Larissa Waters (Queensland, Australian Greens) | Hansard source

This July has been the hottest global month ever recorded. The climate crisis is happening now. Antarctic sea ice the size of Western Australia has gone missing this winter. The Northern Hemisphere in July saw extreme fires and heatwaves and record Atlantic Ocean temperatures. The UN Secretary-General, Antonio Guterres, says that we've left the era of global warming and we've entered the era of global boiling. He's called for dramatic, immediate climate action. He's previously called for developed countries like Australia to get out of coal, oil and gas. The time to act if we're going to keep global heating below catastrophic levels must be now. Yet, the Albanese government continues to approve new fossil fuel projects, putting our climate and our environment and our very humanity at risk.

Environment assets include the Great Barrier Reef, which is one of the seven Natural Wonders of the World and supports countless, miraculous species of creatures and corals and plants and provides a livelihood for 60,000 workers in my home state of Queensland and a revenue pre-COVID of almost $6 billion a year. Recurrent bleaching as a result of the climate crisis has already changed global reefs forever. More than half the coral cover of the Great Barrier Reef has been permanently lost in successive mass coral bleaching since 2015. Because of that bleaching, and the mass industrialisation of the reef with export ports to ship out yet more coal and gas to the world, the world heritage committee put the reef on the watch list for endanger listing, and the time for our country's homework to be re-marked by the committee is nigh. It could even happen as early as tonight.

Professor Terry Hughes tweeted today: 'The Prime Minister has rejected any moratorium on new coal and gas plants. Minister Plibersek has already approved three new coal mines in two months. Does UNESCO seriously think Australia is doing all it can to safeguard the great barrier reef's world heritage values?' With the Albanese government continuing to expand fossil fuels, it's hard to imagine how an endangered listing for our Great Barrier Reef can be avoided again. Then again, maybe Australia can bribe our way out of such a listing like we did last time with the global lobbying effort, more effort than was spent on actually addressing the climate crisis.

That's three coalmines in two months. Meanwhile, in a totally unrelated coincidence, fossil fuel companies have donated $2 million to the Labor Party, the Liberal Party and the National Party in just the last financial year. We need to ban fossil fuel donations. We need to make sure that coal and gas projects are made based on the science and not political interests. There can be no new coal and gas. None of those 114 coal and gas projects can proceed if we are to have any hope of staying within liveable parameters.