Stuart Robert (Fadden, Liberal Party, Assistant Minister for Defence) Share this | Hansard source

I move:

That this bill be now read a second time.

The Defence Legislation Amendment (Woomera Prohibited Area) Bill 2014 gives effect to the recommendations of the Hawke review of the Woomera Prohibited Area. The review was established in response to increasing demand for access to the Woomera Prohibited Area by the resources sector and the challenge this posed to Defence activity.

The Hawke review consulted extensively to obtain the views of individuals and groups that had an interest in the future use of the Woomera Prohibited Area. The final review report was released on 4 February 2011 and made a number of recommendations aimed at improving the coexistence of the various parties that had an interest in the Woomera Prohibited Area, the WPA. The focus of the recommendations was to improve the management of the WPA in a way that would meet Defence's testing requirements while creating conditions to make it commercially viable for other sectors, particularly resources, to invest in operations in the WPA.

The WPA is Australia's most important military testing range. It is used for the testing of war materiel under the control of the Royal Australian Air Force. It covers almost 124,000 square kilometres in South Australia, approximately 450 kilometres north-north-west of Adelaide. It is the largest land range in the world, with a centre line of over 600 kilometres, and is comparable in size to England.

At the same time, the WPA overlaps a major part of South Australia's potential for significant minerals and energy resources, including 30 per cent of the Gawler Craton, one of the world's major mineral domains, and the Arckaringa, Officer and Eromanga basins for hydrocarbons and coal. Olympic Dam is adjacent to the WPA and is part of the same geological formations. In fact, the minerals that are known to be found in the area include copper, gold and iron ore. There is high potential for oil, gas and uranium to also be found in the area.

The South Australian government has assessed that over the next decade about $35 billion worth of iron ore, gold and other mineral resources are potentially exploitable from within the WPA.

The Hawke review considered how to use the WPA in a way that ensured that both its full national security and economic potential was realised. The review proposed a system to maximise the coexistence between defence and non-defence users of the area.

The review recommended that Defence remain the primary user of the area, but acknowledged that exploitation of the WPA's considerable mineral resources would bring significant economic benefit to South Australia in particular and Australia in general.

And this bill will assist doing just that. There are four mines currently operating within the WPA and the government looks forward to additional mining operations commencing in the near future. Furthermore, the government believes the certainty and clarity of the exclusion periods will assist new operators to appropriately plan around Defence activities.

The review proposed that the WPA be opened up for resources exploration to the maximum extent possible, but within the confines of its primary use for defence purposes. This will allow companies to take advantage of the resources potential in the WPA while ensuring its future viability as the most important test and evaluation range that supports the Australian Defence Force.

The bill implements existing administrative procedures for non-Defence users to access the WPA in legislation. This regulatory change provides non-Defence users with long-term certainty around their ability to access the WPA and the conditions attached to that access. It also represents an estimated saving of around $690,000 in administrative costs for individual applicants in the resources sector to access the WPA over the next 10 years.

So, as well as providing certainty, this bill is cutting red tape—consistent with this government's drive to rid business of unnecessary impediments to expand, to invest and to employ Australians.

The bill establishes a framework that provides all non-Defence users within the WPA a greater level of certainty over Defence activity in the area and greater certainty over access arrangements.

It allows users to make commercial decisions with some assurance as to when they will be required to leave the area because of Defence activity.

The framework maintains the primacy of the WPA as a national security and defence asset and sets up a co-existence scheme that allows access by non-Defence users subject to conditions that protect the safety of all users in the WPA and ensure the appropriate national security protections for an area used to test Defence capability.

Existing users of the Woomera Prohibited Area, including Indigenous groups, pastoralists, the Tarcoola-Darwin railway owners and operator and existing mining operations, will continue to access and operate under their current arrangements. The co-existence scheme established by the bill will apply to new users of the WPA only.

This means that for non-Defence users, the permit system will allow access to the WPA on a conditional basis (noting that existing users will continue to gain access under their current permissions). The permit conditions put limits on permit holders' access to allow Defence to conduct its testing activities in a manner that is safe and secure.

In order to obtain a permit, individuals must complete a permit application form in order to undertake the activity for which they require access to the WPA. The Woomera Prohibited Area Coordination Office will process the form and issue a permit within the time frames set out in the draft Woomera Prohibited Area rules. Local staff of the Woomera Test Range may also be able to approve some permits for purposes, including emergency access. There are different types of permits—resources exploration and production, opal mining, research, environmental and other (including tourism activities). Once the rules are finalised, the forms will be accessible on the Woomera Prohibited Area Coordination Office website. The forms are likely to be very similar to the forms currently used for access during the transition period.

While the bill provides the overarching framework for the legislative scheme, the detail of the proposed regime is to be included in the WPA rules, to be agreed by the Minister for Defence and the Minister for Industry.

The Woomera Prohibited Area Advisory Board has been established to oversee the Woomera Prohibited Area access system and foster relationships amongst WPA stakeholder groups.

The board's ex-officio members are senior representatives from the Australian government departments of Defence, Industry, and Finance, and the South Australian Department for Manufacturing, Innovation, Trade, Resources and Energy and Defence SA.

The board was established to ensure:

The WPA Advisory Board meets on a regular basis to undertake these functions. The roles and functions of the board are to: monitor and recommend amendments to coexistence policies and procedures; develop high-level relationships between Defence and the resources sector; resolve disputes between Defence and non-Defence users; report annually on the balance of interests in the WPA; and conduct a review every seven years of the balance of interests in the WPA.

The board will work with Defence in an endeavour to resolve all reasonable impediments to Defence authorising a permit, and the chair of the advisory board should have the power to refer Defence access conditions to the secretaries of Defence and Industry to seek their review by Defence where necessary.

In broad terms, the bill will authorise the Minister for Defence, with the agreement of the Minister responsible for energy and resources, to make the Woomera Prohibited Area rules prescribe certain matters, including defining the Woomera Prohibited Area and the zones to be demarcated within that area. It will create a permit system for access and use by future non-Defence users of the WPA. It will introduce offences and penalties for entering the WPA without permission and for failing to comply with a condition of a permit. An infringement notice scheme and demerit point system will apply to the offence for failing to comply with a permit condition. The details of these schemes will be included in the rules.

There are provisions for compensation for acquisition of property from a person otherwise than on just terms, although the rules may limit the amounts of compensation payable by the Commonwealth. The bill provides that any declaration or action taken under regulation 35 of the Defence Force Regulations 1952 in relation to the WPA is taken to have always been valid. It provides that the rules may limit the amounts of compensation payable by the Commonwealth for loss or damage in the WPA arising from a breach of common law or statutory duty of care in relation to the use of the area for the testing of war materiel.

This bill takes previous attempts to deal with the various interests and stakeholders even further—and does so in a manner that is fair, transparent and predictable.

The bill is an improvement on recent Woomera bills for a number of reasons. For example, in October 2013 the South Australian government raised concerns about potential unintended consequences of the legislation for their land management and economic objectives regarding pastoral leases in the WPA. In particular, it noted that the way the bill was drafted would have the consequential effect that any new holder of an existing pastoral lease would be subject to the new legislation and rules. This was especially relevant in the area designated as the 'Red Zone', in which the previous bill stated no new permits will be granted.

Such an approach would have effectively precluded the sale or transfer of pastoral leases in the Red Zone, to the detriment of both economic activity and the important land management services provided by pastoralists. That, of course, includes maintenance of access roads, water infrastructure and fences, weed control, culling of feral animals, and monitoring and fighting fires.

The government determined that existing pastoral leases could be maintained under current arrangements as 'existing users', including in cases where a pastoral lease is acquired or extended.

The Northern Territory government has raised concerns about the potential for long disruptions to the railway and the impact of that for tourism and freight delivery to the Northern Territory. Current arrangements (under the Defence Force Regulations 1952) allow the minister to suspend permission to access the railway and the Stuart Highway for safety or security for the testing of war materiel—at any time and with no time limit specified. These arrangements have existed in their current form since 1989.

That said, today, rail and road closures occur only for as long as is required to conduct the test and ensure safety or security. This will continue to be the case under the proposed new arrangements. For example, a recent long-range missile test required the suspension of rail traffic through the WPA for a period of three hours on three occasions over a 21-day period. This was done in close cooperation with the rail operator and did not impact on their schedule.

The Tarcoola-Darwin railway owners and operator had raised concerns about their status as 'existing users' of the Woomera Prohibited Area under the Defence Force Regulations 1952 and that the scope of their existing use includes the railway and all associated infrastructure.

The status of the owner and operators of the Tarcoola-Darwin railway as existing users of the Woomera Prohibited Area has been clarified in this bill in section 72TB.

Continuing positive engagement with the rail owners and operators, including the development of a working level agreement, will minimise the effect that any testing activity may have on rail operations and schedules.

This version of the bill includes a technical provision that provides that any declaration or action taken under regulation 35 of the Defence Force Regulations 1952 in relation to the Woomera Prohibited Area is taken to have always been valid.

This provision ensures that any declaration or past act taken under regulation 35 of the Defence Force Regulations 1952 in relation to the Woomera Prohibited Area is taken to have always been valid. This section is inserted to avoid any doubt on the past applicability of the Defence Force Regulations to the Woomera Prohibited Area which may arise as a result of the establishment of the new access regime by the bill.

In order to meet the constitutional requirements to provide just terms compensation, the provision provides that where the declaration or past act would be invalid because of an acquisition of property other than on just terms; the Commonwealth is liable to pay reasonable compensation.

Certainly it has taken some time for this Bill to be forthcoming. Developing a policy approach across the Commonwealth and South Australian governments to facilitate non-Defence access to the WPA is a complex task.

The Hawke Review of the Woomera Prohibited Area recognised that the passage of legislation can be a lengthy process and consequently identified transitional arrangements to support the introduction of the coexistence model.

Adopting a phased approach to admitting new non-Defence users enabled Defence, in conjunction with the South Australian government, to acquire the capabilities and build the expertise required to manage the complex access control arrangements of the Woomera Prohibited Area.

A moratorium on new users accessing the WPA was put in place from 3 May 2011 through to 5 October 2012, when the transitional phase commenced.

During the moratorium phase, Defence established the joint WPA Coordination Office, and developed the protocols necessary to enable greater access by the resource and energy sectors. Defence consultation and negotiation with industry on the transitional deeds of access allowed for access during the transition phase, and provided the foundation for the future legislative model.

Following the end of the moratorium in October 2012, implementation of the review's recommendations moved into the transition phase. During this time the Coordination Office progressed the development of draft legislation in support of the co-existence framework.

This important legislation:

I commend the bill to the House.

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