Peter Whish-Wilson (Tasmania, Australian Greens) Share this | Hansard source

I want to stand up in the federal parliament today and introduce to my fellow senators the ancient endangered Maugean skate. Dubbed by the scientists who discovered it in Tasmania nearly 40 years ago the 'thylacine of the sea', this ancient skate that's been with us since the days of the dinosaurs is only found in one population—in Macquarie Harbour on the west coast of Tasmania. For those of you who are watching the Alone Australia series on SBS, that's slightly due south of where those participants were at the edge of the Tarkine rainforest.

Sadly, we heard last month, from an IMAS interim report—it is unusual for scientists to do an interim report—that they were so concerned about the decline in skate numbers, a 50 per cent decline over 10 years, that they rang the alarm bell. Most concerning was the lack of juvenile recruitment. In other words, they weren't finding young skates. We heard from the federal environment department in estimates a few weeks ago that the culprits that are ruining the water quality in Macquarie Harbour—because of the low dissolved oxygen, the skate is struggling—are industrial salmon farming; variable hydroflows into Macquarie Harbour, affecting the dissolved oxygen; heavy metal contamination in the harbour from mining and other activities; and recreational gillnetting.

The government has made a pledge of zero extinctions, and that pledge sits overarching to the new environment laws that we're going to be debating in this place soon. I understand that Minister Plibersek has written to the Tasmanian state government calling for an extreme intervention to prevent the skate from going extinct. The same scientists who discovered the skate said in the media last week that it is 'one extreme weather event away from extinction'. Going into a potential super El Nino event, this couldn't be more critical than it is now, and it'll be a big test for all of us, to make sure—