Mr Tony Burke (Watson, Australian Labor Party, Minister for Sustainability, Environment, Water, Population and Communities) Share this | Hansard source

Thanks for the supplementary question. I notice that the shadow minister is not the one who has moved the disallowance. He has deferred it off to the member for Calare. The member for Calare in a piece of organisational brilliance has not only moved disallowance for the Coral Sea, for the North-West Zone, for the North Zone, for the South-West Zone and the Temperature East; he has also moved disallowance for the South-East Zone, which was the Howard government's zone. So they are actually attempting in the vote tonight to abandon the exact plans that had been called on by the Howard government.

This shows exactly how far the negativity has gone. It is not enough to outdo and to try to wreck conservation attempts by this government; they have got to attack what little environmental legacy there was from the Howard government and get rid of that too. Make no mistake, if disallowance goes through tonight it begins to become legal for oil and gas drilling to happen in the Coral Sea. It then becomes legal for oil and gas drilling to happen off the Margaret River area. Areas like the Diamantina Fracture Zone and areas like the Perth Canyon that are up for protection now with 20 years of science and all consultation—and what is their approach? In the power of wanting to say no, just like they did with the super trawler, if it is about protecting the ocean, this opposition has no interest.

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