The Conservation Council of WA has expressed disappointment at the prioritising of industry over nature, following the signing of a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) between the State and Federal Governments to fast-track development approvals in Western Australia.
Federal Environment Minister Murray Watt and WA Premier Roger Cook today signed an MOU to develop a new bilateral agreement which will give the State Government greater assessment powers under the Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation (EPBC) Act.
CCWA Executive Director Matt Roberts said Minister Watt’s lack of consultation with environment groups in shaping the MOU was yet another example of nature being relegated into second place behind industry.
“We invited Minister Watt to meet with us while he was in Perth today, but he declined,” Mr Roberts said.
“Our state laws have been failing to deliver the protection needed for nature. The MOU signaling a deferral of Federal Environmental powers to the State is a dangerous move that must be accompanied by serious state-wide environment reforms.
“While the EPBC Act is supposed to ‘protect’ nature, the narrative continues to be entirely skewed towards how we can make it easier to get projects off the ground – the protection of nature and the environment seem to be secondary considerations.
“The revised National Environmental Standards under the EPBC Act, fell well short of what is needed.
“We cannot keep handing God-like powers to Ministers with no accountability. The National Standards need to hold the Minister to account, and revised nature laws in WA are needed to do the same over here.
“WA’s nature is in crisis and the laws, resources and systems in place to protect nature are broken. The health of threatened species in decline, habitat loss is growing at an alarming rate, and ecosystems are under increasing strain from a drying and warming climate.
“So why would the Federal Government think it’s appropriate to hand further accreditation and assessment and decision-making powers over to this State Government?
“We’ve had years of policy reform targeting streamlining and fast-tracking nature laws – we’ve had that discussion, and now we need to be talking about how we meaningfully protect nature.
“Part of the streamlining promise that keeps getting missed is that these laws are meant to give clear rejections when environmental standards aren’t met.
“Our environment Minister’s priority must and should be protecting the environment, not fast-tracking projects that threaten one of the most biodiverse regions on the planet, home to ancient ecosystems and species found nowhere else.”
Mr Roberts said CCWA’s Back from the Brink: A Protection Agenda for Nature, to be launched on World Environment Day, outlines some of the most important changes needed in our state environment laws and brings together thinking from across the environment movement to set out a clear pathway for the transformation needed to protect WA’s natural environment.
“There are 450 plants and 250 animals listed as threatened in WA - every year the number of species on the critically endangered list continues to rise.
“A recent Auditor General review on Threatened Ecological Communities (TECs) was damning, cautioning that the listing of species as threatened did not guarantee their protection. It also flagged a 100-year backlog to review the conservation status of 390 priority species. All signs of a broken system for nature protection.
“WA is home to eight of Australia’s 15 biodiversity hotspots, and it contains between 600,000 – 700,000 native species, many found nowhere else in the world.
Mr Roberts said the reforms to the EPBC last year failed to meet some key recommendations that the Samuel Review identified as both holding up projects and causing destruction to nature.
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Media contact: John Cooke – 0433 679 780