Bob Brown (Tasmania, Australian Greens) Share this | Hansard source

The behaviour of the government is outrageous in this matter. It is an affront not just to both houses of parliament and particularly the Senate in this regard but to 20 million Australians. This is a simple case of the government preparing legislation to comprehensively weaken and remove teeth from the nation’s Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act. The Greens opposed that back in 2000 when the legislation came through because we felt it was far too weak. But here is the government tugging its forelock to the resource extraction industries, not least the coal industry in this country, which do not want to have any environmental assessment, any protection of this nation’s most magnificent natural and cultural sites put in the way of them making money.

It involves centrally the failed Minister for the Environment and Heritage, who would be better under the title of minister against the environment, who ought to be seeing that this weak legislation which Australia has in place is strengthened, not emasculated. But he, of course, is not in control of his portfolio. I listened to him in question time again today and yesterday in answer to Senator Siewert’s request for information, basically, as to whether he was going to stand up for the world’s great rock art site in the Burrup Peninsula. There is no alternative for that rock art if it is to be bulldozed, but there are good alternatives for Woodside if it is going to bring gas ashore. What we heard was the minister cavilling, demurring, quivering, backing down, and saying anything but that he will protect the environment.

We could have an honest delivery of legislation to the Senate, which could then pass it on to a committee inquiry with due time for the public and the environmental and cultural experts—not least the First Australians, the Aboriginal people of this great nation—to feed back to the parliament. Instead, when great heirlooms of this nation are being threatened, we have the information leaked out about this legislation to the Australian newspaper through Dennis Shanahan, political editor, who has a direct line to the Prime Minister’s office. You have the executive, which is the Prime Minister, treating both houses of this parliament with utter contempt. The control of the Senate by the Prime Minister has his vassals opposite weakly trying to defend the indefensible.

The Minister for Justice and Customs will be on his feet in a moment. One thing he will not do is to apologise for the outrageous move to give the Senate a few weeks to go to the public and the experts to look at a piece of legislation which comprehensively weakens environmental and cultural heritage protection in this country, because that is not what the big corporate backers of this government want. It might be what the Australian people want, but it is not what those corporate backers want. They are the people who will have on their logos—and the Prime Minister will be right up there with them—the use of Australia’s symbols in proclaiming their Australianness. What this legislation is about is devaluing, derogating duty towards and letting slide away more of this nation’s heritage by this corrosive and erosive process of weakening environmental laws and handing more across to the corporate domain to determine because this duplicitous and hypocritical government places profits before what makes us Australian and before what should be pride in this country.