The state of Australia’s natural environment is rapidly going from bad to worse, as those in government with a duty of care choose to dress windows and kick potential solutions down the road.
Tanya Plibersek is widely thought to have been given the environment and water portfolio to restrain her ambitions. Although reportedly fond of bushwalking, she has no previous experience in an environmental role, either in government or opposition, having spent her political life specialising in health, education, foreign affairs, human services and women.
It can be something of a curse to be the human face of the government’s environment policy, with little real power to change things, but Minister Plibersek’s fall has been further than most, having been elected as part of a government promising to do much better in this area than its predecessor – not a big ask in this case.
When the Albanese government released its Nature Positive Plan in 2022 there was an expectation that sweeping reforms of Commonwealth environmental law would follow, particularly a reworking of the deeply flawed and unfit for purpose Environment Protection Biodiversity and Conservation Act.
So far, little has changed, apart from the announcement of two additional bureaucratic bodies; a new federal EPA (this is the watchdog with no teeth, only able to implement existing laws) and another one created to manage environmental data, to be called Environment Information Australia (EIA).
Too hard basket
The rest of the Nature Positive Plan – the part concerned with legislating real change on the ground, to protect species and ecosystems – has been broken up and relegated vaguely into the future. This has been warmly welcomed by mining companies, particularly in WA, while the environment organisations and other stakeholders who have been working behind closed doors with government to develop the plan are calling it a betrayal.
George Woods from Lock the Gate recently appeared at a parliamentary committee and said, ‘This delay is going to drive wildlife closer to extinction. It’s going to maintain the blindfold in Australia’s keystone environment law on climate change damage caused by coal and gas mining and exports.’
She said the government had failed in its promise to halt new extinctions, with ‘the lack of any kind of response from the minister to these really substantial problems.’
The absence of legislative reform means that coalmine and gasfield expansions, along with the destruction of forests, can continue just as they did under Scott Morrison, with no additional consideration of climate or species protection, but with a new body providing the green light.
Even without the new EIA, the data on Australia’s environmental decline is overwhelming.
World leaders
Australia leads the world in mammal extinctions, is second in the world for biodiversity loss, and has been named as the only rich country on a global deforestation hotspot list, with an area of bushland and forest equivalent to the MCG being bulldozed every two minutes, mostly for beef production. More often than not, being mapped as threatened species habitat is no protection against destruction in the lucky country, with agriculture and forestry exempt from existing federal environment laws.
The CSIRO has recently estimated 50 million native animals are killed each year in Queensland and NSW due to deforestation, on top of the 3 billion estimated to have died from bushfires across Black Summer.
The Great Barrier Reef is currently undergoing its worst ever coral bleaching (with no obvious response from the government), logging in Tasmania is accelerating, new coal mines are opening, ecosystems in WA are collapsing under the pressure from climate change and other human activity, offshore gas in NSW is back on the table, wind farms are being built in environmentally sensitive areas, new pipelines are being laid, and the fracking industry is spreading across the Northern Territory with no federal intervention, potentially permanently polluting underground water.
In a rare ray of sunshine, Tanya Plibersek did reject the Toondah Harbour development proposal near Brisbane, but only after a decade of grassroots community activism. She has declared herself ineligible to step into the Wallum dispute.
Recently the federal environment minister’s role has been further diminished, with her ability to oversee the offshore petroleum industry now handed over to Resources Minister Madeleine King, a woman who has shown as much enthusiasm for fossil fuels as Keith Pitt, Matt Canavan and Barnaby Joyce, who each held the portfolio before her.
How any of this squares with the government’s stated commitment to net zero is anyone’s guess. What happened to the climate trigger, Albo?
Originally from Canberra, David Lowe is an award-winning film-maker, writer and photographer with particular interests in the environment and politics. He’s known for his campaigning work with Cloudcatcher Media.
Long ago, he did work experience in Parliament House with Mungo MacCallum.
The ALP, after all the pre-Election22 hype, a huge letdown on environment;
– EPBC big reform promised, now shoved off into the long grass.
– ‘Climate Trigger’ talked up, now nowhere to be seen or heard of.
– PEP11 cancellation , Albo talked a h u g e game, now nowhere to be seen.
– Fossil Fuel projects still getting government subsidies and new Fossil projects still getting approvals.
But this is what happens when you vote A lternate L iberal-lite P arty ( and LibNat ) that gleefully pockets those $’shundredsofhtousands Fossil Fuel Industry ‘donations’.
If you want better, stop voting Lab and LibNat.
What vote greens with policies like in housing we went more but just not near us or federal laws on rents when they don’t have the constitutional power. Anyway Madeline king has stated she won’t be making that decision on offshore exploration.
Rod, stick with the same and you keep getting more of the same, all sponsored by Fossil Fuel Industry.
Poor old ALP, in power at Federal level and all across the mainland at State level but national cabinet is uninterested to deliver anything on rents. What is the point then of the ALP?
Oh dear Joachim, here we go again, the Greens are so good at grandstanding and so hopeless at delivering. The great thing about this great country is that there two political parties that can govern Australia, and on election day we get a choice of either voting for a regressive, corrupt Coalition, or a progressive Labor Party that actually makes a difference to everyday Aussies. But by far the best thing that happens on election day is that a vast majority of those Aussie voters are far to smart to elect a a Greens Govt that would bring this country to its knees in their first term, if they lasted that long.
Keith, I see you didn’t address any of those ALP’s non/ actions that I outlined.
It is indefensible stuff from ALP, so you’ve gone MIA again.
Trying your worn out deflection of anti-Greens nonsense isn’t working old son.
Joachim my man, your constant attacks on the only political party in Australia that can govern in its own right isn’t working old son, I’ll address why the Greens won’t be able to form ANY sort of a Govt after the next election, happy to help.
Hilarious
I think the greens are delusional fanatics when it comes to the environment and climate change hysteria but iam going to put this aside and vote greens at the next state and federal elections purely on the absolute fact that they are the only Australian political party against the genocide that our current duopoly support
it is a deep stain on Australian society that our government and corporations have aligned Australia and its citzens with the murderous phsycopathic Israeli government, over 30,000 men women and children slaughtered by a nation that our governments support.
Dennis, what could the Greens possibly do to resolve that appalling situation in Gaza when the rest of the world can’t?, maybe a rethink on that voting intention would be in order, all you would do is weaken a progressive Labor Govt.
Firstly, there is no “ current duopoly support” for what is happening in Gaza. What you have is both the Greens and the Coalition attempting to play politics with a tragic situation that has a long history and few answers.
Secondly, I somehow doubt that you have voted any other way recently.
Thirdly, I take a somewhat antithetical view to yours. I don’t think anyone is overstating the perils of climate change, I just think that the Greens know the complexities involved in decarbonising a world so intricately dependent on energy supply – they’d just rather play politics with this one too. Conversely, I think our Government, in not taking sides, playing politics or inflaming passions, is displaying just the right qualities of leadership.
It’s fine to say there should be a spirit of protest in universities. Students have been apathetic and uninspiring for too long. In my days at university however, we marched in the streets against conscription and the Viet Nam war. We showed up on masse at Tullamarine to protest the Concorde’s arrival. I do not recall two sides lined up across a ditch, mindlessly shouting slogans at each other 😢 Just one manifestation of our growing intolerance for each other at home.
To March 2019 100 Australian endemic species weee listed as extinct (or extinct in the wild) since the nation’s colonisation by Europeans in 1788. The list includes 38 plants, 34 mammals, ten invertebrates, nine birds, four frogs, three reptiles, one fish, and a protist.
In March 2021 In The Australian (Coalition) government has officially acknowledged the extinction of 13 endemic species, including 12 mammals and the first reptile known to have been lost since European colonisation.
Species loss, across the globe, appears to be due to climate change and habitat loss from housing development for increasing human populations, as well as agriculture and fire.
PNAS.org also states: “ In contrast to general patterns of extinction on other continents where the main cause is habitat loss, hunting, and impacts of human development, particularly in areas of high and increasing human population pressures, the loss of Australian land mammals is most likely due primarily to predation by introduced species, particularly the feral cat, Felis catus, and European red fox, Vulpes vulpes, and changed fire regimes”.
I don’t think responsibility for all of this lies with Tanya – much as it is attractive for some to cite, admittedly tragic, statistics and point the finger at an Environment Minister two years into her role.
The degradation of the GBR is largely cased by heat stress from raised water temperatures and increased UV radiation. Global influences that, while we must be part of global cooperative action, Tanya Plibasek can do little to reverse single handedly.