Louise Pratt (WA, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Environment and Water (Senate)) Share this | Hansard source

I move:

That the following instruments, made under the Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act 1999, be disallowed:

Temperate East Marine Parks Network Management Plan 2018 [F2018L00321]

North-west Marine Parks Network Management Plan 2018 [F2018L00322]

North Marine Parks Network Management Plan 2018 [F2018L00324]

South-west Marine Parks Network Management Plan 2018 [F2018L00326]

Coral Sea Marine Park Network Management Plan 2018 [F2018L00327].

We are here today to stand in opposition of the government's environmental vandalism. The government forced this chamber to make a decision on this disallowance before I moved it, which has constrained the opportunity for consideration and debate of these issues. I forewarn those who are still deliberating on this issue: I call on them not to vote with the government at this time because we should not be allowing Australia's network of marine parks to be gutted. What the government is doing is: the more pristine the protected area the more savage the changes are. In the government's alternative marine park plans is the Coral Sea, which has been the jewel in the crown of our territorial waters, our Commonwealth marine parks, and it is going from being protected to being a haven for long-lining and trawling.

I call on the crossbench not to listen to the mistruths that are told by those opposite—claims like, 'Labor did not adequately consult on the marine parks.' This is utterly false. We took six rounds of consultation. We received almost three-quarters of a million submissions. We had 250 stakeholder meetings that were attended by more than 2,000 people. That is more than six times the submissions that the Turnbull government received on its own proposals. Even the government's hand-picked review panel found Labor's consultation processes were extensive. Indeed, the government's review panel said in its findings:

There was a considerable amount of 'consultation fatigue' expressed by many stakeholders in the face-to-face meetings. A common initial comment was 'We've already been through this; can't we just get on with it?'

There was buy-in and support for Labor's marine parks, and the government has gone ahead and sought to trash them.

These claims about inadequate consultation were made by one Mr Davey. I find this particularly galling and surprising given he personally attended a consultation meeting with Tony Burke, the environment minister, on 6 May 2012. He was there with a range of other fisheries stakeholders and several departmental officials. It doesn't matter how this government tries to spin it; it is undertaking the largest ever removal of any area from conservation in our nation's history. We stand here to support the original marine park plans as endorsed, as consulted and as secured by the Labor Party.

Senate estimates revealed that consultation means nothing to this government. The Director of National Parks received 82,000 submissions on marine management plans from. These plans that we have before us, which we're seeking to disallow, are even worse for the environment than the recommendations of the review of marine parks commissioned by the Abbott government, before this government. We have 97 per cent of submissions calling for Labor's original plans, which were put in place in 2013, to be restored. Among those who identified as recreational fishers, for example, 95 per cent of those submissions asked for the plans to be restored. Why? Because Labor's marine parks are substantively better for recreational fishers than the government's alternative plans. They're significantly better and they allow recreational fishing in areas that will enable regeneration of those fish. But, instead, the government wants to open those areas to commercial fishing and absolutely trash the marine protection that would support the enjoyment of recreational fishers in our country.

Let's go through what we stand to lose here. We stand to lose significant parts of the Coral Sea protection. Minister Frydenberg's proposal sees that absolutely smashed and decimated. It is extraordinary. In my home state of Western Australia the Diamantina fracture zone is also absolutely decimated in its marine protection areas. If it was appropriate to show you the maps in this place, I would do so. Unfortunately, we are bringing on this disallowance motion at a time when we've not had adequate opportunity to talk to everybody in this place about why these marine plans are so terrible and so bad. We are seeing over 50 per cent of the marine national park zoning being stripped away by the government.

As I said about recreational fishing, what the government is doing—and I call on recreational fishers right around the country not to fall for the government's misinformation about this—is erasing Australia's largest recreational fishing zone in deference to large-scale industrial fishing, including midwater trawling and tuna longlining. Our network had 18½ per cent of the Coral Sea reserve set aside for recreational fishing. What has the coalition done? It has removed that entirely and replaced it with areas where all commercial fishing is allowed except for bottom trawling. Yes, it's true to say that recreational fishers can still go there. But so can commercial fishers.

Shark Reef and Vema Reef have had high-level protections completely removed. Unique reefs like Marion Reef and Kenn Reef have been stripped back to only partial protection. In our temperate east waters, one of Australia's longest standing marine national park zones, Middleton Reef, in the far north of the Lord Howe marine park area, has been cut. This marine park, I'll have you know, was not declared as part of the recent Labor government's marine park protection; it was declared in 1987 by the Hawke government. It's incredibly important to the marine network in that area, as the marine zones there are rare and valuable.

As I said, off the coast of south-west WA is the Diamantina fracture zone. This has reduced one of Australia's largest marine national parks to one with the lowest possible zoning. This is where everything is allowed, except bottom trawling. You know, how could you bottom trawl, frankly, in an area that's between five and seven kilometres deep? There is no fishing or mining out there currently, so why do you want to lift it? You want to open it up to commercial fishing. At Geographe Bay, you removed one of two marine national parks. In the north-west of Western Australia, large marine national parks that help sustain the marine life of the Kimberley, and indeed our very important Ningaloo Marine Park, have been stripped of much of their protection. And in the north, in the Gulf of Carpentaria, we have seen our protections cut off the Wessel Islands, Karumba and in the Torres Strait, leaving those important areas open to both bottom trawling and mining.