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

I move:

That this House notes that:

(1)Australia has over 500 national parks that protect our unique and precious environment;

(2)Sydney's Royal National Park (RNP) was established in 1879 and is Australia's oldest national park and the world's second oldest national park;

(3)the 16,000 hectare RNP has unique cultural, heritage and environmental values;

(4)the RNP:

(a)is the traditional country of the Dharawal people;

(b)has one of the richest concentrations of plant species in temperate Australia with more than 1,000 species; and

(c)is rich in wildlife such as birds, reptiles and butterflies and exemplifies the biodiverse Hawkesbury Sandstone environment;

(5)the RNP's importance to the nation was recognised with a National Heritage listing in 2006;

(6)the values of the RNP deserve World Heritage protection;

(7)federal Labor will consult Traditional Owners and the local community on nominating the RNP for the World Heritage List; and

(8)with the consent of the Traditional Owners, Labor will prioritise a World Heritage nomination.

I move this motion as somebody who has had a love of the Royal National Park his entire life and in the context of there being a very real threat to the Royal National Park right now from the New South Wales government. The New South Wales government, under Premier Berejiklian, has a proposal to, effectively, get rid of 60 hectares of the park to make way for the proposed F6 extension. It's a plan that was produced without public consultation, and that highlights the government's reckless and destructive approach to the natural environment of New South Wales.

With a proposal like that, World Heritage is clearly the only mechanism available that can stop a coalition government from environmental destruction. We know this because we've watched it in the last few years. It used to be the case that, when anything was put under protection, there would be an argument as to whether the protection should go ahead; but, once it was in, there would be a principle of 'no backward steps'. Even on a World Heritage listing, this government was willing to try to take backward steps; but a World Heritage listing is the one thing where a line is drawn and they are prevented from doing so.

We saw it with respect to the areas of Tasmania that had been added to the World Heritage List during the previous government when I was Minister for Sustainability, Environment, Water and Population. One of the first actions of this government was to go back to the World Heritage Committee and say: 'We know you looked at these beautiful rainforests, and we know you thought they were World Heritage, but we'd like to log them anyway. Can we just take them out?' The World Heritage Committee dealt with it in a few minutes. Embarrassingly, the delegation from Portugal described the submission from Australia as 'feeble', and it was thrown out. Those forests, as a result, were protected.

It doesn't stop the government from still wanting to engage in environmental destruction. Only a couple of weeks ago the Deputy Prime Minister was to announce a new dam in Tully which was going to involve the flooding of the Wet Tropics area. Once again it was a World Heritage area that we thought was protected, that now had bipartisan support for its protection, the battle for which had gone with the passing of the Bjelke-Petersen government. Yet World Heritage is the one thing a coalition government has not been able to undo. Similarly, with the protections that we put in place in the oceans, they are keeping the boundaries but they want to be able to kill the sea life within them. That's what's happening there.

The Royal National Park should not be up for grabs. The Royal National Park should not be up for clearing. The Royal National Park should not have areas that are up for demolition. We have a very proud legacy in Australia with that national park. We turned the national park announcement that the United States had made with respect to Yellowstone from a one-off announcement to a global movement. We made it clear, with the advent of the Royal National Park, that what was happening was going to be a global shift of country after country protecting areas. I would have thought that that action of protection was locked in and was in place. People have spent their lives, as I have, riding bikes on Lady Carrington Drive, going for picnics at Wattamolla or going to Garie Beach or Marley Beach or just driving through on their way to Bundeena. But now this incredibly precious place is being viewed by the New South Wales government as up for grabs. This resolution is about noting the magnificence of the Royal National Park and about having a pathway forward to committing to the only form of protection that coalition governments do not undo.

Sharon Bird (Cunningham, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Vocational Education) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Is the motion seconded?

Warren Snowdon (Lingiari, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for External Territories) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I second the motion.

Sharon Bird (Cunningham, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Vocational Education) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I thank the member for Lingiari. The question, therefore, before the chair is that the motion be agreed to.

Craig Kelly (Hughes, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I am pleased to speak on the motion of the member for Watson this morning about the Royal National Park because, following the redistribution before the last election, I got the most fortunate of redistributions, and most of the Royal National Park. Most of the park, apart from some of the real southern parts, now falls within the great electorate of Hughes, and that is something that I am very proud of.

I would concur with points (1), (2), (3), (4), (5) and (6) of the motion moved by the member for Watson. But I am a bit confused when it comes to point (7), which says that federal Labor will consult with the traditional owners and community on nominating the Royal National Park for World Heritage listing. Why I am confused is that this motion is moved by the member for Watson, who was the federal environment minister of this country for three years under the Gillard-Rudd government, yet I am unable to find where he actually said 'boo' about the Royal National Park. As the federal environmental minister for three years, why didn't he, in the past, take any step or say anything about an attempt to get the Royal National Park World Heritage listed?

Both the state government and the federal coalition government have already made moves on this. In fact, in a press release from back in 2015, the New South Wales environment minister said:

Royal National Park is one of the most remarkable places in Australia and we are currently finalising our assessment of the potential World Heritage values of the Park.

He went on:

Once finalised, we will work closely with Minister Hunt's—

the coalition's federal environment minister's—

department to ensure any documents comply with the World Heritage Committee's operational guidelines and the broader World Heritage Convention.

So it was the coalition—the Liberal government of New South Wales and the coalition government here in Canberra—that actually took active steps, while the member of parliament who moved this amendment, a former environment minister for three years in this country, sat on his hands and did absolutely nothing.

There are a couple of issues with the attempted World Heritage listing. I agree with the four criteria put forward by the subcommittee of the Sutherland Shire Environment Centre as to why we should obtain World Heritage Listing. The Royal National Park is the first national park in Australia, having been gazetted in 1879, and its creation marks the beginning of the conservation movement in this country; it is the only national park in the world within the boundaries of a major city; its biodiversity is wide-ranging and unique; and it contains a wilderness area, and a World Heritage listing would protect this unique place from the aggressive urbanisation facing the area.

One of the issues that need to be tackled with the World Heritage listing is that, although we love the Royal National Park—it is a most magnificent area—it is not actually pristine. Before it was listed as a national park, it was used for timber getting. Even after it was gazetted as the Royal National Park, we know that, in 1887, some 3,000 ornamental trees were planted, many of them exotic, when they beautified the area around the Audley weir in the style of an English garden. We also know that in the park in the past there has been excavation of large volumes of gravel, ironstone and claystone for road and rail construction. The logging of trees continued until the 1920s.

I am pleased to support the heritage listing. I am pleased that the New South Wales government are working through all the issues to get this heritage listed. But I am very concerned that we see political opportunism from the Labor Party on this issue, especially from the member for Watson. As environment minister for three years, he did nothing—he did not say boo—but all of a sudden, when he comes into opposition, he thinks this is a good idea. It is something the coalition government has been working on.

One of the great things about the Royal National Park, if I can just conclude, is the magnificent waterways of Port Hacking. Since my electoral boundaries moved, I've taken to throwing my kayak in down at Grays Point and Swallow Rock and kayaking all the way around the south-west arm. The water there is absolutely pristine. You can see the bottom for a couple of metres. Anyone that does that kayaking trip and sees the wilderness and the natural wildlife understands that this place deserves World Heritage listing. I'm pleased the coalition is working towards that.

Warren Snowdon (Lingiari, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for External Territories) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Could I firstly acknowledge the motion that has been put by the member for Watson and which I have seconded. I endorse totally the member for Watson's remarks and refute the objectionable concerns expressed by the previous speaker around the member for Watson, who, as the Minister for Sustainability, Environment, Water, Population and Communities, was a very good minister and did a great deal, despite what the previous member said.

I know not a lot about the Royal National Park, but I do know a lot about World Heritage listing because there are a number of national parks in my own electorate. Principally, there are Kakadu and Uluru-Kata Tjuta, but there are also two other national parks in my electorate which are administered by the Commonwealth, one of which is on Christmas Island and the other on the Cocos (Keeling) Islands. There's no question that two of the most iconic national parks in this country, Kakadu and Uluru, are both World Heritage listed for their natural and cultural attributes, and there's no question about their importance in preserving their natural heritage and also the cultural heritage of those two wonderful properties.

It's worth pointing out, though, that there is some concern being expressed which I think is well worth understanding. A lot of international visitors don't appear to be availing themselves of the opportunity to visit our national parks. Indeed, I discovered this morning that, of all the visitors to 15 national landscape areas featured in a recent Tourism & Transport Forum report on nature based tourism, only four per cent of these are international visitors. That raises a couple of issues, but most of all it raises an opportunity. Clearly, we're underselling our national parks and their importance as opportunities for cultural and natural tourism for the environmental values of those parks. Despite the advertising campaigns that appear to be happening regularly, we don't appear to be able to attract those tourists to our national parks.

I might point out that there are real opportunities to be garnered here. The way in which we've entered the joint management arrangements—particularly at Kakadu and Uluru—is important because it gives a primary interface with Aboriginal people in those parks and their cultural heritage concerns and makes them important sites in their own right. But there is more that can be done. Of that, there is absolutely no question. I think that, as we enter these discussions further about the attributes of World Heritage listing and the importance of our parks, and the importance of joint management and understanding the cultural and heritage values of these parks, what we need to understand is that we've got a greater capacity than we currently exercise to engage with local communities and local community members and traditional owners, in this case, in both Uluru and Kakadu. There's no reason, in my view, why new partnerships can't be forged beyond what currently exists for fire control, weed and feral animal management control—particularly in places like Kakadu—and the obvious opportunities for improving their role in cultural heritage management.

I do want to commend the national parks workers for their commitment to preserving the natural heritage and for their engagement with the local communities around cultural heritage values. Over the many years since the establishment of Uluru as a park in 1987—you'll recall we had celebrations about that recently—under the Aboriginal land rights act the land was claimed and won back and then leased to the Commonwealth for the benefit of the nation, as happened in Kakadu where:

Most of the land that was to become part of Stage One of Kakadu National Park was granted to the Kakadu Aboriginal Land Trust under the Land Rights Act in August 1978 and, in November 1978, the Land Trust and the Director signed a lease agreement for the land to be managed as a national park.

That's been the history of these two parks. They have been Aboriginal land that the Aboriginal people have given back to the nation to operate as parks for the betterment of the nation. For that, they deserve great acclaim.

The parks on Christmas and Cocos are different entirely, but both have significant natural attributes of great importance to preserving identity—for example, the rainforest on Christmas Island. On Cocos (Keeling) Islands is one particularly important site, the resting place of the Emden, the mighty ship that was sunk by HMAS Sydney. (Time expired)

Sharon Bird (Cunningham, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Vocational Education) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The time allotted for the debate has expired. The debate is adjourned and the resumption of the debate will be made an order of the day for the next sitting.

Sitting suspended from 13:06 to 16:00