Dorinda Cox (WA, Australian Greens) Share this | Hansard source

I rise to take note of the ministerial statement by the Minister for Resources. The minister opened this statement by saying there are very few bigger global challenges than addressing climate change, and that we will not meet our commitment of net zero without the resources sector. Whilst this is partly true, there's a very significant proportion of the resources sector that have contributed to climate change and continue to do so, and that's the fossil fuel industry. The fossil fuel is holding this government and this country back from achieving real change and real climate action that is in line with the science. I'd like to draw your attention again to the IPCC report that was released last week. I've already spoken about it this week, and there are some key findings that I think the government needs to be reminded of. This report made it very clear that there needs to be no more new coal or gas projects opened up and that we must stop giving public money to fossil fuel projects.

The report stated that removing fossil fuel subsidies would reduce emissions, improve public revenue and macroeconomic performance, and yield other environmental and sustainable development benefits. Now, doesn't that just sound great? Imagine what we could do with the billions of dollars that governments have chosen to give to corporations that are reporting those record profits, and in the middle of a cost-of-living crisis, which we've heard about all week in this place. When people are having to choose between paying their rent and feeding themselves, governments in this country continue to give billions of dollars to fossil fuel companies.

This latest IPCC report was, frankly, a scary reminder of just how much we have to do in order to have any hope of keeping ourselves under 1.5 degrees of warming, which we are on track to fly right past. So, for the minister to stand in the place and say that we need the resources sector to fight climate change, without addressing the fossil fuel industry and the 116 fossil fuel projects in the pipeline, is misleading at its best. But there's some truth in the minister's statement, and we will need minerals like lithium, silicon and others to build batteries, wind turbines and solar panels. And I acknowledge the conversations I've had with Minister King about the government's new critical minerals strategy, mainly ensuring that traditional owners are not left out of this conversation. After all, every single resources project in this country is on the unceded lands, every tonne that is dug up and sold is stolen wealth, and every cent made from these projects is stolen. We have to remember that.

And we have to remember First Nations people being locked out of our economy for many years and in many different ways and across every sector. This includes having projects go ahead on their lands without their consent, with few royalties paid—just not enough. First Nations people need to be the owners of these critical minerals projects on their lands and be deeply embedded every step of the way—drawing up environmental plans, exploration and production through to rehabilitation. This is the only way we can be confident that our cultural heritage is being protected and we can avoid another disaster like Juukan Gorge.

We will continue to do mining in some circumstances, particularly in places like my home state of Western Australia. But the conversation now needs to be about how we can do this with as few environmental water, cultural and climate impacts as possible. We need stronger regulations and we need a climate trigger, and I am happy to share in the fruits that we've negotiated with the government this week. The balance between the need for these minerals and the impacts of mining them is a tricky one to get, but we simply can't continue making the same mistakes that we've made previously. That's led us to where we are now. We continue to work alongside the government, and I continue to work alongside the minister, to make sure that balance is not forgotten.

We are in a crucial decade of change for climate action. We have had so much delay from previous governments that we now need to sprint away from fossil fuels in this country and towards renewable energy. We need more-ambitious emissions reduction targets that are actually in line with the science. And we need a government that's not going to accept the dirty donations and be captured by fossil fuel industries in this country. Thank you.