Mr Tony Burke (Watson, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Finance) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The two largest conservation decisions which have ever been made in the history of our planet both had their origins in this parliament. The largest conservation decision in history was when Bob Hawke and Michel Rocard worked together to turn the Antarctic into the world's largest conservation area. The second-largest conservation decision ever taken in the history of this planet was when the Australian government made the decision to protect our oceans.

That decision on ocean protection is one that, on coming to government, the Abbott government decided to suspend—and in suspending it, there was a large amount of misrepresentation about the decision that was made. They then referred the matter to an expert panel. That panel has now reported. We will now, in the light of this parliament, see whether the new environment minister continues with the mistake of his predecessor, or whether he goes back to the bipartisan approach which had traditionally been taken with respect to conservation decisions. That approach was very simple—that with conservation decisions, once taken, no backward steps were subsequently made; an approach which had survived changes of government for decades until the arrival of the Abbott government. When the previous Minister for the Environment had argued, as shadow minister, that he did not like the conservation decision that had been made for the protection of our oceans, the member for Flinders—now the Minister for Innovation but then shadow minister for the environment—said this: 'There hasn't been consultation or a science-based process.' On becoming minister, he then set up the committee, and suspended the protection. The committee has reported back to show that the objections that were made were factually wrong. The government's own committee—set up by them to suspend the protections for the oceans, and then to examine the decisions that had been made by the previous Labor government, including when I was environment minister—has come back with the finding that the panel:

is satisfied that the marine bioregional planning programme, which was based on the Integrated Marine and Coastal Regionalisation of Australia and complemented by scientific workshops, peer-reviewed publications and literature reviews, was a sound basis and drew upon the best available information for designing the CMR networks—

that is, for designing the marine reserve networks. You do not get a more thorough rejection of the arguments that the member for Flinders had put when he said, 'there hasn't been consultation or a science-based process,' when the committee that he personally selected to look into the decisions that had been made rejected that view wholeheartedly.

The panel has then come back with recommendations which involve a significant step backwards in the protection of the Coral Sea. Make no mistake: you cannot protect the Great Barrier Reef properly without protecting it on every side. It needs to be protected from above, with respect to the climate change policies that are put in place. It needs to be protected from the west, with respect to the decisions that are made about land clearing, and it needs to be protected from the east, with the protection of the Coral Sea. The protections that were put in place only had—in total—a one to two per cent impact on the gross value of production for the fishing industry. The impact on recreational fishing was similarly small. If you left the Queensland coast and travelled east, as a recreational fisher you had to travel 400 kilometres before you reached the Marion Reef and found a place where you could not fish. If you went 400 kilometres in a tinnie, your biggest problem would not be whether or not you could drop a line, it would be whether you would ever make it back again.

Marion Reef's lagoon, which, because of its isolation, has biodiversity not matched in other areas, effectively loses its protection under the recommendations that are being made, because it is divided in half. The ecology on the northern half is the same as the ecology on the southern half. If you allow fishing within it, you wreck and trash the ecology that is there. Osprey and Shark reefs are regarded as some of the most iconic dive sites in the world. They, similarly, had their protections torn away. (Time expired)