Stephen Conroy (Victoria, Australian Labor Party, Deputy Leader of the Government in the Senate) Share this | Hansard source

I thank the senator for her question. I am advised that the Minister for Sustainability, Environment, Water, Population, and Communities has not received an application to emergency list wild rivers in Queensland under the Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act. The EPBC Act provides for the environment minister to include a place in the National Heritage List, under emergency listing provision sections 324JK and 324JL, if the minister believes that the place has or may have one or more national heritage values, that any of those values is under threat of a significant adverse impact and that the threat is both likely and imminent. As all of these conditions must be met, repealing of the Wild Rivers Act and/or a lifting of a wild rivers declaration would not necessarily itself be a sufficient justification for the minister to include a place in the National Heritage List under the emergency provisions of the EPBC Act. Senator, if there is any other information that your question was soliciting that I have not covered there, I am happy to take that on notice and see if there is anything that the minister would like to add.