Guy Barnett (Tasmania, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise tonight to place on record my strong support for the pulp mill project in northern Tasmania, subject to strict environmental conditions. I wish to speak about this project and the process to approve it and to make some suggestions on the way forward. I believe a lack of confidence in the state government’s approval process has led to a lack of confidence in the pulp mill project, and this is regrettable. However, there is a way forward and, like the Prime Minister, the Hon. John Howard, I am hopeful and optimistic that the pulp mill can be approved and can deliver many benefits for Tasmania. I support value adding and downstream processing—a pulp mill and then a paper mill. This should be our future. Continuing to export raw woodchips from Tasmania is an undesirable waste of our resources. It is not a clever strategy.

The woodchip export industry started in Tasmania in 1973 and was supposed to be a temporary industry while we developed value-adding industries. Here we are, 34 years later. It is time we stopped exporting an estimated five million tonnes of woodchips each year. I recall a meeting in my office some 4½ years ago, soon after I became a senator. I was meeting with Barry Chipman and others from Timber Communities Australia, urging them to get on and to support the establishment of a pulp mill in Tasmania. This pulp mill is actually the third attempt by the Tasmanian community to build a pulp mill, the first being Wesley Vale in 1988-89 and the second a proposal by the Taiwan Pulp and Paper Corporation in 1992-93. Now there is the Gunns proposal. The first attempt failed amid the politics of the environment. The second proposal was withdrawn on purely economic grounds. During the Wesley Vale saga I was senior adviser to the then Tasmanian Premier, Robin Gray, and saw the politics of the controversy firsthand.

The state Labor government, and Premier Paul Lennon in particular, through his ham-fisted approach to the approval process, have, in my view, nearly lost this pulp mill project to Tasmania. The state Labor government have compromised the state’s proper approval processes in the most cavalier fashion, with rules made up or broken as they went along. Their actions have been foolhardy at best, but I would describe them as ham-fisted. They have resulted in the dramatic resignation of two heads of the Resource Planning and Development Commission. That was the independent assessment body established to oversee the approval process. Both heads, Julian Green and Mr Justice Wright, angrily resigned, citing political interference and pressure from the Lennon Labor government. Gunns withdrew from the RPDC process on 14 March 2007, and on 20 March 2007 Premier Paul Lennon introduced the Pulp Mill Assessment Bill, thus avoiding his own agreed method of independent assessment.

From the Australian government perspective, the proposed mill remained a controlled action and therefore still required assessment and approval under the Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act, the EPBC Act. The Australian government has undertaken a full and rigorous assessment of matters that relate to the Gunns pulp mill under that act, independent of any state assessment. The development cannot proceed unless these approvals are obtained. It was on 16 August that Minister Turnbull invited public comment on his department’s draft approval and conditions. Then, on 29 August, Minister Turnbull decided under the EPBC Act to specify 30 business days from that date for a decision. The next day, Minister Turnbull announced a scientific panel headed by the Australian government Chief Scientist, Dr Jim Peacock, who would consider the draft approval and public comments and report with recommendations regarding approval. That report is due later this week, I understand.

Interestingly, on 9 August this year the Federal Court dismissed challenges to the federal assessment process from the Wilderness Society and a group called Investors for the Future of Tasmania. This further confirms the vigour and appropriateness of the federal approval process compared to the state approval process. As I have said, the $1.7 billion pulp mill project will have the capacity to produce 800,000 tonnes of air-dried, bleached craft pulp per annum, generating annual export revenue in Tasmania exceeding $350 million. Directly and indirectly, the project is expected to generate up to 8,000 jobs during construction and up to 1,500 jobs once the mill is operational. In 2005 I visited Sweden, the home of 44-odd pulp mills. Knowing of the Gunns pulp mill planned for Tasmania, I met with both the forestry and environment committees of their parliament. Both committees confirmed that there were no significant issues with pulp mills or their establishment in Sweden. I am confident that our federal approval processes will ensure proper scrutiny, and I am hopeful of a positive decision as soon as possible and preferably before the election is called.

We can go further, and there is always room for improvement. The compromised approval process at a state level requires solutions at a national level so that proponents of major developments are not deterred by sovereign risk concerns from presenting projects for assessment in the future. We need to rebuild and restore public confidence in the approval process for not only major projects in Tasmania but projects of national significance. Accordingly, I make three suggestions for the future. Firstly, at the state level, I suggest a tough and thoroughly independent environmental protection agency—an environmental watchdog proposed by the Tasmanian Liberal opposition leader, the Hon. Will Hodgman, and also promised by the Tasmanian Labor government at the 2006 election but so far not implemented despite Mr Hodgman’s constant reminders. This agency would give comfort to the community where there is concern about a development polluting the environment. The community would have more confidence in the Gunns pulp mill if they had confidence in the monitoring of its operations once constructed, and the state Liberal team’s new EPA would strike a more sensible balance between development and protecting our natural environment by upgrading the identification and policing of environmental breaches, if any.

Secondly, at the federal level, I propose a formalised, independent, objective assessment process for projects of national significance. To my knowledge, most states have an independent, objective assessment process for projects of state significance. This is a proposal for an independent, objective assessment of projects of national significance. I might add that COAG has done some work on this already. Last year on 14 July at the COAG meeting and again this year on 13 April, COAG committed to reducing the regulatory burden across all three levels of government and to addressing the environmental assessment and approvals processes. COAG agreed to develop a proposal in consultation with states and territories for a more harmonised and efficient system of environmental assessment and approval as soon as possible.

COAG supports the work of the major project facilitator, and already this Australian government funded entity has assisted 32 projects worth $41.7 billion and will deliver around 11,280 jobs if they proceed as planned. The projects include the Visy Industries’ $450 million expansion of its Tumut pulp mill. So we need to go further, either with or without COAG support. The nation needs an approval process whereby the Australian government is able to declare a project of national significance so that, for projects of a certain size, such as the Gunns pulp mill, the approval process is undertaken independently and objectively within agreed time lines. I believe such a reform would go some way to avoiding the Wesley Vale and Tamar pulp mill controversies that have dogged my state over the last 20-odd years.

To remain a buoyant and competitive economy on the world stage, Australia cannot afford to be regarded as a nation where environment approval processes vary markedly between eight state and territory jurisdictions and industry’s sovereign risk is always at stake. Such a process would include rigid time frames so that the proponents would be able to plan and budget for the approval process and not fear that their plans may be tied up in courts or tribunals for years. Special parliamentary legislation would be required to alter time frames or any part of the assessment process. Is this heavy-handed? No. If a project is big enough, if its costs run into billions of dollars, then the nation has a role to play in ensuring its proper assessment and monitoring.

Thirdly, and finally, we need a comprehensive education and information campaign on the benefits of the mill but also how, when and where it will be monitored. The structures and initiatives in place to achieve this and the time line involved in rebuilding confidence in both the mill and the process will be critical. Public affairs management of the project, informing and educating the public on the mill development and the process, has unfortunately not been up to scratch. So we can still do better. These are suggestions for consideration.