Ian Campbell (WA, Liberal Party, Minister for the Environment and Heritage) Share this | Hansard source

It must have been two out of seven, then. The government agreed with Labor on all but those two, so through our own processes we came to similar decisions. It is open to the government, or any government, to seek to put new triggers into the act. I have already said that we would not rule out looking at a water trigger at some time if a cooperative federalist approach fails to address Australia’s water needs. That would be one of the policy options that we would not rule out.

But you do not need a five-yearly review to tell you to do that. You need to have the sort of approach that the Howard government has, and that is to look at the needs, look at the effectiveness and do things like having a robust independent State of the environment report done to guide you in your policy decision making. If you make a decision that you want to put in a new trigger, then you bring the matter to the parliament without the need for yet another piece of red tape.