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

This is a serious case of having our intelligence insulted, Senator Conroy. I do not know if you have been listening at all to what I have been saying. I am asking: how do these guidelines get enforced? Yes, of course I heard Senator Wong saying in here that she has now put in a couple more words about surface water and groundwater. I am saying: who will actually deem that this has been complied with? The issue here is that the Secretary of the Department of Climate Change is supposed to be telling the tax commissioner whether this is legit or not. That assumes that somebody at the Department of Climate Change actually considers the specific hectarage that we are talking about and asks: ‘Is there a groundwater issue? Is there a surface water interception issue?’ Does it take into account clearance, or is this just here essentially as a bit of decoration to say that, if you wanted to, you could look at this and, if you wanted to, you could take some notice of this? What I am asking is: how will it be determined whether a person did anything about surface water or groundwater before getting the tax deduction, and how will the Secretary of the Department of Climate Change make that determination? The Liberal Party’s support for these guidelines is based on them being complied with, on them actually existing, but they are not regulations and they are not mandatory. So can you please explain to me the difference between mandatory regulations and these guidelines as they pertain to the enforcement of these provisions?