Karen Grogan (SA, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

On 19 July the 2021 State of the environment report was released. The report was provided to the Minister for the Environment last year, in 2021, which is when it should have been provided, but was not released; it sat on the previous minister's desk for six months. The first page of the report explains that the state and the trend of the environment in Australia are poor and deteriorating, and the further details of the report are deeply, deeply disturbing. Erosion, deforestation, loss of species, poor water quality, mass coral bleaching—all of these things writ large in this report.

The major findings of the 2021 State of the environment report paint a troubling picture of inaction and neglect by the former government. In Australia we now have more foreign plant species than we have native plant species. Australia has lost more mammal species than any other continent. Ocean and land temperatures are rising, and all of this was not dealt with in any way under the previous government. We are one of the top 15 global emitters.

The change in government that we have seen in the last few months brings an opportunity to start to address the alarming findings in this report. We owe it to ourselves, to our community, to the global community and to our future generations to protect the environment. The Albanese government will begin the process of reforming our environmental laws to ensure that they set clear and measurable targets and provide certainty for community and for business. We will establish an environmental protection agency. We will set a goal of protecting 30 per cent of our land and our oceans by 2030.

The State of the environment report painted a particularly concerning picture for those of us in South Australia—specifically the condition of the Murray-Darling Basin, a river system that is the lifeblood of South Australia. In 2019 the Murray-Darling experienced its lowest water level on record due to drought, overuse and climate change. With rainfall at 70 to 80 per cent below normal in 2018 and 2019 we saw a situation where more than one million fish died and many bird populations declined. And to make matters worse the former government delivered only two gigalitres out of the promised 450 gigalitres of water. These were conditions in the Murray-Darling Basin Plan. The previous government spent nine years obfuscating and ignoring this plan, with no intention or action to find that important 448 gigalitres of water by 2024. This has a huge impact for Australia, and particularly South Australia because we sit at the bottom of that river system. Environmentalists, farmers and communities are all reliant on the river, and they can coexist. The binary debate that is frequently peddled about the choice between the environment and the agricultural sector is false. If the river's health fails, then the farms fail and the communities crumble. This is not about agriculture versus environmental issues; it is about all of us coming together to find the solution to ensure the health of that river.

Thankfully, an Albanese Labor government is wholly committed to delivering the 450 gigalitres of water. We know that this is going to be difficult, but we will deliver this flow. Our plan to safeguard the Murray-Darling will hold the Basin Plan and lay the groundwork for the basin's future. We will increase compliance and improve monitoring of the Murray-Darling Basin. We will not accept river water theft as a given. We will restore transparency, integrity and confidence in water markets and in the management of those markets. We will increase First Nations ownership and we will update the science that informed the Basin Plan at the time it was created. We have a plan for Australia, we have a plan for South Australia, and under an Albanese government, under the watchful eye of Minister Plibersek— (Time expired)