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

With regard to the very points Senator Moore has just made around the issues of public benefit: I am sorry, but in whose definition is the public benefit? We want a clear process set out that actually does look at the environmental, social and cultural aspects of particular developments. I am sorry, but comparing it to the Clean Energy Finance Corporation is erroneous given that these projects have the potential to dig things up that potentially have a significant impact on the climate to put in place significant infrastructure that may in fact not be in the long-term public interest. It may be counted, depending on who is doing the assessment, as having some public benefit in the short term but may not in the long term, particularly when you focus on the issue of climate. That is why we want in the legislation the requirement to do this type of very significant cost-benefit analysis so that those sorts of issues are clearly mandated to be looked at. Otherwise, some of the flawed decision-making we have seen in the past about things that might be in the public benefit might well get approved when they ought not to be.