Tony Zappia (Makin, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

On the most recent figures I have been able to find, Australia generated some 67 million tonnes of waste. That was in 2016-17, so I suspect that perhaps, when those figures are updated, the figure might even be higher than that. But 67 million tonnes of waste were generated, of which 54 million was referred to as 'core waste'. That is waste dealt with by the waste and resource recovery industry across the country. About a third of the waste comes from construction and demolition services, a third is from commercial and industrial sectors and the rest, I suspect, is mainly household waste that's accumulated across the country.

By comparison with other developed countries, Australia generates more waste per capita but recycles less. We have about 6.7 million tonnes of inorganic waste collected every year and, sadly, about 130,000 tonnes of plastic ends up in waterways and oceans each year as well. Even more concerning, only two per cent of Australian waste is converted to energy. I know that, in other places in the world, the process has been in place for decades where some communities effectively convert most of their waste into energy. I have personally visited plants that do that and seen just how efficiently it can be done. Yet here in Australia we don't seem to be able to do that, and I have to say it is of some disappointment that governments in this country over the years have not embraced available technology for the conversion of waste to energy.

The net effect of those figures is that it leaves around 45 million tonnes of waste every year to be disposed of. Last year around 4.5 million tonnes of recyclable waste was shipped overseas to Asian countries, including India, Malaysia and Indonesia. But those countries, like China, where previously much of Australia's waste had been exported to, are also closing their doors to Australian waste. So what happens to the remaining 40-odd million tonnes of waste here in Australia? Around half of it goes to landfill. Of course, that comes at both a cost to the environment and an economic cost to society. It is a cost that is rising and that some state governments seem to profit from by applying so-called waste reduction levies.

In South Australia the state government has for some years applied a zero waste levy—that is, a state tax—which was intended to encourage recycling. There is a levy applied to every tonne of waste that ends up in landfill. In 2019, the levy was a hundred dollars per tonne. Since then, the Marshall Liberal government has pushed the levy up to $140 per tonne. In one year, the already hefty levy was increased by 40 per cent. Of course, that increased levy was passed on to communities and ratepayers through both local government rates and the waste industry itself, which had to charge more for collection services. Effectively, it became a tax on the community. The South Australian government's zero waste levy is, quite frankly, blatant backdoor taxation, with most of the funds that are raised ending up in general revenue rather than in the environmental and waste reduction initiatives the levy was intended to fund. As expected, the South Australian Marshall government justifies the very high zero waste tax as a disincentive to sending waste to landfill and an encouragement to recycle more. But, like the Morrison federal government, the South Australian Marshall government have shown no leadership whatsoever in the recycling agenda. Yes, they fiddle around the edges, but in terms of major structural changes to recycling across this country very little has been done.

The only reason this legislation and the $20 million National Product Stewardship Investment Fund were established is the waste crisis that Australia was confronted with when China and other countries closed their doors to Australian waste. This government then, after seven years in office, had to bring in measures to try to address that situation. I can recall the outcry across Australia from the local government sector when they couldn't send their waste overseas for recycling, it was building up—there were mountains of it—and they didn't know what to do with it. So, effectively, a crisis meeting is called and the government responds. It's a reactive approach to a serious issue that should have been addressed much, much sooner.

It comes as no surprise that that was the government's attitude, given their dismissive attitude to environmental responsibilities more broadly. That was made very clear again only a few weeks ago when the government rushed their EPBC legislation through this parliament. They guillotined debate on it because they didn't want members in this place and the Australian public more broadly to understand what they were doing. It highlighted what the government have been wanting to do for years now, in fact ever since coming to office, which is to hand over environmental responsibilities to the states. They want to do that without properly resourcing them or transferring any funds to them to do the oversight that is required. It's a very simplistic way for the government to wash their hands of environmental responsibility, and they finally did that with the EPBC legislation. It was brought into this parliament as a result of a review of the current laws that apply across the country, which needed to be upgraded and strengthened rather than simply handballed to the states.

When we read stories that across the world, and even in this country, wildlife numbers have plummeted by some two-thirds over the past 50 years because of human activity and the severely degraded land on which we live, it is a real concern that this government takes very little interest in trying to protect and preserve our environment. We know that something like three-quarters of all of our land and 40 per cent of our oceans have been severely degraded over the past decades. Those figures alone are of concern—but then to think that the government simply says, 'But we're not particularly interested in that; our interest is purely economic activity'! And, for the coalition government, economic activity trumps environmental protection every day of the week.

There is a failure by this government to understand that environmental degradation comes at a financial cost to the economy. It comes at a financial cost—

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