George Christensen (Dawson, National Party) Share this | Hansard source

Poor old minister. On Monday he was busy in the other place defending the supertrawler on behalf of the government—backing up a decision the environment minister had made when he was fisheries minister to get the supertrawler over here—saying things such as: what the Greens wanted to do was have fisheries managed by politics, not qualified fisheries managers. He was saying that, only to have the rug pulled from under him the very next day, when he stated that he now had a degree of uncertainty about how the vessel was going to operate in these waters. What a shambles. What a lame-duck minister he is. In reality, we will have one minister making these decisions with the stroke of a pen. He will have that power with but one limitation. What is that limitation? It is stated in the original legislation, which says:

(3) The Minister must not make an interim declaration unless the Minister and the Fisheries Minister agree that:

(a) there is uncertainty about the environmental, social or economic impacts of the fishing activity;

That is in the legislation that was originally brought to this place. It mentions social impacts. What exactly is the social impact of fishing? What does social impact actually mean? If we look at the Oxford dictionary, we see that 'social' is relating to society, of course, and 'impact' is a marked effect or influence. So the minister is going to step in and ban any fishing business—commercial or tourist charter fishing—that he deems to have some marked effect or influence on society. That would give me a lot of confidence if I were a lawful Aussie commercial fishing operator who was seeking to expand or to pass the game onto a son or daughter and I knew that the minister could close my paddock down because he thought that my activity had a marked effect or influence on society. No wonder Brian Jeffries, a director of the Commonwealth Fisheries Association, has said that the issue is all about fishing rights. No wonder Dean Logan of the Australian Marine Alliance has said:

If this bill passes it will give the Department of Environment … the authority to stop [bluefin tuna fishing] … all the way down the east coast … in Commonwealth waters.

He went on to say:

Bluefin tuna have been earmarked by environmental NGO's as a target species that they believe to be 'threatened' …

…   …   …

… sceptics could see this as an insidious ploy to achieve a pre-determined Green outcome with a massive decoy. Regardless of the hypothesis … professional fishermen do not deserve to be punished any more due to Ministerial incompetence.

It is a good point that Mr Logan makes. Does a campaign being run by the Greens against another commercial fishing activity mean that that fishing activity will have a social impact as defined by the original bill? If ragtag leftie groups like GetUp! or Greenpeace target the voters of the member for Melbourne—all those inner-city Melburnians—with massive billboards and Facebook pages and email campaigns to close down bluefin tuna fishing because they do not like it, does that mean bluefin tuna fishing constitutes a social impact as defined by the original bill.

But again it is the member for Dobell to the rescue, with his amazing amendment powers that have no doubt been derived from the office of the Leader of the House. Social impact? Zap, it is gone. Economic impact? Zap, it is gone too. But the environmental factors remain, which means that the minister still has the unfettered power to stop on a whim any lawful commercial fishing activity in this nation if he believes it poses an environmental risk—there need be no science and no consultation entered into.

If the Pew foundation widened its scope and decided to lock up all northern waters to commercial fishermen across the entirety of, say, the Great Barrier Reef catchment area, which is under Commonwealth control, if they bombarded the minister with email after email and they got phony reports funded by the environmental lobby to get a specific outcome, could commercial fishing in North Queensland suddenly be defined as something that has an environmental impact? The answer is, yes, it could, because the bill, even with the proposed amendments, still gives the environment minister unfettered power to put a stop to any commercial fishing anywhere at any time. And it could have stopped recreational fishing too if we had not pointed out the problem with this bill. This is marine parks by stealth that gives the environment minister the right to stop commercial fishing and tourism charter fishing. Why do you need such a nuclear bomb of a response to squash one trawler unless of course you are gearing up for a scorched earth policy?

Now we hear that there are more amendments on the table perhaps to do with the member for Kennedy, who I know is a supporter of the North Queensland industry and would not be able to bring himself to support the original bill or the bill in its proposed amended form. It shows what a mess of a government this is, making it up as it goes along. The environment minister has proven he does not give a damn about what the Australian commercial fishing industry—or the recreational sector, for that matter—actually thinks. He has proven that through his attitude to them on his marine park fishing lockout proposal. He proved that when announcing the consultation for the proposal, saying, 'It is too late for people to say they want this line shifted or that zone painted a different colour. The question now is very straightforward: do we go ahead with the most comprehensive marine park network in the world or do we not?' That is some consultation—just take it because we are certainly not going to leave it, not with the Greens' tail wagging this dog of a government. That is his approach. So the minister has form in ignoring the fishing community. He has form in upsetting them. It would not be hard to conceive that this environment minister and this dog of a government, being wagged by the Greens tail, could lock up a fishery, that he could ban any commercial fishing anywhere in Commonwealth waters at any time he chooses.

Now there is talk of a root-and-branch review . I saw in the Australian yesterday the head of WA's Austral Fisheries saying that the outcome of this review could be 'Armageddon' for the commercial fishing industry in this nation. He went on to describe the review as something that is 'inspired by politics'. Again, it is not difficult to see where all of this is heading, because already the tail is wagging. Greenpeace's ocean campaigner Nathaniel Pelle has said this week that:

… fisheries management needs to be changed to be based on ecosystem management and the "precautionary principle", where if there is a risk of damage—even if the scientific evidence is uncertain—fishing should not be allowed.

So there we go—there could be the precautionary principle in place with fishing. What is happening? If when you dangle a line over a boat you may catch a fish, well, don't do it. That is ridiculous, but that is the direction we are heading in.

This is why the Australian commercial fishing industry is against this proposal. This is why the recreational fishing sector was against the original bill that was put on the table, and a lot of them are still against it. This is why the Liberal-National coalition is against the bill as it currently is. I call on the government to deal with the actual problem, the problem that they created. Deal with it and deal with it alone and let us keep Australia fishing without this dark shadow of bans hanging over every tinny, longline fisherman, trawler, charter boat and commercial fishing operation in this country. Come and talk to the shadow environment minister. Come and talk to the shadow fisheries minister. Let's put something on the table that deals exclusively with the supertrawler Margiris. Let's not use an atom bomb to kill an ant. Let's not destroy the Australian fishing industry or give the minister the power to destroy it with this bill.

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