Simon Kennedy (Cook, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

First, I'd like to acknowledge the member for Bass and the rest of the committee for the great work they've done. I was not a part of it, but it's a topic that's very close to my heart. It's also close to the hearts of a lot of people in my electorate of Cook.

Much of Australia's way of life is built around the water. Eighty-seven per cent of Australians live around the water. The electorate of Cook has the Pacific Ocean to the east, the Georges River to the north and the Hacking River to the south. Our country is surrounded by the Pacific, Southern and Indian oceans. Water is a huge part of our identity as Australians. It's also a huge part of the identities of people who live in my electorate and enjoy these waterways.

Plastic pollution is threatening the enjoyment of Australians and people in my electorate. It's also threatening biodiversity and human health. It's a significant, growing issue. There is currently 150 million metric tonnes of pollution in the ocean. According to the Australian Marine Conservation Society, based on current trends, there will be more plastic than fish in our oceans by 2050. Three-quarters of the pollution on Australia's coastline is made up of plastics, which account for about 80 per cent of all marine debris. It's a huge threat to biodiversity. There is entanglement in abandoned, discarded or lost fishing gear, known as ghost nets. Plastic bags, ropes, clothing and sixpack rings are some of the other most common items to injure sea turtles, marine mammals, seabirds, whales, sea lions and others. When this marine life ingests plastics, it can block the digestive system, causing a long and slow death from starvation.

Chemical additives leach into the air, water and soil, and much of this is toxic to animals. And, yes, it can be toxic to humans as well. These toxic additives that are absorbed can accumulate in the food chain and pass from fish to humans. A particularly intractable problem in plastics are things such as BPAs, flame retardants and heavy metals. The presence of these materials in recycled plastics limits their use in consumer products with high potential for human exposure, such as food packaging. Higher up in the food chain, when ingested by humans, microplastics can damage cells in the human body, leading to serious health impacts. There have been academic studies linking microplastics to cancers, lung diseases and birth defects. During use and disposal, plastics release microplastic and nanoplastic fragments along with thousands of toxic chemicals, including additives and residual monomers into the environment and into people. Plastic additive chemicals can disrupt endocrine functions, and studies have linked them to premature births, neurodevelopmental disorders, male reproductive birth defects, infertility, obesity, cardiovascular disease, renal disease and even cancers. These need to be investigated more, but there is increasingly mounting evidence. It's particularly hazardous for children. Exposures are being linked with pregnant mothers as well as a lot of other different things, like cancers. Early life exposure to plastics is actually being linked to increased risk of noncommunicable diseases, such as heart disease, type 2 diabetes and obesity in children across the human lifespan.

We have a big problem. That's what that tells us. There is a big, emerging problem, and we need to reduce, reuse and recycle. They're the three traditional levers you have in plastic management. These strategies have proven highly effective for paper, cardboard, glass and aluminium but have largely failed when it comes to plastic. Plastic recovery and recycling rates are below 10 per cent globally. Ninety per cent of plastics are not reduced, reused or recycled. They are actually disposed of into our ecosystems. Australia ranks 15th in the world for generation of single-use plastics. That's absolutely terrible for a country of our standing and where we care about the environment and our population. In 2018, we released national packaging targets. The idea is that, by 2025, 100 per cent of packaging would be reusable, recyclable or compostable; 70 per cent of plastic would be recycled or composted, 50 per cent would be the average recycled plastic, including in packaging, and we'd be phasing out single-use plastic. I think it's safe to say we are going to fail abysmally at achieving these 2025 targets. The proportion of recyclable packaging has decreased from 86 to 84 per cent—though there was a change to this score, so maybe it's a bit muddy, there. But it's not going up. The plastic recycling rate increased from 18 to 20 per cent—way off the 70 per cent target. The average recycled content of packaging has increased by a mere one percentage point from 39 to 40, and problematic and unnecessary single-use plastic has been reduced from 33 per cent from the 2017-18 baseline.

The case for government intervention and regulation is made if industry cannot get its act together. Plastic in our external environment is an externality, and it's an unpriced externality. In my opening monologue you heard about the damage it is doing to the environment, to biodiversity and, potentially, to human health. If industry is not acting, we need to start pricing that externality. The warning to industry is that if it doesn't get its act together soon, that will be priced.

To borrow an ice hockey term from my time in the US—maybe it's out of place in Australia here—the puck is moving in that direction. We have a very proud and successful packaging industry in Australia, be it Amcor or Pratt manufacturing. If Australian innovators can get their act together and see that the puck is moving in this direction, there is going to be a huge economic opportunity globally to get either recycled or substitute packaging manufacturing opportunities for this country. There'll be jobs, and it will become a huge export industry.

Domestically, we also need to look at recycling programs. Sorting is a huge problem, and even the technology involved in sorting—when we're only getting 10 per cent of plastic being recycled, that's largely a sorting problem. It's not a uniquely Australian problem. This is a global problem and more and more dollars will be going here.

We need a sustainable market for recycled plastics. Again, we may, at some stage, need to look at a tax, a levy or some sort of pricing mechanism. State and federal governments need to work together to work out how we can reduce consumption. There is a need for regulation here. I would prefer a market mechanism, but we have an externality that is not being dealt with effectively.

Let me be direct: the reason people are using plastic is that it's got a lot of great properties. It's cheap, it's flexible, and it's quick and easy to produce. So there is a market product there, but we now have evidence of the damage it is doing to enjoyment of waterways, to marine biodiversity and to human health. We do need to start acting. There is innovation and funding going towards it. But I think it is similar to energy policy with net zero, where there is a case for regulation by government and for potentially pricing this.

If I were an Australian manufacturer out there in this industry, I would think that there is a huge opportunity to actually start moving towards this. There is a huge economic opportunity, not just a domestic opportunity but also an export opportunity. I would love to see Australian companies taking the lead in that, capturing a global market and doing great stuff.

I'd like to make a couple of shout-outs to businesses I have seen doing that. Siklus in Indonesia is making products as much as 40 per cent cheaper while providing a refill cart for food and cleaning items, such as soap, to reduce single-use plastic waste. Kal Glanznig is a local resident in my electorate who's produced the film Rising Up. Rising Up is an epic film that discusses the problem of plastics and then talks about the many innovators in the private sector who are starting to solve this problem. I am filled with hope. I do think this is a solvable problem and there are technologies out there that begin to solve it today.

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