Larissa Waters (Queensland, Australian Greens) Share this | Hansard source

I know there is support from Senator Macdonald for such an anti-environment agenda. We did not need any confirmation of that, but thank you anyway, Senator Macdonald. I will just catalogue some of those. In those two years there were more than 30 changes made to our environmental laws in Queensland. The Great Barrier Reef, which is very close to my heart, is on the radar of the World Heritage Committee for possible inclusion on the World Heritage list of sites in danger if we continue to trash it with mass dredging and dumping and new and expanded ports for fossil fuel export, which will, of course, damage the reef by way of climate change impacts. When asked about all of those concerns and the international shame that the Newman and Abbott governments are bringing to Australia based on how we treat our reef, Campbell Newman says:

We're in the coal business.

That was his response to concerns about the future of the Great Barrier Reef, the 69,000 people who rely on it staying healthy and being on the World Heritage List for their job and the $6 billion that reef tourism brings in every year. Our Premier says, 'We're in the coal business.'

Apparently we are also in the uranium business, because Campbell Newman has lifted the ban on uranium mining in Queensland. He is allowing the release of legacy mine water. It is no longer just a pilot program. He has now locked that in and extended that out, so we are now treating the reef like a toilet bowl with dirty mine water that is polluted with all sorts of heavy metals and other toxins.

The shale oil mining ban has been lifted as well, thanks to Campbell Newman. The right as a member of the public to object to mines that you are concerned about, for whatever reason—be it your own private interest or be it environmental concerns—has been removed as well. Campbell Newman is shutting down community input into that process.

The Stradbroke Island mining issue has been very controversial. He got a rather large in-kind contribution from a Belgian mining company in the course of his election campaign. That is on the public record. Sibelco helped him out to the tune of about $90,000. What do you know—once he assumes the premiership he then retrospectively reinstates their expired mining lease. If that is not corruption, I do not know what is.

The list of changes goes on. Of course he has defunded the environmental defenders office, because they actually care what the law says and they want people to be able to enforce it—so they must be silenced. He has disbanded the office of climate change, cut the solar feed-in tariff and junked the support for the Solar Dawn project. I have already mentioned the job cuts. He has cancelled our state planning policies, particularly the coastal state planning policy which might have actually helped the Great Barrier Reef. It is now more expensive for community groups to challenge poor and unlawful decisions in the courts. He has released a port strategy that is a glossy version of 'business as usual'. It is fine for cows to go into national parks now. It is fine for hotels to be built in national parks now. Vegetation management—protections for vegetation have been watered down. The waste management levy has been scrapped. Fancy that! Other states are now dumping their waste in our state because it is cheaper for them to do so, as though we are somehow the rubbish tip of Australia. Protection for our pristine and free-flowing wild rivers is gone—abolished. That was about two weeks ago. The list does go on.

Campbell Newman is an absolute disaster for Queensland and, in particular, a disaster for Queensland's environment. We have heard how he has taken money in, I believe, a corrupt manner prior to the election and then granted a particular favour for that Belgian mining company. We know his views on the Great Barrier Reef and just last week he backflipped on a clear commitment to the World Heritage Committee. I should have referred to 'Premier Campbell Newman', if that is the point of order.