Larissa Waters (Queensland, Australian Greens) Share this | Hansard source

Last night's program showed how koala populations in New South Wales and Queensland are crashing, threatened by climate change, disease, dogs and rampant land clearing from both urban development and mining. In April this year, Minister Burke gained the ability to protect koalas from big developments in Queensland, New South Wales and the ACT when koalas were added to the federal threatened species list following a Senate inquiry into koalas instigated by the Greens. Minister Burke said on Four Corners 'the only reason we've had to intervene at all is that the states on their own have allowed numbers to continue to go into freefall'. So why, through April's COAG agreement, has the government agreed to hand off federal responsibility for threatened species, including koalas, right back to the states, who are the ones sending koalas to extinction?