Jonathon Duniam (Tasmania, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Environment, Fisheries and Forestry) Share this | Hansard source

I move:

That the Senate take note of the document.

What this country does internationally is important, but what they do here domestically is more important when it comes to our environment. I think there is a range of issues the minister might have glossed over in his annual report card. I always find it amusing when the government tables its own report card, marking its own work over the last three years, since 2022, telling us that everything is peachy and all is good. In fact, it is far from that. There is a range of issues I think we need to go through here to properly dissect that. I'll come to the EPBC Act reforms that the minister has alluded to a little later on.

There are a few things I do agree with in the minister's statement. The environment and, of course, the laws related to regulating, managing, protecting and preserving our environment do go to the heart of our economy. We live, exist and work in the environment. It is not a separate organism; it is not something that is ethereal and totally disconnected from how we operate here in this country. It is important that we have laws and arrangements in this country to ensure that when we make decisions related to the functioning of our economy, they don't have an adverse impact that outweighs the benefits of any economic activity in the environment.

It is connected to the health of the nation. It's also connected, as the minister said, to housing. Having said that, though, for the last three years—under this government, prior to the last election—EPBC laws have held up decisions relating to tens of thousands of housing units, dwellings, across this country. To suggest that things are on track and that this government has got matters under control and things are heading in the right direction when we're in a housing crisis—no HAFF or program run by this government would have addressed these issues in the same way as they are attempting to do now through reforms of the EPBC Act which are specifically targeted to removing the handbrake on delivering housing supply in this country, which is critical to addressing the issues that all Australians think this government should get on with. But their handling of this portfolio and their handling of the laws have not, in any way, lead to dealing with this crisis in a way that should be in accordance with the approval of the Australian people.

To try and pretend, as the minister has in his statement, that this government has had its hand on the tiller of law reform in this country and that what it is doing as a good environmental actor—as the minister said this country is regarded as—I think is something worth scrutinising a little more than these debates ordinarily allow us to. It has been 3½ years since this government was elected to power and five years since the Samuel review was handed down recommending changes to the EPBC Act. For the first year, the Morrison government attempted to get reform through this parliament but was blocked in doing so by those now in government when they were in opposition. That takes us down to four years. So there was a year of activity, but reform was blocked by the opposition, the Labor Party. Then there was a change of government.

For three years, the entirety of the last term, nothing happened in this place because the government decided, behind closed doors, to hide away from the world their plans for reforming laws that govern that public good, the environment. Stakeholders of all sorts had to sign nondisclosure agreements. They were sequestered away in various rooms either here in Parliament House or down in the offices of the Department of Climate Change, Energy, the Environment and Water, trying to nut out a plan that they could bring into this parliament and foist through as quickly as possible. But for three years under the former minister, Ms Plibersek, nothing happened. We didn't get laws for a new EPA. We didn't get reforms to how we'd manage major projects and how they might impact on the environment. We didn't get faster approval times. We didn't get added environmental protections. We didn't get any of that. It was three years completely squandered. I'm heartened by the progress that has been made by the new minister, Minister Watt, and I commend the government for bringing these reforms to the parliament. I don't commend the government for saying, 'Now's the time to pass it. It's now or never,' having tabled 750 pages of legislation just a few days ago and roughly the same amount in explanatory memoranda. It takes a bit of time to get through, and of course this government has had the benefit of the last three years of work to try and pull it together.

To get this right—to ensure we get it right—is going to require proper scrutiny, and I am pleased that this Senate ordered that the Environment and Communications Legislation Committee will interrogate this legislation properly until the end of next March. That is important. All of those facts are important to put on the record. There are many redeeming features of the proposal that has been put forward by the government, and I'm hopeful that we see some further changes that make this bill entirely acceptable and something that will gain passage.

One other area of course that I think is missing from the minister's report card on the government's activities is something that's important to a number of people—reforms to laws as they govern Indigenous cultural heritage in this country. Last term we were promised we would have laws in the parliament that would reform the ATSIHP Act, the very outdated legislation governing Indigenous cultural heritage. I think it dates back to 1984. That is legislation that is truly out of date, and again it was a promise in the last term that we would have reformed laws in here in the wake of Juukan Gorge, the terrible disaster there, that would protect Indigenous cultural heritage and would give certainty to Indigenous communities and also those who work in and around Indigenous cultural heritage about what to expect. But three years passed—three years that have been covered by the Labor government's report card on its own work. It glossed over this and other statements, and we still have not a skerrick of legislation that would reform an act that is now 41 years old—almost as old as me. I think that is a terrible indictment. It was urgent to deal with at the time, and I agree with the government. It was urgent in the last term to deal with. So why are we here, in another term—and we asked about it at Senate estimates—yet to see any evidence that this government is taking that issue seriously and is progressing what is an important piece of legislation to many, not just here in this place but out there in the wider community, which needs to be dealt with as a matter of priority?

The minister says in his statement—and I accept there are some good things that have happened, particularly on the international stage, but what happens here domestically is equally as important as what happens out there around the rest of the world and how we interact with other nation-states. To say that this is a national priority when over the last three years or more nothing has been done on key priorities—promises that were made by the government in the lead-up to the 2022 election—and when there have been big fails when it comes to law reform, reforms that would protect the environment, reforms that would enhance our economic activity and put us as a world leader when it comes to environmental regulation in the world is a crying shame. It's important to have a bit of honest reflection about some of these things. I always enjoy reading people's own marks on their own homework, but I think there are a few red marks against some of the government's activities over the last 12 months.