Christine Milne (Tasmania, Australian Greens) Share this | Hansard source

Following on from Senator Brown in relation to the regulations which the minister is touting, it is even more imperative that we pass these amendments because there is no ecosystem based management provided for in the legislation. The areas governed by the legislation are separated along state and territory boundaries. There are no provisions establishing regular reviews of management decisions and risk assessments to reflect new knowledge and understanding. In the regulations which Senator Colbeck talked about, there is a requirement for an environment plan to be submitted whenever a new or modified petroleum activity is proposed by an operator, but the decision whether to issue a permit, lease or licence does not involve collaborative decision making or involvement of those with expertise in ecology. There is also no obligation on the designated authority when assessing environmental plans to consider ecologically sustainable development.

The decision to issue a permit or licence made by the designated authority is made alone, with no reference to other sectors or agencies, and the requirement that operators act in a manner that does not interfere with the conservation of marine resources is qualified by the statement, ‘to a greater extent than is necessary,’ clearly making the environment secondary to the needs of the operator. The references to conservation in the regulations and the legislation refer only to the resources of the sea and the seabed and not to the marine environment as a whole. The regulations, while incorporating more than the legislation does, certainly do not go to the issues I was talking about earlier—namely, the requirement for regional marine planning; the requirement that the designated authority, when assessing environment plans and whether or not to issue a permit, can do so alone; and the clear statement of intent that operators act in a manner that does not interfere with the conservation of marine resources to a greater extent than is necessary.

That is the ‘out’ clause for the industry at every turn. They say, ‘It is necessary for us to interfere with the conservation of marine resources,’ and, therefore, they are allowed to do it. That is the problem. That is why we want a situation in which we can exclude and prohibit oil exploration in marine protected areas. It is tragic that we have a situation where the reference to conservation refers only to the resources of the sea and the seabed and not to the marine environment as a whole. That reflects the thinking of four years ago when people talked not about the marine environment, but just about the resources of the sea and the seabed as if they were simply resources to be taken in the absence of any reference to the national oceans policy and in the absence of any regional marine planning.

That is why I am moving these particular amendments which I think most Australians would welcome, and certainly those in the fishing industry would welcome because they are constantly frustrated by what they see as an attempt to get the fishing communities out of marine protected areas in order to let the oil and gas explorers in so that they can do whatever they like in relation to their seismic testing and so on, and not have to fight with the fishermen in terms of resource allocation, space and so on. So let us make it a little bit consistent here: let us have marine protected areas in which oil exploration is prohibited.

Question put:

That the amendments (Senator Milne’s) be agreed to.