Ian Campbell (WA, Liberal Party, Minister for the Environment and Heritage) Share this | Hansard source

She should be quiet; she should be embarrassed by her criticism. Labor spent $5 million on building that reserve system and increased it by one per cent in their time in office. We have spent $87 million and increased it by 25 per cent. There are 21 million hectares of Australia under the reserve system. That is the most phenomenal habitat protection and ecosystem restoration project anywhere on the planet, and Senator Milne cheers the Europeans.

This legislation gives our money, our effort and our partnership a renewed focus. It gets away from saying, ‘Let’s have legislation, let’s have bureaucracy and let’s have more paperwork.’ Let us, in fact, have more action to protect Australian wildlife, protect habitat and actually protect our environment. I commend this bill to the Senate.

Question put:

That the amendment (Senator Carr’s) be agreed to.

I move:

That consideration of this bill in Committee of the Whole be made an order of the day for the next day of sitting.