Sarah Hanson-Young (SA, Australian Greens) Share this | Hansard source

I move:

At the end of the motion, add:

"and, in respect of the Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Amendment (Streamlining Environmental Approvals) Bill 2020, contingent upon introduction in the House of Representatives, the provisions of the bill be referred immediately to the Environment and Communications Legislation Committee for inquiry and report by 30 November 2020".

This amendment has been circulated. It refers the EPBC bill to a Senate inquiry to report on 30 November. This is absolutely essential if we are to have proper scrutiny of these laws. They've just been tabled in the House of Representatives, and they are a full-blown attack on Australia's environment and on our wildlife. This bill is effectively a carbon copy of the legislation tabled by Tony Abbott in 2014, when Tony Abbott was doing the bidding of big miners and big developers to strip environmental protections and to allow these big companies to have free rein over Australia's natural wonderlands, our precious beaches, our precious forests and the homes of our native animals. It is absolutely essential that this chamber take every opportunity to scrutinise this piece of legislation.

We have known for months that the government wants to weaken Australia's environment laws. Back in May the Prime Minister stood up and crowed about how he was going to take a chainsaw to Australia's environment and how he was going to make it easier for big companies to get the green light for approvals. We've known for months that this legislation was coming up. Today it's been tabled and it's worse than we thought. It is a full-blown attack on our environment. So, in this place we need to make sure we send it off to the committee to look at it properly, to ensure there is scrutiny and to look at the flaws in this legislation.

For anyone in this place to say that they haven't had time to consider whether the Senate should, indeed, be sending this to an inquiry is just rubbish. We've known for months that this was coming. It's been tabled today and it should go off to a Senate inquiry. I'm extremely concerned that Labor is indicating that they wouldn't support sending this legislation off to an inquiry. Why on earth not? Whose side is Labor on? Are you on the side of the environment or are you on the side of Tony Abbott and the big polluters? Whose side are you on? Unless we send this legislation off to an inquiry today, this government is going to try and ram this legislation through the parliament as quickly as possible.

I understand that One Nation doesn't believe that they have had enough time to consider their position on this amendment or, indeed, on sending any of these bills before the Selection of Bills Committee last night. Where are they? The role of this chamber is to scrutinise and look at government legislation to make sure it is right. It is precisely our job to do this. If One Nation don't support this then they're just doing the dirty work of the government all over again. Where are they, anyway? I haven't seen Pauline Hanson all week.