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

I rise to speak on the Great Barrier Reef Marine Park Amendment (Coronavirus Economic Response Package) Bill 2020, which the Greens support. The bill seeks to waive the environmental management charge to the Great Barrier Reef Marine Park Authority to provide financial relief to the tourism industry. But, really, the greatest relief that the government could provide for the reef and the 64,000 people who rely on it for their job and livelihood is to take strong action on the climate crisis.

Four years ago the reef narrowly avoided being listed as 'in danger', and it was a wake-up call to the government that far more needed to be done. Of course the coronavirus pandemic has delayed the World Heritage Committee UNESCO meeting that would've assessed whether the government had done its homework. But, sadly, we know things are not looking good.

On 7 April the ARC Centre of Excellence for Coral Reef Studies released the key findings of their aerial study of the reef and confirmed that the Great Barrier Reef has experienced what is now its fifth bleaching but the third mass coral bleaching in just a five-year period. They also found that a quarter of the reefs within the marine park experienced severe coral bleaching over the past summer, and in fact the recorded bleaching is the most widespread, having for the first time struck all regions of the reef—northern, central and now the southern sectors.

It's no surprise that the marine park authority has now downgraded its assessment of the long-term health of the reef from 'poor' to now 'very poor'. The government delegation to the World Heritage Committee, however, lobbied for climate change not to be a relevant consideration when thinking about whether the site should be put on the 'in danger' list.

The government has prioritised the management of the reef by giving half a billion dollars to a small charity, which was shrouded in controversy and lacked transparency. The UN scientific reports have confirmed that, if we see a temperature rise of 1½ degrees, we will lose 90 per cent of coral reefs globally. If we hit two degrees, we will lose all coral reefs globally. We're already at one degree, and in fact the IPCC has us on track for between three and six degrees of warming. So, if you really want to help the reef and the people who rely on it for their livelihood, take action on the climate crisis, take on your fossil fuel donors and do the right thing to protect those jobs and protect our reef.