway. If Australian companies want to compete in a world increasingly demanding lower carbon products, we need credible mechanisms that help them reduce emissions, while the next generation of technologies comes online.

Australia also has an opportunity to become a significant producer of high-integrity carbon abatement. That means supporting projects that remove carbon from the atmosphere, avoid emissions, restore landscapes and improve land management while ensuring the carbon abatement itself is properly measured and credited. We have spent generations building Australia's industrial economy. Now we have the opportunity to use that expertise to build its clean industrial future. We can create skilled jobs, attract investment and develop technologies and expertise that can ultimately be exported around the world. And we can show that a region built on heavy industry can also lead Australia's transition to net zero.

We should also be honest about how we get there. Australia lost years of investment, certainty and the time that we could have been spending building those industries and infrastructure that we now need. For almost a decade, the coalition spent too much time fighting the reality of climate action rather than preparing Australia for the future. Anyway, that's why this government's getting on with the job. We don't have any time to waste. We've legislated emissions reduction targets. We're investing in renewable energy, supporting new transmission, backing manufacturing, investing in skills, strengthening the systems that underpin Australia's carbon market.

I want to make a particular point to the Greens political party, because Newcastle is a community that cares deeply about climate change and our natural environment. We want stronger action on climate change. We want clean energy. We want genuine emissions reductions, and the government's getting on with that. So I hope the Greens support this bill. There is a difference between demanding perfection and delivering real, substantive climate action. Let's not have a repeat of those mistakes of the past. The last time Australia had a major opportunity to take meaningful action on climate change, the Carbon Pollution Reduction Scheme got voted down in the Senate, where the coalition and the Greens joined together. Let's not repeat that.

This bill has important strengths for First Nations communities. We want to see that First Nations knowledge and perspectives are embedded. They have got to be represented in Australia's carbon market. Ultimately, this bill is about trust—trust that the numbers are real, trust that the rules are clear, trust that projects are properly scrutinised, trust that people with expertise are making the decisions, and trust that First Nations rights are respected.

Newcastle has never been afraid of change. We're a city of workers and innovators and have been for generations. We've powered Australia. We've built things Australia needs, and now we've got the opportunity to help build what Australia needs next: a cleaner, more competitive and more sustainable economy. That's what this bill helps deliver.

When I was a tomato farmer, I learnt pretty quickly that you cannot run a successful business on uncertainty. You need to know what you're planting, what it's going to cost and whether you have a market when the crop is ready. You make decisions months in advance. You put your own money on the line, and, once you've planted a crop, you can't simply change direction halfway through the season. That's the reality of farming. It's the reality facing businesses right across the electorate of Dawson. Whether you're growing tomatoes, running cattle, operating a transport business or investing in a new project, you need clear rules and a reasonable chance of getting a return.

This Albanese Labor government seems determined to make everything harder. The Carbon Credits and Other Legislation Amendment (Integrity and Transparency) Bill 2026 is another example of the government making it harder to do business. Just scratch the surface, and what do we find? More red tape, more uncertainty and more power for the minister. It's like buying a tractor advertised as an upgrade, only to discover it costs more to run, takes longer to do the job and someone else is going to decide when you get to use it.

The coalition will oppose this bill because this legislation goes well beyond improving administration. It changes the rules around native title consent. It removes an important financial safeguard, and it gives the minister new powers to interfere with the existing carbon credit methods. These are serious changes with real consequences for regional Australia, and those consequences deserve proper scrutiny.

Let me start with the issue that concerns me most—the impact on farmers. Under the existing carbon credit system, eligible projects on native title land can be registered conditionally. Project proponents then have up to five years, through the first reporting period, to demonstrate that the necessary consent has been obtained. Native title holders already have strong legal protection. Their consent is required, and they have the right to negotiate. The coalition recognises these protections and their importance, but Labor wants to take this process much further. Under sections 27 and 28, a registered native title claim could become an eligible interest even before the claim has legally been determined.

The bill also introduces a more complicated two-stage consent process. Under section 32, the Clean Energy Regulator could revoke a project declaration before the first reporting period where there is no reasonable prospect of obtaining the required consent. Let's just think about that. A farmer could spend months planning a project. They could engage advisers and consultants, prepare the paperwork and commit their own money. Then they could find themselves caught in negotiations over a claim that has not yet been determined. And, all the while, the costs just keep mounting.

I know what it's like to have your own money tied up in a farming operation. I know the pressure of making decisions when your livelihood depends on getting them right. And I know farmers don't have endless time or endless money to spend navigating complicated government processes. Yet Labor wants to introduce another layer of uncertainty. And for what purpose? What problem is this fixing?

The government points to the 2022 Chubb review, but the review did not recommend everything contained in this bill. Its recommendation on native title dealt with obtaining consent before conditional registration. It did not recommend extending eligible interests to unresolved native title claims. This is a very important difference between encouraging consultation and creating an additional legal requirement that could delay a project. Labor is trying to present the two as though they are the same. They are not, and the people who understand these processes are raising serious concerns.

The National Farmers Federation has warned that negotiations under the existing arrangements can already be lengthy, difficult and expensive. It has raised the reports of landholders being asked to pay money upfront simply to arrange an initial meeting. Now imagine adding even more complexity to that process. AgForce Queensland has also warned that the proposed changes could increase costs, create uncertainty and delay projects for the agricultural producers. In Dawson, where agriculture is a major part of our economy, those concerns deserve to be heard. Our farmers already have to contend with floods, fires, cyclones, rising input costs and unpredictable markets. They don't need the Albanese Labor government adding legal uncertainty to that list. Farmers need to farm, not do unnecessary paperwork.

The concerns don't stop at the farm gate. Last week, the High Court handed down a significant decision concerning the Mount Pleasant coalmine in New South Wales. The court found that planning authorities had failed to properly consider scope 3 emissions—the emissions produced when Australian coal is used overseas. This has raised serious questions about investment certainty across the Australian resources sector. In Dawson, where the coal industry supports thousands of jobs, that uncertainty matters. From the mines of the Bowen Basin to the workers and businesses servicing them from Mackay, our community sectors deserve and depend on a strong resources sector. We cannot afford a situation where Australian jobs and investment face growing legal uncertainty over emissions produced when our coal is used in other countries. Against that backdrop, the Albanese government wants to introduce even more uncertainty into the carbon credit system. Our mining communities need clear rules. They need investment confidence and certainty that the industries supporting them regionally have a future.

That brings me to another deeply troubling part of this bill: taxpayers money. Under the existing legislation, the government must have regard to achieving carbon abatement at least cost when purchasing carbon credits. I think that's a sensible requirement. If you're spending public money, you should be looking for the most economical way to achieve that result. It's the same principle any family with a budget or a small-business owner understands: you don't spend more than you need to just because you can. But Labor wants to remove that least cost test and replace it with a 'value for money' test. That might sound harmless, but here's the problem. The legislation doesn't clearly define what that means. Instead, the accompanying documents point to a range of other considerations including environmental, social, economic and cultural benefits. Those considerations may have merit in particular circumstances, but they should not be an excuse for looser spending rules.

Under Labor's proposal, the government could justify paying more for carbon credits based on a broad assessment of those additional benefits, and taxpayers would be left asking: How much more? Who decides? Where is the accountability? Families across Dawson are watching every dollar. Small businesses are doing the same. They're dealing with higher power bills, higher mortgages, higher rents, higher insurance costs and the rising price of just about everything, and they expect the federal government to show the same financial discipline that they have to exercise every single day. Taxpayers deserve better than that. The government should be tightening accountability, not weakening it.

That leads me to my third concern: more power to the minister. Under part 3 of this bill, the Minister for Climate Change and Energy could make a method transition declaration when specified criteria are met. Those criteria include whether a carbon credit presents a material risk to the scheme. In practical terms, an existing project could be required to move away from the method it was established under. The declaration would be subject to parliamentary disallowance. That provides some oversight, but it doesn't eliminate the uncertainty facing people who have already invested. Imagine putting your savings into a project, following the approved rules and then discovering that those rules could change before you've earned a return. Would you feel confident making that investment? Would your bank? Would your business partners? Of course not. That's why the National Farmers Federation have argued that these powers should be limited to generally exceptional circumstances.

We've already seen how political decisions can create uncertainty in the carbon credit market. In September the government reached an agreement with the Greens during a dispute over the native forest management methodology. Changes affecting carbon credits associated with the proposed great national koala park were also announced. The full consequences remain to be seen, but it demonstrates why parliament should be cautious about giving ministers additional powers over established projects. For regional industries, investment certainty matters, and this bill risks undermining that. It also sits along Labor's safeguard mechanism, which is already placing pressure on major industrial facilities through declining emission baselines. The coalition has made it clear that we will scrap Labor's safeguard mechanism, because Australia's economic future depends on keeping our industry strong, competitive and capable of employing more Australians. Nowhere is that more important than in regional communities, like mine in Dawson.

When I look at this legislation I see the farmer wondering whether another investment is worth the risk, the contractor trying to keep local workers employed and the small-business owner who is already struggling with rising costs. And I see the families whose livelihoods depend on the success of those businesses. These are the people for whom I fear the consequences when Labor gets it wrong. They deserve certainty. They deserve fair rules. They deserve a government that treats their money with respect. Integrity is not achieved by creating more uncertainty, transparency is not achieved by weakening a clear financial test, and confidence is not achieved by giving a minister greater powers to change the rules.

The Albanese Labor government should refer these contentious provisions to a Senate inquiry—let the farmers speak, let the industry experts speak, let the people who actually operate under these laws speak, and then listen to them. The people of regional Australia should not be expected to pay the price of poorly designed policy. As a former farmer, I understand that you reap what you sow. If this government keeps planting uncertainty, adding costs and changing the rules, it cannot expect regional Australia to produce the investment, the jobs and the growth our country needs. Dawson deserves better. Australia deserves better. That is why I and the coalition will be opposing this bill.

As we debate this legislation and prepare to vote on it there really is one simple question that all of us in this chamber need to answer: are we prepared to implement the expert and independent advice on how to strengthen the integrity, transparency and accountability of Australia's carbon market? That is the question at the heart of the Carbon Credits and Other Legislation Amendment (Integrity and Transparency) Bill 2026. Australia's carbon market has grown to become one of the largest and, indeed, one of the most respected carbon markets across the globe. Its success demonstrates that strong environmental outcomes can go hand in hand with economic opportunity and investment.

Listening to the member for Dawson talk about uncertainty, it is not lost on people who recall what happened under a decade of coalition government how dripping with irony his comments were. What we saw, in stark contrast to what we are seeing now, was 10 years of deep uncertainty when it came to carbon policy and when it came to the regulatory frameworks that not only businesses but also the broader community had to deal with. Those were dark days. They were dark days because businesses, small businesses and big businesses, had absolutely no idea what was happening, had no idea what legislation was coming down the pipeline next, had no idea how to plan for their businesses and their economic prosperity and had no idea how to hire or what skills to build. We cannot go back to those days.

The Australian Carbon Credit Unit Scheme provides a mechanism for businesses, landholders, traditional owners and other participants to generate carbon credits by avoiding or reducing greenhouse gas emissions or removing carbon from the atmosphere and storing it over the long term. Projects under the scheme deliver these practical outcomes in many different ways. Participants may adopt new technologies or modernise equipment and infrastructure, driving productivity at the same time. They can improve business operations and energy efficiency, adopting cheaper and cleaner ways of producing energy, or they can implement better land and vegetation management practices, helping protect our environment and incentivising better economic outcomes, incentivising better pricing for business and incentivising more sustainable outcomes across the deck.

It's working. Since 2011, the ACCU Scheme has delivered more than 190 million tonnes of emissions abatement through over 2,600 projects. The market is valued at more than $4 billion. That is a market that didn't exist until just a few short years ago. Critically, the scheme is an important part of Australia's plan to reduce emissions and achieve net zero by 2050. Beyond its contribution to climate goals, the scheme is generating significant economic, social and cultural benefits, particularly in regional and remote areas. ACCUs have become a new agricultural commodity, helping farmers and landowners to have the opportunity to diversify their income and to attract investment via activities such as soil carbon sequestration, plantation forestry and reforestation.

The scheme is also creating meaningful economic opportunities for First Nations communities, supporting employment, enterprise development and long-term investment. In doing so, it's helping Indigenous communities build that economic independence while maintaining strong connections to country and to culture. The scheme recognises and rewards the environmental value of traditional land management knowledge and practices, including strategic and controlled burning early in the dry season. These methods are expected to generate substantial economic returns, an estimated $7.7 billion, across northern Australia. Indigenous organisations are already playing a leading role in the sector, generating the majority of carbon credits produced through savanna fire management projects. This reflects the central role that First Nations communities continue to play in caring for country and delivering positive environmental outcomes at the same time. The income generated through these projects provides far-reaching benefits beyond emissions reduction. It supports stable long-term employment. It strengthens Indigenous ranger programs. It funds education and training initiatives, protects cultural heritage and enables First Nations communities to continue caring for country using knowledge that has been passed down through generations.

That's why the integrity and transparency of this scheme matter. When First Nations communities invest their expertise and resources into carbon projects, they deserve confidence in that system. They deserve to know that it operates fairly and effectively. Under the current carbon credits act, which established the scheme, carbon projects may be granted conditional registration on native title land and proceed for a period of up to seven years before the consent of native title holders is required. As Anna Boustead, CEO of the Indigenous Carbon Industry Network, has said:

This legislation loophole has driven a 'land grab' of carbon projects, with hundreds of carbon projects registered over the last four years primarily by non-Indigenous carbon developers. Many of these projects were registered without consent from Traditional Owners.

This reflects findings from the independent 2022 Chubb review, which made 16 recommendations to improve the scheme. Recommendation 11 calls for amendments to the carbon farming initiative act so that ACCU projects cannot be conditionally registered on native title land without first obtaining the consent of native title holders. Closing this loophole will bring the scheme into closer alignment with that principle of free, prior and informed consent, strengthening the rights of First Nations peoples to have a genuine say in projects that are proposed on their country, on their land. In practice, this strengthening of First Nations consent requirements means there must be consent for the project application before it is registered and consent to how it will operate before any ACCUs are used.

The bill also strikes that balance between stronger protections and practical administration. While enhancing safeguards for native title holders and claimants, it also streamlines administrative arrangements for area based emissions avoidance projects. This will reduce unnecessary regulatory burdens for eligible interest holders.

I want to take a moment to talk more about that principle: free, prior and informed consent. It's a cornerstone of the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples. It's also a fundamental principle guiding the Australian Greens' engagement with First Nations issues. The Greens political party have stated that they will ensure Australia complies with those principles and all other international instruments that recognise the rights of First Nations peoples. If that commitment, that bond, that compact that the Greens political party has made is indeed genuine, then they will vote for this bill. Talk without action is the natural enemy of change, and if the Greens political party choose to tell the Australian people that this is what they believe, then they have to stump up and vote in the same way. You cannot say it without putting your vote behind it.

By strengthening requirements for free, prior and informed consent and improving the recognition of native title rights within the scheme, this legislation advances the principles contained in the United Nations Declaration of the Rights of Indigenous Peoples. It ensures that First Nations communities have a stronger voice in decisions affecting their country and greater control over projects undertaken on native title land. Voting against these reforms means rejecting practical measures that give effect to that most important principle: free, prior and informed consent. Voting against these reforms means rejecting the strengthening of not only First Nations people's rights within Australia's carbon market but also the carbon market itself and the certainty that it grants to communities, First Nations peoples and, indeed, business. I therefore urge the Greens to support this legislation. In doing so, you will be supporting stronger protections for First Nations communities, greater integrity in this scheme and the implementation of principles that you have long advocated for.

This bill implements other amendments to the Carbon Credits (Carbon Farming Initiative) Act. What they have in common is enhancing that integrity and transparency of the scheme. The amendments include the evolution of the Emissions Reduction Assurance Committee into the Carbon Abatement Integrity Committee. This new body will have expanded responsibilities and a stronger focus on ensuring the integrity of the scheme as it continues to grow. Critically, the new committee will be required to have First Nations representation, reflecting the importance that the Albanese Labor government places on Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander input into the operation of the scheme.

This bill also transfers the responsibility for government purchasing of ACCUs from the regulator to the Department of Climate Change, Energy, the Environment and Water. The reforms will also make it easier for landholders to undertake a broad range of emissions reduction activities within a single project. It will allow both carbon sequestration and unrelated emissions avoidance activities to be credited under the same project. This will support the development of more flexible framework-style approaches.

This bill also implements amendments to the New Vehicle Efficiency Standard Act to improve the administration of the new vehicle efficiency standard and to better align the operation of the scheme with its original policy intent. In particular, the amendments adjust the timing of key milestones within the new vehicle efficiency standard, including the calculation of interim emissions values and final emissions values, the timing for extinguishing liabilities and the expiry dates for NVES units. These changes will ensure that industry participants have a full two years to use, trade or extinguish NVES units that they have earned or received through transfers from other vehicle suppliers. This provides greater certainty and greater flexibility for businesses who are participating in the scheme.

The question I asked at the beginning of this speech should have a simple answer. It should not be a partisan question. These reforms should not become a political football. To quote Anna Boustead again:

Today's proposed amendments mark a meaningful shift towards recognising and protecting Indigenous rights and interests within Australia's carbon market …

As I said, support for this legislation is support for strengthening integrity and transparency. Support for this legislation is support for empowering First Nations people. Support for this legislation is support for ensuring that our carbon market continues to deliver for business, communities, First Nations people and all Australians.

I reflect on the member for Moreton's contribution there, mentioning dark days. There are indeed dark days in Australia, not from the period 2013 to 2022, when the coalition were last in government, but for the employees of the Kemerton Lithium Plant in my own electorate. Hundreds were laid off when that facility closed, citing the unviable cost of energy in Australia today and the unviable cost of business in Australia today. This bill, the Carbon Credits and Other Legislation Amendment (Integrity and Transparency)—so-called—Bill is a wolf in sheep's clothing accordingly.

Indeed, the member for Moreton reflected on business uncertainty, and I do wonder whether businesses around Australia today feel any sense of certainty when the taxation regimes that they face, through the extensive use of trusts, legitimately, by small businesses and farmers across Australia, are under attack from the Albanese Labor government. I wonder whether businesses feel any sense of certainty at all when it comes to their capacity to pay their tax bills with credit cards, which one minute was perfectly fine but the next was sneakily banned some eight hours after the announcement by the ATO that they would no longer accept small businesses paying their taxes by credit card, followed by a couple of texts flying around between journos and the PM and the Treasurer. And we find that that has suddenly been pushed out to 30 June next year.

This bill goes a long way beyond making just a few administrative changes—a little nip and a tuck, as the bill title would imply—and instead greatly expands Australia's native title regime and the reach that it has through doing business in Australia. It removes the least cost financial test and hands the Minister for Climate Change and Energy sweeping new carbon credit powers. These are deeply consequential amendments that the coalition simply cannot support.

Let's step through these in turn. The very significant expansion of native title changes and reach in Australia is effectively the principal concern that the coalition has with the bill. The reason for that is that, under the current arrangements, the Carbon Credits (Carbon Farming Initiative) Act 2011 provides for the conditional registration of eligible offsets projects on native title land before the consent of eligible interest holders has been obtained. What that has meant in practice in the many years subsequent to the passage of that legislation—through the Gillard government, I might add—is that a project may be established for up to five years, which is the first reporting period, before it is required to provide evidence to the Clean Energy Regulator that the eligible interest holder's consent has been obtained to undertake that project. That's worked satisfactorily in our country since 2011, but this bill, in clauses 27 and 28, drastically upends that process. What the bill would actually mean going forward is that a mere claim to native title would become an eligible interest in the project. That doesn't mean that the title claim needs to exist at law; it doesn't mean that the title claim needs to exist—but rather that the claim has been made. And that means that a proponent for one of these projects, of which the government publicly says it is so desperately short, would need to, under the passage of this bill, actually engage in a consent process with anyone who sought to make a claim.

Just think about what that means for the business certainty that the member for Moreton seemed so interested in. It is simply extraordinary to involve people who might not actually have a claim at law in the approvals process for a carbon credits project. Amongst other things, this makes the approvals process so much more cumbersome for setting up a carbon abatement project, and that just flies in the face of the idea that we're desperately short of carbon credit union units in Australia.

At clause 32, the bill goes on, the Clean Energy Regulator would be allowed to unilaterally revoke a proponent's project declaration at any time prior to the first reporting period—five years, as we just said—if there is no reasonable prospect that the consent will be obtained between proponents and eligible interest holders. Just think about what that means for business certainty, where this decision can be unilaterally yanked by the minister at any point in the first five years of the project.

We, of course, acknowledge readily that native title laws have existed in Australia for well over 30 years. Although their composition has always been the subject of complex and significant national debate and, indeed, many protracted legal proceedings in various courts across Australia there has always tended to be a recognition by lawmakers in this place that there are practical limitations to the application of native title laws. That's why the bill that we have before us goes so much further than is acceptable, because it is the definition of 'mission creep' or 'scope creep' rather than a nip and tuck.

Let's turn to the issue at hand in terms of any bill that comes before the parliament. What are you actually trying to fix? What proposed change does this bill represent as a solution? Under the current carbon credits regime, native title holders enjoy absolutely rock-solid legal protections. We see that because these include provisions that a project proponent must obtain the consent of a native title holder and there is a built-in right to negotiate. This change not only upends that but also goes way beyond what the government's own report recommended.

In introducing this bill, the assistant minister asserted that the changes the bill is trying to make arise from the 2022 Chubb review. But, when you read the Chubb review, that's not the case. Recommendation 11 of that review was the only recommendation that went to issues around native title. It proposed that project proponents be prevented from conditionally registering projects prior to obtaining the consent of eligible interest holders. The review did not recommend an expansion of eligible interest holders to cover a mere claim of native title, which, as we said, is a claim that may not exist in law and might be vexatious in nature. Anyhow, the 2022 Chubb review did not recommend the expansion of eligible interests. In fact, the review went only so far as to state:

Proponents, in keeping with current industry best practice, should consider the need for, and the benefit of, consent from not only Native Title holders but also Native Title claimants.

That's a reasonable proposition. If this bill only adopted the recommendation of the Chubb review, then we might find ourselves in an entirely different position when it comes to supporting this bill. But the legal realities of expanding the native title regime are unclear at best. This is, as I said, an expansive and well-litigated part of Australian law. The reality is that by fiddling in an unconsulted way and an ill-considered way—this stuff is headed straight for the courtrooms of Australia.

According to the Indigenous Carbon Industry Network, who support the bill—and I believe they have met with the assistant minister—11 per cent of Australia's landmass is currently under native title claim that's awaiting a decision to be made by the Federal Court as to the area's native title status. That is a huge part; 11 per cent of Australia's landmass is under a claim awaiting determination. That's before you open the door to any sort of vexatious claim that might be made under the expanded provisions should this bill pass the parliament.

In their submission to the prior consultation process on this bill, the National Farmers' Federation recommended that the government replace the regime and instead opt for a right to negotiate similar to that which applied under the future acts regime. The NFF, in making their submission, provided some particularly compelling evidence. They found that negotiations underway with the current regime are already difficult, protracted and not always conducted in good faith by all parties. They provided reports of landholders having to pay money upfront simply for an initial sit-down meeting with an eligible interest holder. If that's a feature that we want to become part of the Australian economy, I don't want any part of it.

Worryingly, the National Farmers' Federation went on to state that such events are not isolated. They reflect a pattern of behaviour experienced by the sector nationwide. They went on to say that the ACCU Scheme should not convert a prospective claim that has not yet been formally determined into an indefinite consent right. I believe that's a point that is strongly made. They're not alone though in raising concerns about the significant expansion of native title through this bill, which, as I said, is a wolf in sheep's clothing and not merely a nip and tuck.

AgForce Queensland, which represents 6,000 farmers who manage some 55 million hectares of land, argue that the proposed changes represent risks that create substantial uncertainty and significantly increase project establishment costs, transaction complexity and delays for agricultural producers. These are landholders who we want to be where they are ready, willing and able to undertake carbon abatement projects. These are landholders who otherwise are seeking to do the right thing and to invest capital in the production of carbon credit units—which, if we accept the government members' submissions on this bill, are desperately short and in demand and should be fostered. So this bill represents an own goal, when you consider those who already own the land in Queensland that we're talking about.

They're not alone. Other large consumers or users of carbon credits, including from the oil and gas industry, have raised substantial concerns with this proposal. They see that it creates investment uncertainty, which will reduce and delay ACCU supply. These are businesses that have nothing directly to do with the production of carbon units but, rather, rely on the ability to have a functioning ACCU market in Australia to meet the current requirements of the government's net zero legislative framework. So we either, as the coalition have suggested, take a knife to the net zero agenda of the government, bin the safeguard mechanism and accept that there is this uncertainty in the supply of ACCUs, or we reject this bill and the uncertainty it creates for the supply of ACCUs that Australian businesses are currently relying on. It's an own goal, it's a wolf in sheep's clothing and fundamentally it doesn't represent a step forward when it comes to dealing with these issues.

So our plan is, as I said, to get rid of the safeguard mechanism, because we've seen, in my own electorate, the impact of the carbon credits market, the net zero legislative agenda—driving up the cost of energy in Australia and driving a loss of jobs. Hundreds of jobs have been lost at Albemarle's Kemerton lithium refinery, and they cited that it was the cost of power and the cost of doing business in Australia that effectively shut that facility—a facility that represented hundreds of millions of dollars of new investment and never achieved nameplate production capacity.

But unfortunately the story from my electorate is far from the only one. Multiple facilities covered under Labor's carbon tax and the emissions safeguard mechanism have closed or are in the process of being shut down. In some cases there have been billion-dollar bailouts of those facilities to keep them online, as we've seen at Tomago and other places, like Whyalla. But while the energy minister wants to pursue his green dreams rather than supporting cheaper power in our country, the only large industrial facilities that depend on carbon credits under the safeguard mechanism that'll stay online are those bailed out by the poor old taxpayer.

That is not the limit of the economic madness that we see in pursuit of these policy goals, though, because of course the energy minister wants to put offshore wind turbines on Geographe Bay, directly related to carbon credits and this other legislative framework. Yet, on the government's own numbers from the CSIRO's GenCost report, offshore wind is three times more expensive than onshore wind, and that gap is increasing over time. So we've got a bill that will jeopardise the investment and will reduce and delay ACCU supply. We've got projects that aren't supported locally; indeed, they are actively rejected by their communities. And we've got legislative proposals before the parliament that say they're one thing—just a nip and a tuck—but represent a substantial step backwards when it comes to the supply of ACCUs. We've got only one choice, and that's to reject this bill.

The Albanese Labor government will be known as the government that fast-tracked Australia's renewable energy transition—a renewable energy transition that has been described as the biggest technological shift since the industrial revolution of the 19th century. And just as the industrial revolution shaped economies and societies, the renewable energy transition will change all Australians' lives for the better. It will mean cheaper energy because renewable energy is consistently demonstrated to be cheaper than gas or coal. It will mean a long-term vision for Australia's energy grid that guarantees a reliable and efficient source of power, taking advantage of Australia's abundance of natural resources like solar and wind. It will mean a more sustainable environmental footprint as we look towards meeting our emissions reductions targets.

The Albanese Labor government will be known as the government that met the energy moment, a government that isn't in denial about our global reality, a government that refuses to waste years on internal ideological squabbles, kowtowing to industry lobbyists while the world literally burns. While Australia and the world find themselves on the brink of environmental collapse, our friends in the Pacific watch sea levels rise and we all deal with the more frequent and stronger storms and freak weather that we've been facing. This government is prepared to act now to build the infrastructure that will shore up our energy resilience. This government is committed to leaving a world that is liveable for our children and grandchildren and the generations that follow. That is why the Albanese Labor government is committed to ensuring that Australia's carbon market, one of the biggest integrity schemes in the world, is fit for purpose, efficient and transparent.

Carbon credits incentivise big polluters to engage in emissions-reduction activities and help them meet their safeguard mechanism obligations. For example, they encourage industry to employ new technologies, upgrade their equipment or change their business practices to prioritise productivity and energy efficiency. Since 2011, carbon credits have achieved 190 million tonnes of abatement over 2,600 projects, amounting to a market value of more than $4 billion. Carbon credits are a crucial component of Australia's climate policy framework. They are a crucial part of Australia's objective to achieve net zero by 2050.

The Carbon Credits and Other Legislation Amendment (Integrity and Transparency) Bill strengthens and reinforces the regulatory framework around carbon credits. It will mean that consent needs to be sought for projects on native title land and before carbon credits can be issued. It will grant new powers to the minister to compel a project's transition to an alternative method where the current method poses a material risk to the integrity of the carbon credits scheme. A method is a set of rules and requirements that determine what activities are eligible for carbon credits. Methods cover a range of projects in agriculture, energy efficiency, landfill and waste, mining, oil and gas, and vegetation.

The bill will strengthen the compliance powers of the Clean Energy Regulator to reverse a decision where false or misleading information for a project has been identified and to issue fines rather than pursue a remedy in a lengthy and complicated court process. It will reassign responsibility for the buying of carbon credits from the Clean Energy Regulator to the Department of Climate Change, Energy, the Environment and Water, separating their powers and functions and avoiding conflicts of interest. It will streamline the administration of the Carbon Credit Scheme, facilitating easier transitions to new methods and providing the regulator with more flexibility to adjust audit frameworks and manage outstanding consents and regulatory approvals.

It will replace the Emissions Reduction Assurance Committee with a carbon abatement integrity committee, a body that will provide crucial advice to the minister and the secretary of the department, spearhead method development, perform compliance checks and routine reviews of methods and reviewed the crediting period extensions during which carbon credits can be claimed. The committee will require that at least one member be Aboriginal or Torres Strait Islander, and the bill will make changes to the National Greenhouse and Energy Reporting Scheme, a single framework for reporting company information about greenhouse gas emissions, energy production and energy consumption. It will streamline the way in which this information is published and improve transparency by empowering the regulator to be able to require a more detailed publication of information.

The bill will make changes to the new vehicle efficiency standard. The new vehicle efficiency standard incentivises manufacturers to send more energy-efficient vehicles to Australia, giving Australian consumers more choice when it comes to electric and hybrid vehicles. The new vehicle efficiency standard has meant more Australians are purchasing more energy-efficient vehicles. In August this year, electric vehicles outsold petrol vehicles for the first time, an increase of 171 per cent on the same month last year. The bill improves the new vehicle efficiency standard by fixing the timing misalignment for vehicle suppliers, giving them a longer period in which to reduce the emissions value—what determines their eligibility for carbon credits—of the cars they import into Australia in any given year.

Australia's carbon market plays a substantial and meaningful role in reaching our 2050 net zero target. Our carbon market is one of the best of its kind in the world. This bill is about improving and maintaining the transparency, accountability and integrity of Australia's carbon credit scheme. It's about strengthening Australians' confidence in the system. This bill will help cultivate an environment in which emissions-reduction activities are an attractive proposition for investors who want to do their bit. It will support vital research and development in new emissions-reduction technologies. While striving towards our emissions-reduction targets, the economic benefits will flow to industries, local communities and landholders, and it will create more long-lasting jobs. This bill is a trifecta of successes. It will benefit the climate, it will benefit the economy and it will benefit Australian communities.

This important bill is just one plank of the Albanese Labor government's comprehensive mission to reduce the production of emissions in this country and to do what we can to pull ourselves back from the point of no return, from the point of complete climate disaster. It is non-negotiable. We need to do all we can to mitigate the effects of climate change, which are already currently being felt across the globe in economies and communities, while ensuring that Australians can affordably and reliably access the energy they need. We, unlike those on the opposition benches, have been steadfast on this question. The Albanese Labor government has set a target of between 62 and 70 per cent reduction on 2005 standard emissions by 2035, while those opposite have opposed this and just about every other climate target and have abandoned net zero by 2050. Our commitment to net zero by 2050 and our interim targets are practical and achievable. They're informed by scientific consensus and backed by industry.

Eighty per cent of global GDP is covered by national net zero commitments, with global investment in clean-energy projects amounting to over US$2 trillion. That is why we've introduced a reformed safeguard mechanism that will require that Australia's biggest polluters cut their emissions by five per cent every year and we've committed to making Australia's energy grid 82 per cent renewable electricity by 2030. Australia is on track to meet these objectives while embracing technological changes along the way that will also improve the speed, efficiency and effectiveness of our methods.

The Albanese Labor government has made and continues to make record investments in renewable energy. Since we came into government, Australia's wind and solar capacity has increased by 60 per cent. We have had record levels of renewables in line with record demand for them. Coal and gas generation are at historic lows, which is good because these are the most expensive forms of energy. The reason that these power stations are closing is not because they've suddenly become greenies; it's because they are no longer economical. They can't compete against renewables. Renewables and batteries have been more accessible and affordable than ever before, all of which has translated to cheaper electricity bills for all Australians.

The government introduced a $1.7 billion energy savings package to help households, businesses and local governments to cut their bills. We've invested in clean energy right across the country, including a 30 per cent discount on solar batteries, an initiative that has experienced one of the highest uptakes in my electorate of Boothby and has been wildly popular across the country. This not only benefits those houses that put the batteries on but also drives down demand for expensive gas generated electricity in the evening, benefiting everyone by taking the peak down. From July this year, the government's Solar Sharer Offer has meant that retailers are now required to provide three hours of free power every day by tapping Australia's excess and abundant solar energy.

We have invested in the electrification of our economy, including, as this bill seeks, to reinforce the New Vehicle Efficiency Standard, giving consumers more choice and better choice when it comes to electric vehicles. When we came to government, there were only 45 types of EVs on the market. Now there are over 160. When we came to government, there were no EV models under $45,000 on the market. Now there are eight models that can be bought for less than $45,000. To encourage greater uptake in EVs, the government has made EVs more affordable with tax discounts. On top of this, we are building more EV chargers right across the country. We've expanded clean fuel use by supporting green hydrogen and low-carbon liquid fuels in industry. We continue to harness new technologies to facilitate the renewable energy transition, and we will, with this bill, bolster Australia's carbon credit scheme.

Australia is primed to take the renewable energy transition to the next level, the biggest global energy shift since the Industrial Revolution. We have the policies to back it, the natural resources to give life to it and the technologies to facilitate it. The Albanese Labor government has a vision for Australia that recognises the global environment in which we exist. The coalition has opposed us at every turn. While we want Australia to be a renewable energy superpower, they would prefer that we languish in tired squabbles about the realities of climate change, denying what is before us. It is happening. Countries around the world are experiencing the effects of climate change every day now, and it's the Albanese Labor government that is committed to taking urgent and appropriate action. I commend the bill to the House.

I rise to speak on the Carbon Credits and Other Legislation Amendment (Integrity and Transparency) Bill 2026. I think this is not an administrative tidy up. I think this bill is a wolf in sheep's clothing. It's fundamentally flawed, and I think it's a regressive net zero bill. It begins with extending expanding the native title regime and removing the least cost test. It gives the minister sweeping new powers over carbon credits. I think these are really consequential changes that will make Australia poorer and make it more difficult to do business in Australia and make it more difficult to develop our country and our resources. I think that's a retrograde step, because we need our economy to be strong and we need to be successful if we are to navigate all of the challenges that we face into the future.

The bill's most serious flaw is its expansion of the native title arrangements. Under the current act, an offsets project may be conditionally registered on native title land before consent is secured, but evidence of consent must be provided by the end of the first reporting period within five years, and sections 27 and 28 of this would make a mere native title claim an eligible interest, whether or not the title has been established at law, and impose a much more cumbersome two-stage consent process. Section 32 would let the Clean Energy Regulator revoke a project declaration before the first reporting period where there is no reasonable prospect of consent. What problem is this solving? Native title holders already have strong protections. Proponents must obtain consent, and holders retain a right to negotiate.

The change also goes beyond the Chubb review. Recommendation 11 opposed conditional registration before consent. It did not recommend extending eligible interests to mere claims. The review said, 'Proponents should only consider the need for and benefit of claimant consent.' The legal consequences for this are very unclear. The Indigenous Carbon Industry Network says 11 per cent of Australia's land mass is under native title claim awaiting Federal Court determination. The National Farmers' Federation recommends a right-to-negotiate model, similar to that which exists with the future acts regime, and it says, 'Current negotiations are already difficult, protracted and sometimes not conducted in good faith, including demands for upfront payment merely to hold an initial meeting.' These incidents, according to the National Farmers' Federation, reflect a pattern of behaviour experienced by the sector nationwide.

It's not just the National Farmers' Federation. Industry concern is more broad than that. AgForce Queensland—it represents some 6,000 farmers, managing 55 million hectares—warns that there is 'substantial uncertainty', higher establishment costs, greater complexity and delays. Woodside has raised concerns. AGL wants clarity on overlapping claims and how consent requirements can co-exist with timely project delivery. And the Business Council of Australia warns of unintended consequences and calls for 'specific guidelines for clear evidence requirements, standard forms and service level timeframes' to reduce delay and uncertainty.

Our concern, also, is that this would unleash a new wave of lawfare in Australia. The expansion risks unleashing this lawfare, delaying good-faith projects, driving up costs and pitting Australians against each other—without improving environmental outcomes. At a minimum, it requires deeper consultation and Senate committee scrutiny, involving farmers, legal experts and a broad sector across industry.

This bill also removes the least cost test, which currently requires carbon abatement purchases to avoid undue financial impact. Labor would replace that with an undefined and opaque 'value for money' test, allowing expensive credits to be purchased in pursuit of government policy. Now, the taxpayer should come first in this, but Labor's record doesn't inspire confidence. The cost of the Capacity Investment Scheme remains undisclosed. Rewiring the Nation has blown out by at least $1 billion—probably a lot more than that. The Cheaper Home Batteries Program has risen from $2.2 billion to $8.5 billion. And the three regional hydrogen hubs have collapsed at taxpayers' expense. That's not to mention the $155 million set aside for COP, including $6 million for hotels in Fiji. The government owes it to the Australian people to be a lot more transparent about what the cost of this is. It can't just say, 'We're pursuing climate action, and it's the right thing to do, in our opinion.' You've got to disclose the costs of these things, and then we can have a debate in Australia about the costs and the benefits.

In addition, this bill gives the minister significant powers. Part 9 would give the minister the power to shut down carbon abatement projects by legislative instrument. Disallowance is not enough; the government has not shown that persistent noncompliance threatens this scheme or justifies such a broad power. And projects should not be torn up when the political fashions change. Again, the National Farmers' Federation has said that the power should 'be limited to genuinely exceptional circumstances', with proponents given time to transition to a new methodology, and we agree with that assessment.

This bill also supports the operation of the safeguard mechanism. From 2014 to 2023, the government was the largest buyer of carbon credits, and demand is now driven by the safeguard facilities because Labor's baselines are constantly falling and they operate as a tax on industry. Covered facilities have closed or are closing, while Australia's annual emissions reduction has flatlined under Labor. The coalition will scrap Labor's safeguard mechanism.

Now, there's an important debate to be had about climate change, its effect and what action looks like. It is an important debate, and I mentioned it in the first speech I gave in this place—that it's a serious and real problem for the globe, for everyone on the planet. But I said this at the time and I stand by it: if we rush towards an energy transition that makes us poorer—and I made this speech in 2022, just as I came into this place, just after the government had gone to an election promising that, for their energy transition, the modelling had shown that their climate action was going to make people's bills $275 cheaper. Well, that certainly hasn't happened. I felt that there was a real risk that if we rushed into it and lived in this delusion—and I do think it is a delusion that renewables can provide 82 per cent of our electricity whilst we remain a serious manufacturing economy—then what was going to happen, and we're seeing this already, unfortunately, was that industry was going to shift offshore to other parts of the world that don't have measures that are as punitive as ours when it comes to emissions. Now, that's a tragedy for Australia, because we lose the economic activity of those industries and all the benefits that come with it, all the employment and everything. In many cases we were doing that in a quite efficient way, but global emissions weren't going to reduce. They were just going to go somewhere else.

That was four years ago. I think this is really playing out. People in Europe are starting to understand that if global demand for all sorts of things that require emissions stays the same and we just shift the problem to another part of the world and say, 'We've done our bit'—well, no. We've only made our country poorer. And if we're poorer, we're less able to deal with—I acknowledge—the issues that climate change is going to throw at us. It often gets scoffed at in this place, but we should face Australia's ability to contribute to emissions reduction globally and therefore climate action, as it's called. Various estimates have it at one to 1.5 per cent of global emissions. People like to say that the per capita issue is significant there, as if that somehow makes the emission different. It doesn't, really. I will paraphrase a climate campaigner: it is an inconvenient truth that most of the emissions happen in Russia, India, China and the United States. If we go ahead with some of this action that's going to affect our economy and they don't, they become richer. They keep emitting, and the climate problem doesn't get solved. We just don't have the resources to deal with it.

Another point I'd like to make about the energy transition and dealing with climate change is I refuse to believe that the Labor Party are really serious about a long-term emissions reduction program in Australia until someone stands at that dispatch box as the Prime Minister in Australia and says, 'We are removing the moratorium on nuclear energy.' I think it's becoming apparent around the world—climate campaigners are starting to say—that we really do need this base-load power, the 24/7 power. It complements renewables. Renewables can't do it all. I've talked before about Centre for Independent Studies examples and modelling from around the world that shows that renewable energy is obviously very good technology in the right place and at the right percentage of the grid. Their assessment is that that's about 30 per cent. Since that report came out, since this government came to power, we can see now that we are going to have a significantly increased requirement for electricity in this country because of the advent of data centres. We can't really avoid that. I think that really needs to provoke a rethink by the current government on what they do about the nuclear power moratorium in this country. I believe it will happen; I really do. I think reality will get there eventually.

We want to oppose this bill and subject it to proper scrutiny, because it will make doing business harder. That means that fewer people are employed, and that means a reduction in living standards. We're already seeing that trend damage this country and its wonderful people enormously, and we've got to turn that trend around. So the opposition will vote against the bill. We believe it should go to a Senate inquiry so the government can hear directly from the farmers, the other stakeholders and a broad range of industry about what the consequences of this bill will be.

I rise to speak on the Carbon Credits and Other Legislation Amendment (Integrity and Transparency) Bill 2026. Our carbon market is truly a great success story. It's one of the most effective and highest integrity schemes of its kind in the world. Now there's a whole new part of this about energy efficiency standards and what they are going to look like for electric cars. I'm not going to comment too much on that. I drive a diesel. I love my diesel. But what I am interested in is the carbon credits, the abatement. Assuming that I'm going to keep driving a diesel, I need to have a way to reduce my carbon footprint on the world, and carbon credits play a massive part in that.

But the other part of it, which is somewhat overlooked but very important, is there's not a lot of economic activity in parts of my electorate. There are vast amounts of really not much. In a lot of communities, finding a job, finding out who am I going to be, can be a bit difficult. There's not a lot of shops. There's not a lot of industry, and that's just the nature of the distances. When I started travelling the Cape consistently, probably in the last decade or so, when I would meet kids in community, mostly they wanted to talk to me about how they were going to be the next Johnathan Thurston. But over the last few years, there's been a dramatic shift in the attitude of these young kids and what they think they're going to be when they grow up. They say to me, 'I'm going to be a ranger. I'm going to look after country.' The way that they can do that and the way that they can fund that is through carbon credits.

Now, savanna burning is worth around $7.7 billion across the northern part of this country. The way that it works is pretty simple. If you're burning at a lower temperature, not as much carbon is released into the atmosphere, and the regrowth sucks more carbon back in. So it is not only creating a net negative of carbon going into the world but it is also providing jobs, economic opportunity, hope, role models and all of these great things. It provides an opportunity on country, and that's really, really important.

They say: if you do something you love, you never work a day in your life. I believe that's true for a lot of people. Doctors who grow up wanting to be doctors and who become doctors find passion in that. It is the same with carpenters, builders, nurses. These kids are growing up wanting to look after country; wanting to be rangers; wanting to stay close to home, to the songlines, to family; and wanting the opportunity to benefit their local economy and their local towns by having jobs that are worthwhile and are providing not just locally but globally. Every bit of carbon that they're able to capture, every credit that they're able to on sell, matters. The purpose of having a job, of getting up in the morning and being a part of the economic story that is Australia matters.

It's also really good for some of our farmers. Fluctuations in prices can cause issues—drought, flood, all of these sorts of things. The ability to use carbon capture to accentuate revenue flows is really important in allowing for that diversification and to give people choice. Choice is a fundamental part of everything that we do in this country. A really important part of this bill is that it gives farmers, primary producers, native title holders and businesses the opportunity to participate in a low-carbon economy not only to make a difference to the planet but also to make money, to provide that economic surety and to get us towards net zero.

Now, net zero doesn't mean that there are no emissions. We have to accept that there will be diesel trucks, diesel cars. Most of the Cape is currently running on diesel generators. These things are going to be there for a while. The idea is to take away from the carbon that goes out by using these credits and abatements. It's an elegant system. It's a way to say: 'Yes, we understand that this piece of industry needs to continue,' but it gives us an opportunity to offset that carbon and that's what makes it so perfect. The fact that those jobs go overwhelmingly to the regions, to areas that don't necessarily have the same economic opportunities as, say, a Brisbane or a Canberra, a Sydney or Melbourne and Adelaide, makes all the difference. It gives them a chance.

Now, I've spoken to PBCs right across the Cape. I spent most of the last three weeks drifting across that really beautiful part of the country, from Cooktown to Wujal Wujal, Hope Vale, Lockhart River across to Pormpuraaw. The savanna burning is now forming an integral part of the way that those communities are looking at income coming into their town, which is paying for infrastructure. It's trying to improve the rates of homeownership to get the rates base up. In Lockhart River, small businesses are springing up all over the place, connected to savanna burning and connected to road building. It's becoming self-sufficient. It's becoming its own little industry in and of itself, and that's really exciting. For some places that have always struggled to get that economic activity and to find that driver, this can be that driver. This can be the thing that makes a difference. We talk about closing the gap. We talk about economic opportunity. And this provides some of it—in something that is so rooted in tradition, spirituality and thousands and thousands and thousands of years of experience that it's just able to happen. It's got almost no overheads.

It's so, so important for our region, and I'm excited to be a part of it. I'm excited to back these communities in, so that, when I am travelling around, I can look the councillors in the face and the elders in the eye and say, 'Yes, we are making a difference here. We are providing something for kids to do. We are providing opportunities for role models to exist.' Having an athlete like Johnathan Thurston as a role model is great. John's a fantastic guy. But he doesn't beat somebody that you see at home. He doesn't beat Uncle Robert, who you see every day in his uniform talking about how the money's coming in and then going to buy a nice big bit of meat—which can be quite expensive in the Cape in some places. That's the sort of thing that I want my kids to see in the regions. I want them to see pathways forwards and the opportunities that are presented.

We talk about the environment more globally and what that means, and about climate change, and all of these things are really, really important. I know this first-hand: the Torres Strait is probably one of the most impacted places on the planet in terms of climate change. We've got to put seawalls up. We're doing climate resiliency projects right across the Cape because of how close and how low lying a lot of these communities are. And that's so important; that global conversation is really important. We have to make sure that we are being a responsible global citizen. People talk about the numbers. But if eight to 10 people do 1.5 per cent then you're at 15 per cent. Everyone has to get on board; everybody has to participate.

As I said, it's hugely important on a global scale. But, ultimately, we are all here for people, and it's the people that I'm most excited about here—not the climate-change aspect of it, which is incredibly important, but the jobs and the economic opportunity and the role models. I've met people in the Cape who are rangers and are the first person in their family to ever have a job. How tall that makes them feel, and how strong, and how much, I guess, a local identity within their own community—a leader within their family. That self-respect and that self-determination is an integral part of, I guess, being a person. Being able to participate in the economy because of the work you've done is an incredibly powerful thing if you've never had that before, and it's an incredibly powerful thing if your family has never really experienced that before. When you get up in the morning and you go to work, and your children see you get up in the morning and go to work, it creates that pattern and it creates those role models and it creates that system—and to do it in a place that you love, in a place that you belong to.

Let's not get this twisted: when you're talking about Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander communities, they belong to the place that they were born. To work on that place and to take care of that place in a traditional manner that has always been done that way, but then to also be a part of a broader global impact, part of the economic story of Australia, part of the global energy transition and part of the capturing of carbon that allows other industries to exist, is truly important.

You always hear about the story of JFK going through NASA, and he speaks to a cleaner and asks, 'So, what do you do here?' and the cleaner says, 'Well, I'm helping put a man on the moon.' The same principle applies: for every bit of savanna burning that creates carbon capture, we can keep our diesels running and we can keep our manufacturing and our industries going. That's what the important part is. And that is bringing some of our remote and regional communities into the broader conversation, where sometimes they have felt isolated and left out. Things happen to them. Things get told to them. Things get placed on top of them. This is an active participation in a global movement and an Australian economic movement and a way to empower individuals at a local level.

When kids tell me they want to be rangers or that their uncle or their sister is a ranger, I see them filled with pride. There was a photo exhibition at AFL Cape York House, which is an institution in Cairns where kids come down from the cape. They use AFL football as a bit of a hook, but it's about getting kids into school and things. They do a photo shoot every year of the kids and their heroes and their role models and what they want to be. Like I said, it used to be football players; now it's rangers. They want to be on country, they want to do the work, they want to get remunerated and they want to make a difference. So, while there'll be a lot of really nice speeches about what this means globally and for climate change, sometimes it's worth remembering what it means for the eight-year-old running around Aurukun or the 12-year-old in Lockhart River to have role models and what it means for them to have an opportunity to be on country, to love their country, to work on their country and to make a difference to the nation. I commend the bill to the House.

I'd like to address my remarks to a number of aspects of the Carbon Credits and Other Legislation Amendment (Integrity and Transparency) Bill 2026. Like everything in this place, my remarks are informed and driven by the conversations that I have in my electorate of Monash and the local communities there that I represent. This bill is introducing sweeping new powers, and that will bring with it pressure on farmers. It will bring with it pressure on farmers in my electorate, who are doing it really tough right now.

It will be my great pleasure next month to speak at the 80th anniversary of Radfords Meats in Warragul, a multigenerational meat-processing business. They've achieved a great deal in that business and a great deal for our region. But I do worry that we're not going to see new Radfords businesses emerging because of a multitude of red and green tape introduced by this federal Labor government. It's red tape on our farmers, who are responsible for our food security, but food security is national security as well. I am very proud to represent people who grow, make and manufacture meat, dairy products and horticulture which are known for their clean, green nutritional value the world over.

This bill is also going to introduce sweeping new powers and regulation across our forestry and timber industry. I am an unabashed, proud advocate for timber towns and timber communities across Australia, particularly in the great Gippsland region. I was proudly involved in a timber business prior to my entry into this place, and I will always stand up for local timber jobs and timber communities, who have never had it tougher. Indeed, I was visiting a timber mill the other day. It's a salient warning about some of the new regulation that this bill introduces and, indeed, other efforts from this government—because, on its current scorecard, the consequences for timber businesses and the timber industry have not been good at all. I will be writing to the Minister for the Environment and Water shortly on behalf of a timber business that has an ongoing referral process under the Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act 1999 concerning private forestry operation in Victoria. The business advised me that they have engaged constructively and in good faith with the Department of Climate Change, Energy, the Environment and Water throughout the referral process, but they are still waiting for a response. In fact, so bad is the timeliness of the response from the department that it falls outside its statutory obligations. A formal referral was lodged in October 2025 for subsequent requests for additional information, which have all been met, but they have not had an adequate response from the department on this issue. In drawing back to the bill before us, I really sincerely worry about the additional impost of red and green tape on businesses like this when departments like the one that they're dealing with are not living up to their statutory obligations.

We just need to look at the timber industry in Victoria and the bridge in Kernot, which is in the Bass Coast region. The Liberal candidate for Bass, Rochelle Halstead, and I fought really hard to secure funding for bridge repairs. It is very important to that local community, particularly for emergency vehicle access, as we head into a hot summer. Instead of getting the available timber resource from Victoria, which you would think would be the obvious thing to do, the thing that is holding this project up is timber stuck at a port in America, because that's the state of Victoria at the moment. Unfortunately it's the state of many other places around Australia, despite the fact that we've got an available resource there, despite the fact, in reference to this bill, that our foresters abide by the strongest environmental and stewardship standards anywhere in the world—indeed, those multigenerational families see that as a great source of pride. They are very proud to work in those businesses as contractors and harvesters and in our mills. Despite all of that, we're reading articles about blood timber supposedly imported from Russia and from other parts of the world with very lax environmental standards. I worry that, in setting the bar here so, so high, we are going to see an influx of these products from other parts of the world.

If you need other examples, we've got the Australian Trade Remedies Commission, which was supposed to bring down a draft decision in September—it's now been delayed for some weeks—on the importation of aluminium windows from China and Vietnam. I've visited a number of local window and door manufacturing businesses in my electorate of Monash, like Talum Windows in Inverloch. They make first-class products with world-leading people, yet they're competing right now against a 1,700 per cent increase in some of those products. That's not fair trade and that's not free trade. That, on a prima facie basis, is economic dumping. You can see why the Australian Trade Remedies Commission are taking an active interest in it. My worry with aspects of legislation like this is that we're going to see more examples of cheap imported products that do not have to abide by the same standards that our manufacturers here in Australia have to.

I also want to make reference to aspects of this bill which deal with vehicle emissions standards, which the government says will provide certainty, and the government has made a big point about transparency mattering. If you take their word, the examples that they've set so far don't instil a great deal of hope. We've seen, just in the last few days, the proposal mooted by the Minister for Climate Change and Energy to have a levy applied to all Australians for roadside EV charging. I have to commend the minister for regional development, who said on breakfast TV this week that that was something she did not agree was fair or reasonable. I'm really glad to see the regional development minister's comments on that, but I really hope the regional development minister's message persuades the minister for energy and other cabinet colleagues too.

We've got issues with electric vehicles at the moment. There's an influx of them from China because the government has put so much pressure on its own climate targets, which it is not meeting, and put a 10 per cent mandate on meeting those climate targets through electric vehicles. What is happening is we're getting an influx of those vehicles from China, many of which have Huawei communications built into them. In estimates over a year ago, the department said they would begin stakeholder consultations with industry on making sure that we do have appropriate safeguards for the way consumer data and privacy settings are dealt with.

Speaking with the industry just this week, they tell me they are still waiting. So, when the government says these things are important in this legislation, for transparency and accountability, I just don't take them at their word. I really don't. Where the government says these are minor technical amendments, they are not. They're consequential changes with serious implications for farmers, industry, investors and taxpayers.

Traditionally, Australia has had a great sovereign reputation internationally as a safe, secure, stable investment destination, but I really worry that, under this government, our sovereign investment reputation is being jeopardised by some of these decisions. We've seen that with negative gearing, changes to capital gains tax and the terrible mess this week on the card surcharges. The government keep changing the goalposts on a whole range of issues, and that is the biggest thing to undermine investor confidence and investor certainty. The rhetoric that is contained in this legislation around how importantly the government values those things—I just can't take their word for it.

One of the areas that has caused concern relates to proposed changes to native title arrangements. We have existing arrangements. For example, under the current system, a carbon abatement project can be conditionally registered on native title land before the consent of the eligible interest holders is obtained, and project proponents have up to five years—being the first reporting period—to demonstrate to the Clean Energy Regulator that the necessary consent has been secured. But sections 27 and 28 of this bill would fundamentally change that process. If the Labor government wants a mere claim to native title to be treated as an eligible interest, I think there would be a number of views on that because that would mean a farmer or a project proponent could be required to negotiate with someone claiming native title, regardless of whether that title has actually been established at law. This would form part of a more cumbersome two stage consent process. Under section 32, the Clean Energy Regulator could also revoke a project's declaration before the first reporting period if it considered there was no reasonable prospect of obtaining consent.

Native title laws have been part of Australia's legal framework for 30 years. They're complex, often contested and always require lawmakers to recognise the practical limitations of their application. But this bill goes too far. It is mission creep, plain and simple. As we've seen with red tape and green tape, the regulatory creep in other areas can have profound consequences for regional communities like mine—for farming communities and for forestry communities. And that is where I have a real issue. More and more we are seeing prime agricultural farmland in my electorate of Monash affected. We've had giant battery energy storage projects imposed upon farming communities. They have no social licence. I've met with some of those proponents and said, 'You need to win the social licence of the communities in which you seek to operate, and you do not have the social licence of those communities in West Gippsland.'

Liberal member for Narracan, Wayne Farnham, and I have said very clearly that they are not welcome because that soil there is the best soil anywhere in Australia. It's prime agricultural farmland. It's for dairy, beef and horticulture, and I do not want to stand in this place and see a continuing encroachment upon that soil, upon those crops, upon that prime agricultural soil. It is something that I will stand up for on behalf of my farmers, my farming communities, every day of the week. That is where we are seeing a creep of dangerous precedents of increasing red tape and administrative burdens placed upon farming families, on agribusinesses. I want to continue to represent a region with businesses, like Radford's meats, that will be around in another 80 years to celebrate their 80th anniversaries—businesses that are proud to employ local people and produce products that are sought after across the world and, indeed, across Australia. It's a great point of pride for our region. But right now our farmers and our agribusinesses are really up against it. Every morning they get out of bed and put their house on the line to give others a shot at a job. What they do is really important for our region. It's important for Australia, and that is why I'm taking a stand on this bill. It's not fair. It's not just. It's not right. It's not sensible reform in many of its aspects, and I will always stand up on behalf of those farming families who sent me to this place.

I rise today to speak in support of the Carbon Credits and Other Legislation Amendment (Integrity and Transparency) Bill 2026, which is a step in the continuous improvement journey of the Australian Carbon Credit Unit Scheme. What is the scheme? The Australian Carbon Credit Unit Scheme encourages people and businesses to run projects that reduce emissions or store carbon—for example, by using new technology, by upgrading equipment, by changing business practices to improve productivity or energy use, or by changing the way that vegetation is managed. The Australian Carbon Credit Unit Scheme supports a wide range of projects that generate carbon credits, such as Indigenous fire management, coastal ecosystem restoration, forest regrowth and forest plantings.

Carbon markets create a regulated space where carbon credits can be bought and sold. Carbon credit brokers and businesses that bundle carbon credits from multiple projects into one large package help connect buyers and sellers, making trading easier. Australian carbon credit units are a tradable financial product. They incentivise carbon abatement activities through projects ranging from reforestation to energy efficiency. They present an additional income source for individuals and businesses running ACCU scheme projects. One Australian carbon credit unit represents one tonne of carbon dioxide equivalent that would otherwise have been released into the atmosphere. Eligible projects include those associated with vegetation management, agriculture, forestry, energy consumption, waste, transport and industrial processes. Australian carbon credit units can be sold to private sector buyers or to the government to generate income, and the Australian government purchases the units through carbon abatement contracts.

This scheme contributes to meeting Australia's emissions reduction targets in a number of ways. Firstly, voluntary and government demand for the units makes a direct contribution towards meeting Australia's national targets over and above the reductions driven by the safeguard mechanism. Secondly, however, by encouraging innovation and the take-up of cleaner technologies, the scheme is directed at transforming some low-emission practices from 'nice to have' to 'business as usual'. The scheme also makes an indirect contribution by allowing safeguard facilities to draw on abatement beyond their own operations, and what this does is increase flexibility, reduce compliance costs and help facilities better manage the timing and availability of onsite abatement.

Over time, the role of the scheme has changed significantly. Initially, it was Australia's main emissions reduction policy, underpinned by large-scale government purchasing through the Emissions Reduction Fund. But following significant policy reforms implemented in the last five years, since the Albanese Labor government came to power, the scheme is now part of a suite of measures that target emissions reduction and that will help drive Australia along the path to net zero. In this respect, the Australian government has made, and has rightly made, ambitious commitments to reducing greenhouse gas emissions, including setting targets of 43 per cent reductions below 2005 levels by 2030 and 62 to 70 per cent by 2035 as part of the pathway to achieving net zero by 2050.

This scheme is a part of it. It remains a world-leading carbon crediting scheme. As we move further along the journey to net zero, demand for Australian carbon credit units will grow, which means that this bill is critical in order to ensure that the scheme can continue to meet demand across the diverse range of applicable industries and that the public has trust and confidence that the scheme is not only fit for purpose but that it is effective. The scheme is now part of the government's broad suite of climate policies which work in concert to drive emissions reductions across the economy. All of them have to be fit for purpose and be effective.

This bill will amend a number of existing pieces of legislation: the Carbon Credits (Carbon Farming Initiative) Act 2011, the National Greenhouse and Energy Reporting Act 2007 and the New Vehicle Efficiency Standard Act 2024. With respect to the first, the bill does a number of things. Importantly, it strengthens governance around methodology determinations in the scheme by replacing the Independent Emissions Reduction Assurance Committee with the independent Carbon Abatement Integrity Committee. Conflict-of-interest requirements will be improved, and relevant fields of expertise will be prescribed—including, rightly, requiring ongoing First Nations representation. The independence and transparency of the committee will also be strengthened because it will enjoy new powers that enable it to obtain independent advice and information relevant to its work. The maximum time period for public consultation by the committee on methods will also be extended, and the committee will be under an obligation to publish more of its advice.

Next, the bill will provide for more flexible Australian carbon credit unit purchasing arrangements, with the goal being to ensure the appropriate separation of functions between the government, the regulator and the department. This is important in reducing criticism that conflicts of interest exist between purchasing and regulatory decisions. The bill will also amend the principles for conducting purchasing processes to replace the existing principle of purchasing carbon abatement on the least cost with the principle of receiving value for money.

Next, there are improvements to integrity, which are necessary because the scheme is only meaningful with respect to emissions reduction if abatement achieved through this scheme is genuine and actually contributing to Australia's emission reduction targets. Abatement is not genuine if it's on paper only. So, to do this, the bill will extend the fit-and-proper-person test to include agents acting on behalf of Australian carbon credit unit project applicants, increasing oversight and supporting improved compliance outcomes.

Matters that are relevant to the fit-and-proper-person test include whether a proponent has a history of insolvency or involvement with companies that have gone into administration or been liquidated; compliance with other relevant laws or schemes; compliance with industry codes of conduct; whether there has been engagement in unfair business practices, like unclear or unfair contract terms or failing to pay clients or landholders; whether there has been a failure to comply with audit obligations—for example, by failing to undertake a compliance audit when directed; whether there has been a failure to comply with an enforceable undertaking; or a failure to meet obligations under the Corporations Act 2001. In addition, failing to have systems and processes in place that enable a proponent to meet its obligations under the scheme and a failure to deliver contractual obligations under carbon abatement contracts and also whether there is an indication of phoenix activity are all relevant to the fit-and-proper-person test.

To be eligible for the scheme, a proponent must satisfy the fit-and-proper-person test, have the legal right to carry out the project activities in question and have the legal right to be issued the Australian carbon credit units from the project. To qualify, and with some exceptions, projects must also be new, in that activities must not have started, not go beyond business-as-usual activities, not be required by law, not be receiving financial support from specified government programs and not be an excluded activity under the Carbon Credits (Carbon Farming Initiative) Rule 2015. Projects must also follow an approved method which sets out the rules for running the project and estimating emissions reductions. 'Method' means just that—the method for conducting the project and the use of approved methods are by design so that projects can effectively measure how much carbon they remove from the atmosphere or how much carbon they prevent from being released.

The scheme only has integrity when proper and effective measurement can take place. For example, in mining, oil and gas, method projects are those that reroute, flare or combust leaked facility emissions, and project activities include storing greenhouse gases underground and destroying or converting oil and gas leaks. Another example is landfill and waste method projects to upgrade or install facilities to reduce waste emissions. Project activities for these methods include treating and destroying waste using eligible waste treatment equipment, converting waste into biomethane to produce electricity or separating organic waste from other waste. This bill seeks to support participation in the scheme by removing barriers to registering new projects at both the project registration and method design levels.

The bill will also make changes to the application of the newness requirement that the regulator must consider as part of the additionality test when assessing applications for projects to be registered under the scheme. These changes will increase flexibility for project proponents and support more projects entering the scheme. The amendments will allow the newness requirement to be assessed at the time an application to register a project is made, rather than when it's assessed by the regulator. This enables projects to commence implementation while the regulator's review and approval process is underway, broadening the scope of the scheme and providing certainty.

The bill will also introduce a targeted exception to the newness requirements for genuine research and development activities so that such activities can contribute to and proponents can participate in future methods. This change is intended to support innovation and testing of emerging abatement technologies which contribute to method development by providing greater certainty for research and development participants with respect to pathways they could use to enter the scheme in the future.

The reforms in the bill strengthen the integrity, transparency, governance and administration of the Australian Carbon Credit Unit Scheme and ensure ongoing confidence in its operation as Australia moves towards its emissions reduction targets. The bill marks an important step in the continued development of Australia's carbon market. By strengthening and modernising the scheme, it helps maintain confidence in the integrity of the system while providing greater certainty for businesses and investors to support emissions reduction projects across the country. I commend the bill to the House.

I rise to speak on the Carbon Credits and Other Legislation Amendment (Integrity and Transparency) Bill 2026. This bill implements the government's response to the 2022 Independent Review of Australian Carbon Credit Units, chaired by Professor Ian Chubb, AC, as well as recommendations made by the Climate Change Authority through its statutory reviews of Australia's carbon crediting framework. At the outset, I want to say I welcome the government's objective of strengthening the integrity, transparency and effectiveness of Australia's climate policies, particularly our carbon market. Public confidence in Australia's carbon market depends on every Australian carbon credit unit, or ACCU, representing a genuine climate benefit. If credits are not delivering real additional abatement not only will confidence in the scheme be undermined but Australia will fail to meet our 2035 and 2050 climate targets.

But, while this bill contains a number of positive reforms, it does not go nearly far enough to address ongoing and serious concerns regarding offset integrity. Most concerningly, aspects of the proposed method transition declaration framework risk allowing projects operating under methods with unresolved integrity concerns to avoid key safeguards currently built into the scheme. In other words, projects that would have had to prove that they were achieving particular milestones may not be required to do so if transitioned to a new method. While this bill focuses on improving the operation of offset markets, it does not address a more fundamental challenge: Australia's increasing reliance on offsets to meet emissions obligations. Carbon markets can play a role in our climate response, but they should not become a substitute for real reductions in emissions at the source.

For better or for worse, the ACCU scheme has become Australia's primary domestic carbon-crediting regime and now plays a significant role in compliance under the safeguard mechanism. The intent of this legislation is to strengthen the integrity and effectiveness of those arrangements by implementation of the Chubb review and the Climate Change Authority recommendations. That objective is important because serious concerns have been raised over a number of years regarding the integrity of ACCUs. Those concerns were brought to the national attention by Professor Andrew Macintosh, the former chair of the Emissions Reduction Assurance Committee, which was the statutory body responsible for assessing the integrity of offset methods. Research by Professor Macintosh and ANU colleagues suggested that 70 to 80 per cent of all ACCUs issued under human induced regeneration, landfill gas and avoided deforestation methods may not represent real and additional emissions reductions. In other words, more than three-quarters of the ACCUs being issued by major emitters to meet their obligations came from methods that have been the subject of significant and ongoing integrity concerns. I note that this is a highly technical area, and Professor Macintosh's conclusions have been contested, including by the Clean Energy Regulator. So there is clearly a need for better sharing of data and audits conducted by the regulator so the evidence base is transparent and public.

But, while views differ on some of the detail, the broader concern that there are genuine integrity questions affecting several major ACCU methods has been echoed by many other expert bodies. The Australian Academy of Science reviewed four ACCU methods and found that human induced regeneration was one of the methods with significant contestability regarding whether projects were consistent with the offsets integrity standards. The review identified concerns related to baseline data, measurement uncertainty, reliance on counterfactual assumptions, attribution of carbon sequestration outcomes, carbon leakage and the impact of climate change on the maintenance of carbon stores. The Wentworth Group of Concerned Scientists has likewise raised serious concerns regarding the operation of the ACCU scheme, particularly, again, the human induced regeneration projects.

It was against this backdrop that the government established the Chubb review in 2022. While the Chubb review ultimately concluded that the ACCU scheme was fundamentally well designed, it nevertheless made 16 recommendations aimed at strengthening governance, transparency and integrity arrangements. While this issue remains contested, I think there is broad agreement on one point: integrity concerns must be addressed transparently and rigorously and low-integrity methods should be ended or phased out.

There are a number of aspects of this bill that deserve support. The bill makes changes to native title consent requirements that are intended to better align with the principles of free, prior and informed consent. This is a positive step; although, I believe there is more work to be done to ensure First Nations communities can participate meaningfully in, and benefit from, Australia's carbon markets while drawing on the expertise and perspectives of First Nations stakeholders. The bill also re-establishes the Emissions Reduction Assurance Committee as the new Carbon Abatement Integrity Committee. This reflects a recommendation of the Chubb review and reinforces the importance of the independent oversight of method integrity. The legislation contains several other technical reforms including changes relating to research and development participants and provisions enabling methods to combine emissions avoidance and sequestration activities within a single project.

These reforms are sensible; however, the most significant aspect of this legislation, and the area I'm most concerned about, is the introduction of a new power allowing the minister to make something called a method transition declaration, MTD for short. The MTD provision allows the minister to require projects to transition off a particular method in limited circumstances. The minister must be satisfied of three things: that the method fails to meet offset integrity standards, that continued crediting would present a material risk to the integrity of the scheme and that an alternative method is available. Projects are then provided with a transition period of between six months and two years, or even up to five years in the case of sequestration projects, to remove the replacement method.

The stated purpose of the method transition declaration process is to provide a pathway for projects operating under methods that are found not to meet integrity standards to transition to a replacement method. This appears to be reasonable at face value and a useful mechanism for dealing with low-integrity measures; however, concerns have been raised with how this mechanism may operate in practice. Concerns include that the threshold trigger is set so high it may never be used. The material risk is a discretionary power open to subjective interpretation by the minister as to what they consider to be a material risk to the integrity of the ACCU Scheme. I will be moving amendments to remove the material risk tests, requiring that a method only be compliant with the offset integrity standards for an MTD to be made.

Another major concern is that requiring the availability of an alternative method as a prerequisite to transition projects means that methods with the least integrity may not be able to be transitioned and could continue to earn credits. While other aspects of this bill clearly mirror the recommendations from the Chubb review, it is not clear where this recommendation has come from or why it is there. The MTD process outlined in this bill differs in important respects from the Chubb review recommendation that it purports to respond to. In particular, there is concern that the mechanism could be used retrospectively to legitimise projects that have failed for years—potentially including those under the human induced regeneration method—and allow them to avoid one of the most important integrity tests built into the existing method.

Under the human induced regeneration method, project proponents receive ACCUs on the basis that regeneration will occur and forest cover will be re-established. A critical safeguard within the method is the requirement that, after 15 years, the project must demonstrate that it has attained forest cover across at least 90 per cent of the project area. If a project fails to meet this requirement, proponents are required to relinquish credits that were overissued during the life of the project. It is one of the central integrity safeguards underpinning the method and provides a final check that projects have actually delivered the outcomes for which they received the credits.

This is particularly important because human induced regeneration projects account for around 30 per cent of all ACCUs issued under the scheme to date. As these projects begin approaching their reconciliation periods, there is a real possibility that some may not be able to demonstrate that they have achieved the required forest cover outcomes. If that occurs, substantial quantities of credits may need to be relinquished. That is plainly a material integrity issue for the ACCU scheme.

My concern is that the method transition declaration mechanism, as currently drafted, could allow human induced regeneration projects to transition to a new method, such as the proposed integrated farm and land management method, which, at present, does not contain the same forest cover requirement. If that occurs, the 15-year reconciliation test could effectively be avoided altogether, precisely at the point where it becomes most meaningful. This would undermine the integrity of the safeguard mechanism entirely. For this reason, I'll be moving amendments that would ensure credits issued to regeneration projects that transition to any new method remain subject to the key eligibility requirements that applied under their original method. These amendments are designed to provide certainty that the method transition declaration framework cannot be used to bypass existing integrity safeguards, and I urge the government to support them.

Australia is currently advancing its case as a climate leader and preparing for its role as a co-host of COP31 alongside our Pacific partners. The government has rightly identified keeping the 1.5-degree goal within reach. They've also identified improving access to climate finance, elevating the importance of the ocean and amplifying Pacific voices and leaderships as priorities for the Australia-Pacific COP31 partnership. Those are important objectives, but, if Australia wants to be seen as a credible climate leader by our Pacific neighbours, our domestic policies need to match our international rhetoric. Increasingly, international law and international agreements are making clear that we cannot simply rely on accounting mechanisms and offsets while continuing to expand fossil fuel production.

The recent advisory opinion of the International Court of Justice reaffirmed the principle of 'common but differentiated responsibilities and respective capabilities'. In practical terms, that means wealthy, developed countries such as Australia have a responsibility to lead, not just balancing emissions on paper but also adopting emissions reduction measures that are consistent with the best available science.

Similarly, the Australian government signed the Belem Declaration on the transition away from fossil fuels. That declaration explicitly recognises that fossil fuels are the primary driver of climate change and that transitioning away from fossil fuels is necessary to keep the goals of the Paris Agreement within reach. Countries are being called upon not only to improve carbon markets and offset integrity but, first and foremost, to reduce emissions at their source and accelerate the transition away from fossil fuels. That's why there's a tension at the heart of this debate. On one hand, we are seeking to improve the integrity of Australia's offset framework. On the other hand, we continue to approve new fossil fuel projects and developments, including the recent approval of the Hunter Valley Operations mine extension in New South Wales.

To conclude, this bill includes some worthwhile reforms but also some significant concerns. The method transition declaration provisions risk allowing projects operating under methods with unresolved integrity issues to avoid important obligations that currently apply to them. At a time when confidence in carbon markets is essential, we should be strengthening integrity safeguards, not weakening them. For those reasons, I'll be seeking amendments to transition the integrity provisions and the method transition declaration framework.

A carbon credit is basically a promise. It's a promise that a project has cut greenhouse gas emissions—the release of gases such as carbon dioxide—or taken carbon out of the air and stored it. If the project meets the scheme's rules, it can earn Australian carbon credit units, usually referred to as 'ACCUs'. Each credit represents one tonne of carbon dioxide equivalent—a way of measuring different greenhouse gases using the same scale. Those credits can then be sold to businesses or to the government. That gives farmers, First Nations communities and other businesses a way to earn money from work that helps reduce emissions. But the whole system depends on what sits behind the credit. Was the benefit real? Was it extra to what would have happened anyway? Does the amount claim match what the evidence supports? Selling a credit does not by itself reduce emissions. The work behind it must do that. Someone buying a credit needs to be able to trust what they are buying. That is the starting point for this bill. It strengthens the rules behind the promise, it improves how the scheme is checked and it addresses practical gaps that have become clear through independent reviews and more than a decade of experience.

If I were still teaching law students how to read legislation, I would start with the question: what is the mischief? That's an old legal expression. It means the problem the law is meant to fix. Then I would ask a second question: how do these words fix it? Those are useful questions for parliament too, because a law can sound impressive while doing very little. It can also create a lawyers' picnic—more questions, more arguments and more time spent working out what parliament meant. The better approach is to identify the problem and give people a clear way to deal with it.

This bill goes across several parts of our emissions-reduction laws. It strengthens consent, the agreement required from people whose rights are affected. It improves independent oversight. It separates government buying from the work of policing the scheme. And it provides a carefully limited response where an existing carbon method develops a serious problem. A carbon method is the rulebook for a type of project. It sets out how the carbon benefit is worked out and what must be measured and checked. Those rulebooks are central to whether the scheme can be trusted.

One of the clearest problems addressed by this bill concerns existing projects. Under the current framework, a method can be changed, withdrawn or allowed to expire, but existing projects can continue using their original method unless they choose to move on to another one. There is some sense behind that idea. There is investment that goes into projects. People have taken a particular approach in good faith. But what do you do if there's a serious problem identified with that method? This is where this law has an off-ramp. It provides an opportunity for a sensible, well-considered transition to a more reliable method rather than doubling down on silly or completely eroding good-faith investment. It gets the balance right. It provides a way to address it. The minister can make what is called a method transition declaration, a formal decision requiring affected projects to move to a suitable alternative method if they're to keep earning carbon credits.

This is an important power. It deserves careful limits, and this bill provides them. First, the method must fail one or more of the scheme's integrity standards, the rules intended to make carbon credits trustworthy. Second, continuing to issue credits must pose a material risk to the scheme. 'Material' means significant enough to matter. The power is directed at serious problems, not small errors with little or no real effect. The independent committee must advise that those tests are met. The minister must also be satisfied after considering the advice and public submissions, people's written views, from across sectors. The decision must substantially reduce the risk. That matters. There is little point disrupting projects if the disruption does not properly address the problem. There must also be a suitable alternative for every affected project. The projects must meet the relevant requirements under that alternative or be reasonably capable of being changed to meet them. The minister must consider likely harm to the environment, the economy and the community. There is public consultation giving people a chance to examine and comment on the proposal. The committee's advice and the minister's reasons must be published. The declaration is also subject to parliamentary disallowance, meaning this parliament can overturn it. Those are real safeguards. The power is not simply a minister saying, 'I no longer like this method.' There is a problem to establish, evidence to consider, people to hear from and conditions to meet.

Some people will reasonably ask what this means for investment. People developing projects want stable rules. That is understandable, but stability cannot mean that a serious fault must be left untouched. Imagine being a farmer doing the work properly. You follow the rules. You measure carefully. You claim only what the evidence supports. Then a serious weakness elsewhere in the scheme damages confidence in everybody's credits. That affects you too. Protecting trust in the scheme protects the value of sound work. The answer is to provide a clear process for addressing serious faults while considering the people affected. That is what this bill seeks to do. It supports environmental work by protecting the link between the credits sold and the benefit delivered.

The bill also strengthens the rights of First Nations peoples in projects on native title land and land subject to registered native title claims. Native title means rights to land and waters recognised under Australian law because of First Nations peoples' traditional laws and customs. A registered claimant is someone whose claim has passed the legal steps needed for registration, even though the final decision on the claim is still ahead. The bill recognises those claimants in the consent process. That matters because a claim can take significant time to be resolved. The people concerned should not miss their chance to have a say simply because that process is unfinished.

The bill establishes two stages of consent. Agreement to the application is required before the project can be registered. Agreement to how the project will be carried out is required before credits can be issued. That distinction is practical. Agreeing to a proposal to enter the scheme is not necessarily agreeing to every detail of how it will operate on the ground. This brings the discussion forward. Before expectations harden, before important choices are treated as settled and before credits begin to flow, early agreement provides a stronger basis for working together. It helps people understand the proposal, negotiate its terms and build partnerships. That is fairer. It is also better project planning.

The bill reforms the expert committee responsible for checking carbon methods. It becomes the Carbon Abatement Integrity Committee. 'Abatement' simply means reducing emissions or removing carbon. That change goes beyond the name though. The bill strengthens rules about conflicts of interest where a person's other interests could affect their judgement. It sets out relevant fields of expertise and requires ongoing First Nations representation. It expands the committee's work and strengthens its ability to obtain independent advice and information. It also provides more advice and related documents to be published with appropriate protections. The practical purpose is clear: give the experts the tools to do their job, make their role clear and let the public see more of the reasoning behind important decisions. People do not need to agree with every decision to benefit from understanding how it was reached.

There is another sound change: responsibility for government purchases of ACCUs would move from the Clean Energy Regulator to the department. The regulator is the body that checks and enforces the scheme's rules. Government purchasing serves a different purpose. Separating those functions reduces the risk of an actual or perceived conflict. People should be able to see that decisions about whether credits meet the rules are distinct from decisions about which credits the government wants to buy.

The bill also replaces lease costs with value for money as a purchasing principle. The cheapest price matters, but price alone does not tell us everything about value. A project may provide other benefits for the environment, local communities or First Nations peoples. This change allows those benefits to be considered as well. It does not mean accepting weak carbon claims because the project has other attractions. The carbon benefit still needs to stand up. It means that when choosing what to buy government can consider more than the price on the page.

The bill also improves the tools for dealing with credits issued on incorrect information. It provides new clear pathways to require credits to be relinquished—that is, returned—where too many have been issued. There is also a voluntary path for people to address information they've got wrong. That is sensible. A scheme needs ways to deal with that wrongdoing. It also needs ways to correct mistakes. The regulator gains further tools for lower level breaches, including infringement notices—formal notices that allow alleged breaches to be dealt with through a financial penalty.

At the same time, the bill supports new work. It makes room for genuine research and testing without automatically shutting the door to future participation in the scheme. That matters because we want people to improve methods, test new ideas, gather evidence and learn what works. We should not create rules that punish the very research needed to develop better projects. The bill also allows methods to support both carbon storage and separate emissions reduction activities within a single project. That can better reflect how a farm or property actually operates. The law should be able to accommodate sound new approaches as they develop.

The bill also changes the National Greenhouse and Energy Reporting Scheme. That is the system through which companies report emissions, energy production and energy use. It creates powers to require more reported information to be published. The detailed publication rules would be set through regulations—the rules made under the act. That means the bill does not itself publish every company's information tomorrow; it provides a framework for greater public access with the details to be worked through. The bill also closes a reporting gap where a company is late in applying to register. Being late to register should not leave a hole in the information the scheme is meant to collect. Good policy needs sound data, and public trust is helped when people can examine more of that data themselves.

Finally, the bill makes practical changes to dates under the New Vehicle Efficiency Standard. That standard concerns emissions from new vehicles supplied to the Australian market. Suppliers have a period in which to address an emissions shortfall by earning or obtaining units under the scheme. The present sequence of dates does not work as effectively as intended. The bill adjusts the timing so the processors can operate properly. It does not change the main emissions limits or which vehicles are covered. It fixes the timetable. Sometimes good lawmaking is exactly that practical—identify the part that does not line up, correct it and give the people following the rules a process that works. That is a clear theme through this bill. Credits should reflect real work, people whose rights are affected should have a meaningful say, experts should have the tools to check the evidence, and government should be able to address serious problems through fair and clearly limited process. These reforms strengthen trust while making room for sound projects, better research and more effective administration. The promise behind carbon credits matters to the person earning it, to the person buying it and to the country relying on it. This bill strengthens that promise. I commend this bill to the House.

I stand here to make a contribution to the Carbon Credits and Other Legislation Amendment (Integrity and Transparency) Bill 2026. I'm also here to support the second reading amendment moved by the Manager of Opposition Business, the member for Wannon. His amendment makes our position clear. This House must refuse this bill because it pushes a failing net zero agenda. It increases legal battles, removes taxpayer protections and hands the minister broad powers without reason. In line with Mr Tehan's amendment, I want to explain the four main areas where this bill fails.

First of all is the expansion of native title to unproven claims. Let me start with the biggest problem in this bill, and it is the changes to native title under the Carbon Credits (Carbon Farming Initiative) Act 2011. Under the current law, conditional registration lets carbon projects start on native title land. At the same time, formal consent is worked out during the first five-year reporting period, balancing progress with strict legal protections. Under existing law, native title holders already have clear, strong, consistent rights. No carbon credits can be issued unless full consent is approved by the determined native title holders. This bill changes that completely. It says that the registered native title claim, a claim that has only been lodged and never been proven in court, becomes a full eligible interest. For a Central Queensland farmer, this forces them to negotiate with an unproven claimant whose legal rights are not established.

On top of that, the bill creates a two-stage consent requirement—first, consent just to apply for registration and, second, consent on how the project will actually be run. To make matters worse, section 34 gives the Clean Energy Regulator power to cancel a project's declaration at any time before the end of the first reporting period if the regulator thinks there is no reasonable chance of getting consent. This is classic government mission creep. Native title laws have existed for 30 years, and lawmakers have always understood that practical rules are needed so land can be managed fairly. What we see in this bill is an extra red tape that helps no-one. We must ask a simple question: what problem is this change supposed to fix? Under the current law, native title holders who have proven their claims already have full consent rights. Why extend these veto rights to unproven claims? The assistant minister claimed in his speech that these changes come from the 2022 Chubb review. That is not correct. Recommendation 11 was the only Chubb review recommendation on native title. It only suggested requiring consent from established holders, meaning determined native title holders. The panel noted project creators 'should consider the need for and the benefit of consent' as best practice, far from writing a legal veto for unproven claims into law.

Now let's look at the facts. According to the Indigenous Carbon Industry Network, 11 per cent of Australia's landmass is covered by active native title claims waiting for a decision in the Federal Court. The National Farmers' Federation provided real-world evidence showing what is happening on the ground. They reported that farmers trying to negotiate under current rules face long delays and are paying thousands upfront in sit-down fees just to hold an initial meeting with a claimant group. The federation said that these upfront fees reflect a pattern being experienced nationwide. As the federation argued, a carbon credit scheme would not turn an unproven claim into an indefinite legal veto.

Listen to peak industry bodies representing the people working our land and producing our energy. AgForce Queensland, representing thousands of farming families managing over 50 million hectares, warns that these changes bring heavy risk, will drive up set-up costs and will cause severe project delays. Woodside Energy, AGL and the Business Council of Australia have all warned that these rules will stop investments, create legal confusion and lead to endless court battles. While the government allocates almost $3 million for First Nations consent support and $5 million for community consultations from its $74.8 million package, grant money cannot fix giving unproven claims the power to freeze regional land management.

The second issue is ditching least-cost abatement for a political slush fund. Let me move to the second major issue of this bill. The government is removing the rule that protects taxpayer money when buying carbon credits. As it is, government carbon purchase must follow least-cost abatement, getting the most carbon reduction for the lowest cost to taxpayers. This is simple common sense. But Labor wants to repeal least-cost abatement and replace it with a vague term called 'value for money'. At the same time, the bill shifts purchasing power away from the independent Clean Energy Regulator and to the department secretary. The explanatory memorandum reveals that value for money lets the government buy expensive carbon credits to support political goals, including whole-of-government emissions reduction, net zero strategies, and subjective environmental, social, economic and First Nations cultural co-benefits. That is wrong. When the government spends public money buying carbon credits, its primary job should be to get the best result at the lowest cost to taxpayers. In this bill, 'value for money' is left completely undefined. It gives the minister an open-ended excuse to spend taxpayer dollars on high-priced carbon credits to meet political targets.

Look at how Labor handles public money without strict controls. The Capacity Investment Scheme is kept behind closed doors. Rewiring the Nation suffered a billion-dollar cost blow-out. The Cheaper Home Batteries Program ballooned from over $2 billion to $8.5 billion. The three regional hydrogen project hubs have collapsed. And the government has spent $150 million a COP climate trip, including $6 million for hotel rooms in Fiji. We should not hand the government a blank cheque to buy overpriced carbon credits.

Major industry bodies have warned against scrapping the lease-cost rule. The Business Council of Australia said that the government purchasing criteria should not be used to differentiate the abatement integrity of carbon credits in the market and that least cost must remain the foundation to which value for money is applied. The Chamber of Minerals and Energy of Western Australia warned that, because 'value for money' is not defined in the legislation, it creates unnecessary market uncertainty that requires a clear statutory definition. The Australian Energy Producers cautioned that the proposal lacks sufficient definition and guidance, creating uncertainty for market participants while departing from the core principle of lowest-cost abatement. Origin Energy stated that it is neither appropriate nor reasonable to introduce undefined and unlimited powers to purchase carbon credits for subjective value-for-money opportunities to support undefined policies.

With that, I will suspend my speech until a later time today.

The debate is interrupted in accordance with standing order 43. The debate may resume at a late hour and the member will have leave to continue speaking when the debate is resumed.