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

Minister, I would like to read from a submission regarding the Darwin Pipeline Duplication Project from our friends across the Timor Sea:

Greetings from your neighbours across the Timor Sea.

As an independent civil society organization, La'o Hamutuk, the Timor-Leste Institute for Development Monitoring and Analysis, closely follows issues in Australia and Timor-Leste, including many aspects of the oil and gas industry which straddle our two nations. Although this is our first submission to NTEPA, La'o Hamutuk has made nearly a dozen submissions to government agencies in Australia. We hope that our information and analysis will help you make wise decisions which protect the environment and the people of both the Northern Territory and Timor-Leste.

Since 2000, La'o Hamutuk has analysed and monitored the activities of the Timorese Government, its development partners, and multilateral agencies, advocating for policies which promote sustainable and equitable economic and social development. Through this work, we try to ensure that our country's sovereignty is recognized and that all of Timor-Leste's people – both women and men, as well as current and future generations – can participate in sustainable, just, inclusive and transparent development which respects human rights and people's cultures.

In this submission, Minister, our friends in the Timor Sea talk a lot about their relationship with the sea and with sea country, but they also talk specifically about what the impact will be. As Senator Whish-Wilson said—and your government claim that they have no conversations currently live with people who are applying for this—we know that the Barossa project and the wells that are owned at Bayu-Undan will be the place. We won't be surprised when this happens. But, in this submission, these friends of ours from Timor-Leste want us to understand how this will impact them, so they write to us and say:

Our submission is written from a Timor-Leste perspective, and we don't presume to speak for the people of the Northern Territory. We encourage you to carefully consider issues raised by people there, including by Aboriginal and environmental organizations.

The NTEPA should not look at the part of this project that falls within the Northern Territory in isolation, as it affects your neighbours and the global climate. Environmental risks don't stop at the three-mile limit; they are not constrained by the 200-mile EEZ. Gas extraction from Barossa and carbon storage at Bayu-Undan may be outside your territorial jurisdiction, but they are intrinsic elements of the proposed DPD project …

A piecemeal approach to a project which straddles multiple jurisdictions may not adequately protect our common welfare. Overarching issues might fall outside of each authority's localized mandate and be overlooked – there is more to this project than the pipelines currently before you.

We know that the Bayu-Undan pipeline has been in place since 2004, but, as Senator Whish-Wilson said, there has not been much work done to look at whether it's leaking or whether it's intact or what those things look like, yet we're going to pass legislation in this place to look at those things.

The conclusion of the submission, which is dated February 2022, said:

People on both sides of the Timor Sea are currently commemorating the 80th anniversary of the Japanese-Australian conflict in Timor-Leste during World War II, which killed tens of thousands of our people in order to avert an expected invasion of the Northern Territory by Japanese soldiers. Although the people of Timor-Leste continue to be respectful neighbours to our Australian friends, we do not appreciate being told once again that we must endure disproportionate suffering to enable you to continue your comfortable lives.

I don't know how much more frank the people of Timor-Leste need to be with the Australian government or the Australian public than they are in that statement. That alone says a lot about how they feel when we are on this side of the Timor Sea continue to make laws which will impact others and continue to be involved in social and economic ventures that have an impact on others. We have heard from Senator David Pocock about the Pacific.

It continues by saying:

We trust that the good people of the Northern Territory will put a stop to this effort at "carbon colonialism" before it gets too far.

'Carbon colonialism' is the language that they use. This concludes their submission, and they have made this submission with the intention of bringing this to the attention of the Australian government. Minister, I would really like to hear what consultation your government, in the lead-up to this bill, has engaged in, particularly with the first peoples of Timor-Leste, about the impact of carbon capture and storage. You say that you don't have any project details available, but I think all of us sitting here know that CCS at Bayu-Undan needs to be facilitated through a bill like this and in order for the Barossa gas field to go ahead and so that Darwin's LNG plant at Middle Arm can continue.

Minister, this government is responsible to its international neighbours, including to its Pacific neighbours, and your government has facilitated lots of country visit. But we are not good global leaders. We are not even good leaders within our region because we are doing things that we know will have an impact on low-lying island nations not just in the Pacific. Have a look at the Torres Strait and have a look at the Tiwi Islands because they are impacted, but we continue to do things that we know will have an impact and we don't consult with people. I'm really keen to hear from this government about what consultation is undertaken. Senator Hanson-Young has asked this question of environment groups, but I want to know who else you have spoken to, Minister. What other groups have you spoken to? What other nations and what other people will be impacted by this piece of legislation? This legislation concerns sea dumping in parts of areas near low-lying island nations, and coastal communities will be affected not just here in Australia but also overseas.