Rachel Siewert (WA, Australian Greens) Share this | Hansard source

It will come as no surprise, I am sure, to the chamber to know that the Greens will not be supporting the Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Amendment (Making Marine Parks Accountable) Bill 2012. This bill is really a cynical attempt by the coalition to garner support from the rec fishers when, in fact, what they are doing is supporting commercial fishers. I will get to a lot more detail of that in a minute. One of the fundamental facts here is that this system of marine protected areas and bioregional planning will ensure that our marine environment is protected. Not only is that good for biodiversity; it is also good for fish stocks. In particular, in this system of federal marine parks bottom trawling will be banned from well over a third of Australia's exclusive economic zone, or EEZ. We know that bottom trawling is a very major threat to fish stocks—and I have articulated those arguments in this place many times in the past. We know it is a threat to fish stocks, along with some of the issues around industrial mid-water trawling—and we spoke at length about that issue during our last session of parliament. We know that these two issues, which are key threats to fish stocks, will be banned from a third of that area. That is a positive for rec fishing.

The coalition say, 'Here we are trying to protect the rec fishers' interests,' when in fact it is actually about running the commercial fishers' arguments. The things which the coalition say this bill is trying to do have already occurred. We already have strong science around these proposals—and I will come back to that. There is overwhelming community support for marine protected areas—and I will also come back to that. The legislation is about politicising this argument. It is not about the science; it is about further politicising this particular argument.

I have been involved in marine conservation for a very long time. Ever since I started work on marine conservation issues, marine protection issues and the protection of our marine biodiversity, I have been hearing that there is no science around no-take areas, there is no science around marine protection. There are pages and pages, reams, of science now that show the benefits of well planned no-take areas and of marine biodiversity protection. But we keep being told that there is no science, when in fact there is. They just do not want to listen to that science.

There has been an extensive amount of consultation, some of which we have just heard about from the previous speaker. There is overwhelming community support for marine protection. It is consistently shown in polling and community surveys that 70 per cent of the Australian community supports marine protection measures. In the latest one, only 13 per cent opposed it. Marine protection has broad community support. There were 36,000 public submissions to the south-west plan, which is the plan for the south-west coast of Western Australia and the coast of South Australia. Thirty-six thousand submissions were supportive of the draft plan. Eighty thousand people around the country sent in submissions to the final consultation phase. That is a lot of people paying attention to this issue. It is disappointing to note that, on websites, the rec fishers were reduced to offering inducements to people to encourage their participation in the process. The consultation process has been extensive.

I do find it hard that the coalition are now seemingly not supportive of marine protected areas when in fact the coalition have been involved in marine protection for a long period of time. They should be proud of the marine protected areas that at a federal level they have put in place. There are really some outstanding examples of what the coalition have done. They started this current process. In my home state of Western Australia, the Barnett government—while I have some criticisms that they have not gone far enough—have put in place a number of marine protected areas, such as Camden Sound and one of my favourite areas on the planet, the Cape to Cape region in the south-west. Years ago, when I was wearing another hat as the coordinator of the Conservation Council of Western Australia, I was involved in those consultation processes. I know each of the reserves that they put in place. I know them. I have walked the beaches there, including along virtually the entire Cape to Cape region. So they also recognise the value of marine protected areas.

In fact, I remember the debate over the Jurien Bay Marine Park in the late 1990s in Western Australia where there was an argument being put that, 'We don't need no-take areas in this marine park, because we are the best fisheries managers in the world and the rock lobster industry has the best fisheries management process. We do not need no-take areas.' This was the Western Australian government and the fishers running this line. There were many hours of arguments around the need for no-take areas. This was happening at the same time as the Marine Stewardship Council were doing their certification process. Again, the arguments there were long and about, 'We don't need to have no-take areas, because we understand the fishery. We don't actually understand a key part of that fishery, but we understand that fishery.'

Of course, circumstances now show that, in fact, we did not understand that fishery and we have had to see significant measures taken because numbers have dropped so low. History has now shown us that, if we had no-take areas there—even the modest ones that we were recommending—we probably would have a better handle on that fishery now than we do. The science is very clear about the role and importance of no-take areas. I think it would be fair to say that it is inconvenient science that the coalition does not like.

The importance of marine protection is recognised globally. Marine parks make marine ecosystems more resilient to environmental shocks and act as restocking areas for the surrounding waters. Marine protected areas have been shown to lead to larger fish and more biodiversity within protected areas. That also has an effect to varying degrees outside these protected areas. There is increased resistance to various environmental threats such as pollution, pests, overfishing and climate change. Where implemented, MPAs have led to the reappearance and/or increased numbers of top predators, better functioning food webs and more stable ecosystems. This is particularly important in a world of crashing fish stocks and ever more environmental pressure on our marine protected areas. Australia has some of the most wonderful biodiversity in the world. In particular in the southwest of WA we have an amazing array of unique species found nowhere else on the planet.

I also think the coalition are getting some of their understanding of the science wrong in terms of, for example, the crown-of-thorns starfish in Queensland where the science is showing that no-take areas—