Stephen Parry (Tasmania, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The President has received the following letter from Senator Siewert:

Pursuant to standing order 75, I propose that the following matter of public importance be submitted to the Senate for discussion:

The Abbott government's failure to protect Australia's World Heritage listed sites.

Is the proposal supported?

More than the number of senators required by the standing orders having risen in their places—

I understand that informal arrangements have been made to allocate specific times to each of the speakers in today’s debate. With the concurrence of the Senate, I shall ask the clerks to set the clock accordingly.

Christine Milne (Tasmania, Australian Greens) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise today to support the notion that the Abbott government is failing to protect Australia's World Heritage areas, and there is ample evidence of that when you look at the World Heritage areas around the country and the fact that, as we stand here today, in Doha the World Heritage Committee is meeting and on its agenda are two matters concerning World Heritage sites in Australia.

The first matter is with regard to the Great Barrier Reef. Australia's failure to stop the expansion of coalmines and coal ports and the dredging of coal ports and the dumping of that spoil into the waters off the Queensland coast is actually jeopardising that World Heritage area—jeopardising the outstanding universal value inherent in our Great Barrier Reef. It is an area recognised around the world. It is one of the major features of Australia of which we as a nation are proud and with which we connect. It is also one of the iconic sites that define Australia in a global context. Yet we have a government prepared to risk the Great Barrier Reef being listed as 'World Heritage in danger'. Let me tell you, Mr Deputy President: if an 'in danger' listing was put on the Great Barrier Reef, it would smash the tourism industry straightaway. It would bring global attention to the fact that the state party with responsibility for looking after that World Heritage area was derelict in its duty and that the world has had to act. What sort of shame would that be for Australia?

The World Heritage Committee has already sent a group of people here on a mission to look at the Great Barrier Reef. Australia has been warned more than once to stop this port development up and down the Queensland coast. Then, yesterday, we had Minister Hunt defer a decision until after the meeting in Doha, hoping that nobody would find out that he was not going to make his decision until after the meeting, in a way that would probably push the issue right over the edge. But I am going to allow my colleague Senator Waters to discuss the Great Barrier Reef more fully.

The Australian Greens have been big supporters of the World Heritage Convention for a long time. It recognises areas around the world for their outstanding universal value as natural areas or as cultural areas or both, and the Tasmanian Wilderness World Heritage Area has been listed as a site which has both natural and cultural values. It is outstanding.

Of the list of World Heritage properties globally, natural sites are a small percentage. There are many, many cathedrals; there are many, many cultural sites from around the world. But natural areas are very special. People recognise that because the areas are of outstanding universal value they need to be protected forever more, and that is the responsibility of a state party. I can tell you, having been to many of those meetings, that country state parties do everything in their power to get one of their sites listed, because, once a site is listed, it gives such prestige to that country, in all kinds of ways but particularly with regard to their global reputation and their tourism industry. Yet here we have Australia trying to undermine the outstanding universal values of the Tasmanian Wilderness World Heritage Area by trying to excise 74,000 hectares of an area that was included last year.

The history of the eastern boundary of the Tasmanian Wilderness World Heritage Area is a very long and difficult one. The values of the area were listed right back in the late eighties, and the only reason those areas—those magnificent forests—were not included in the World Heritage area back then was a political one. David Llewellyn and Michael Field blocked those areas going into World Heritage, drawing what can only be described as a dog's-teeth boundary up the eastern boundary to exclude all of the forests, so that they could be kept out for logging. Finally, after years of the International Union for Conservation of Nature, the World Heritage Committee and UNESCO asking for those forest to be included, they were, last year. There was universal celebration in Tasmania when the World Heritage area was expanded.

Now we are seeing the Abbott government trying to tear down the integrity of the Tasmanian Wilderness World Heritage Area, and I am hoping that the World Heritage Committee will throw it out—absolutely just reject it—as an appalling precedent that a developed, rich country like Australia should attempt to destroy outstanding universal values in order to log a site. The only reason that you would reduce a boundary of a World Heritage area would have to be in terms of what it does to your outstanding universal values. As Peter Hitchcock, an expert in this field, has said quite clearly, taking out this area would destroy outstanding universal values.

Those outstanding universal values are there for all to be able to see. You have got tall eucalypt forests which are famous for their ecological diversity, their outstanding natural beauty, their connectivity and the ecological processes over time that they represent. There are rainforests recognised for their ecological diversity, threatened species and communities of plant and animal. There are habitats of threatened animal species. You have got magnificent cast and cave systems, the geodiversity that that provides and the hydrological integrity that is given to particularly the Florentine Valley by this particular listing. You have got scenic landscapes, areas of outstanding natural beauty, wild river conditions, geological sites, fossil sites, geomorphological sites, glacial features, moraines, gouged valleys, lateral gouging in evidence and, finally, Aboriginal cultural heritage sites.

So it is absolutely essential that we keep this area intact and that the Abbott government's proposal is seen for what it is. There is every reason to keep this area intact, and for the coalition to be suggesting that the area is degraded has been proved to be wrong. No evidence has been brought forward to substantiate the claims that were made by the minister, and even the department has come out and said they were told to do this, they did not consult outside the department, and they say that the government's claims in terms of degraded areas are wrong. In fact, the World Heritage Committee itself and its expert body, IUCN, have come out and said that when they made the listing last year they knew full well there were some degraded areas there but they included them for connectivity and for integrity in the boundaries, and Australia was given the job of rehabilitating those areas. That is what we should be doing.

Instead of that, in order to try and engage in a crass debate to free up forests for logging which will destroy cast systems particularly in the Florentine, we are seeing the government going ahead and humiliating Australia in a global forum. What is more, the precedent if this were allowed is to give a wink wink, nudge nudge to other countries around the world to excise areas for mines, excise them for resort development, for logging, for whatever you like, and have it both ways—have World Heritage and smash other parts of it. It would be like the Egyptians saying, 'Oh well, so long as we keep one of the pyramids we can smash the rest to fix up the roads.' That is how ridiculous this proposition is and how it will be seen as vandalism.

I am very pleased to say that in my conversations with other governments who are on the World Heritage Committee they are instructing their delegations in Doha to reject the Australian position out of hand. I am hoping that the World Heritage Committee rejects the Abbott government's proposal. All it will do is further humiliate and isolate Australia. Far from being a conservationist, as the Prime Minister claims to be, he is an environmental vandal who is on the record saying that there are too many forests 'locked up', that there are too many national parks. That is not where somebody facing climate change and habitat loss and species extinction would be going. We need to protect our World Heritage areas and the Australian Greens will be doing everything we can supporting those in Doha, actually arguing for and working with responsible countries who like global treaties, who want to see areas around the world of outstanding universal value protected. This will be a very black mark against the Abbott government in international environmental circles.

Richard Colbeck (Tasmania, Liberal Party, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister for Agriculture) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

It is a pleasure to take my place in this debate. Can I say right at the outset that I agree with Senator Milne that areas of genuine wilderness that are recognised as genuine wilderness should be protected and should be respected. I agree with Senator Milne in that case. But what we should not have is what we had here in Australia last year, and particularly in Tasmania, where a political process that excluded the community brings about a political result that actually includes areas that should never have been listed in the first place. It is very clear that that is exactly what happened.

History shows that that is what happened. In fact, Senator Milne and her Greens colleagues were saying prior to 2008 that the forestry operations that were happening in these areas we are now talking about were degrading the values of the wilderness estate in Tasmania. They made that complaint to the World Heritage commission, that the forestry operations in the areas just outside the boundaries of the existing estate were diminishing the values inside the estate. So the World Heritage commission sent a monitoring mission to Australia to assess the claim made by the environment groups and the Greens that the forestry operations outside the boundaries, in the very areas that we are talking about now, were diminishing values inside. So the Greens try and have it both ways. It is a consistent process that they undertake. But this is what the World Heritage commission said in 2008. This is not the Australian government, this is not Tony Abbott, it is not me, it is the World Heritage commission, who sent monitors out to check the claims of the Greens. It said:

The area managed under the TWWHA management plan provides a good representation of well-managed tall Eucalyptus forest and there is similar forest outside the property which is also well-managed, but for both conservation and development objectives. The threats to these forests from production forestry activities are well managed and there no need for the boundary of the property to be changed to deal with such threats.

So that is the World Heritage commission passing judgement on the claims of the Greens and the environment movement and this boundary.

Subsequent to that Peter Garrett, then environment minister, in 2010 said in response to the monitoring mission from the World Heritage Committee, 'We will not extend the boundaries any further.' That was a decision of the Australian government in 2010 under the stewardship of then minister Peter Garrett. So not only have the claims of the environment groups at that particular point in time been debunked by the World Heritage commission, the Labor Party in government at the time said we would not be extending World Heritage area any further.

We then had a political process that shut-out large sections of the community that disenfranchised large sections of the community, that took away people's livelihoods. It was a poor and bad political process, driven by Minister Burke, who went into the Tasmanian Legislative Council and said, 'I'm not sure if I'm actually going to do this,' and then walked into a press conference and announced the nomination for an extension of the Wilderness World Heritage Area. I mean, you could not believe a word that man said!

And the same goes for the Greens. In fact, the Greens have said that the values of these areas have been destroyed. Vica Bailey, who I think is in Doha at the moment, said of one of the areas that we are currently considering:

The forest at Mother Cummings was pristine oldgrowth, with all the associated environmental values. Logging has removed these values. Although a so-called forest remains, these unique values are gone.

That is the voice of the Greens themselves. So it is not just us saying that the forestry operations outside the old boundaries have degraded those areas, it is also the Greens themselves. The Greens will say anything to get an argument across. Bob Brown, before he was a senator, when he was campaigning against hydro dams in 1981 was actually arguing for coal fired power stations! We regard hydro-electricity these days as a very valuable renewable energy. But Bob Brown preferred coal fired power stations to hydro-electricity in 1981 when he was arguing against the construction of hydro dams in Tasmania! The Greens will say anything they like. In fact, in this very place, the Greens voted against Senator Bob Brown's own words. Senator Bob Brown, at that time, said new forest, regrowing forest, had a whole range of values. We put those words into a motion and tested it on the floor of the parliament. Senator Brown and Senator Milne actually voted against their own words. They would say absolutely anything to get their point of view across, and they will change their view as it suits.

As I said, genuine wilderness, whether it is the Tasmanian forests or the Great Barrier Reef, should be respected and protected. Minister Hunt has done a great job, in my view, in putting in place a long-term plan to sustain and protect the reef. I congratulate him for doing that. In Tasmania the Greens have one objective, and that is to destroy the Tasmanian forest industry. In fact, the Greens movement in Tasmania has asked the World Heritage Commission to list an extra 806,000 hectares as Wilderness World Heritage Area, not just 172,000 hectares as was put in last year.

I have an assessment of genuine wilderness in Tasmania that was conducted by the Tasmanian government in 2003, defining those wilderness values under a methodology established by the National Wilderness Inventory. It is interesting to note that those areas are well inside the existing boundaries, particularly along the eastern boundaries that Senator Milne is talking about. In fact, when the estate was first listed, the buffer zones were put inside the boundaries. That is clearly demonstrated. Mr Acting Deputy President, I seek leave to table a map of what is genuine wilderness, as established by the Tasmanian government under the National Wilderness Inventory guidelines, so that it is actually on the record.

Sue Lines (WA, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

There are many maps though, aren't there?

Richard Colbeck (Tasmania, Liberal Party, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister for Agriculture) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

This is an official government map from an official report. If you are denying—

Glenn Sterle (WA, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Order! Senator Colbeck, you are seeking leave to table a document?

Richard Colbeck (Tasmania, Liberal Party, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister for Agriculture) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Yes.

Leave granted.

I thank the chamber for that.

Senator Lines interjecting—

I am happy to provide the report, Senator Lines, if that is what you would like to see. I am happy to provide the report to the chamber if that is what you want.

Sue Lines (WA, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Let's table the original submission to list, then.

Richard Colbeck (Tasmania, Liberal Party, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister for Agriculture) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The original submission is actually a public document. What we should do is respect genuine wilderness. We should not be using this process, as the previous Labor government and Senator Milne and her colleagues have done, to destroy an industry.

The special species sector is under particular threat from this listing. We know that there have been existing forestry activities. The Greens pretend 90 per cent of this area is old-growth pristine forest. That is not the case. According to the figures that have been provided to us by Forestry Tasmania, only 28,530 hectares of the 74,000 hectares are actually old-growth forest. It is not 90 per cent as the environmental groups would have you believe. In fact, 9,580 hectares of it is not even forest at all. So when the green groups put out photographs of nice forests with a bit of cloud over them they are, as they quite often do, really misrepresenting what is in those forests. So 46,000 hectares of the 74,000 hectares is classified in other ways. We know that, post 1960, 10 per cent has been harvested. But we also know that some of these areas have been harvested back into the 1900s. So we are taking this action for one good reason: to respect the real values of genuine wilderness, which should be respected. We do not believe, as the Greens do, that we should destroy the forest industry in Tasmania.

Sue Lines (WA, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The government continues the rhetoric of no facts, no figures, just a narrative based on the construction of misinformation and half-truths. It pervades the whole of the government's agenda. It does not matter what the sector is: the mistruths, the construction of a new narrative based on nothing, continues. I want to talk about this matter of public importance and focus on the Abbott government's failure to protect World Heritage listed sites. In doing that, I want to talk about the government's application to the World Heritage Commission to delist a section of the Tasmanian Wilderness World Heritage area.

As I said at the outset, we have come to expect from the Abbott government that a decision to delist—such as the one they have got before the World Heritage Committee at the moment—is not based on fact. It is not based on science, research or evidence. It is a party political decision designed to win votes, as there is again no evidence of any economic or social gain, despite their application saying there is. I had a look at their application to delist today. It is just eight pages long and it is full of absolutely nothing. There is no evidence, no rigour, no science—nothing.

In agreeing to list the extension of the Tasmanian Wilderness World Heritage Area by 170,000 hectares, under the Gillard government, the World Heritage Commission had to satisfy themselves on a number of rigorous areas and they had to be convinced that that area was of outstanding universal value. When you look at the Gillard government's submission—some 28 pages long with facts, figures, photographs and absolute justification as to why that area should be listed—you just wonder what the government is up to. In making the decision to list this particular area, the committee acknowledged that the area included rare and largely intact ecosystems.

Peter Hitchcock—referred to by Senator Milne earlier—a prominent expert on World Heritage areas, states that the great majority of the forest proposed by the Abbott government for excision, about 90 per cent of it, has not been disturbed—we did not hear that today from the government—and that a small area, between five and six per cent, has been logged. That is not a statistic that you hear from the government. They try to convince the public that large tracts have been logged—and indeed we heard that from the government today—that the land is somehow worthless and we have all been duped.

The Prime Minister told a timber industry function in Canberra on 4 March—and I heard this myself—that he wanted to delist this area of country in Tasmania:

… because the area is not pristine forest. It is forest which has been logged. It is forest which has been degraded. In some cases, it is plantation timber that was actually planted to be logged.

Listening to that, you could believe that the Prime Minister was, in fact, referring to that whole area. But, of course, what we see again on display from the Abbott government—and, indeed, the Prime Minister himself—are the mistruths, the half-truths and the outright lies about what is really going on here.

George Brandis (Queensland, Liberal Party, Attorney-General) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Mr Acting Deputy President, I rise on a point of order. That is unparliamentary. She cannot accuse another member of parliament of outright lies. It should be withdrawn.

Sue Lines (WA, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I do not believe that I described the Prime Minister as lying but, if you take offence, I withdraw. One of the environmental consultants to the Senate inquiry described the government's claim that delisting will deliver additional economic and social outcomes and that the area was disturbed as whimsical and not based on any rigorous science, research or evidence. The government's submission to the Senate inquiry lacks any credibility. It is quite embarrassing, actually, and when I read it I could only assume the department were embarrassed. It lacks any credibility. There is no science, there is no rigour and there is no evidence to support the delisting. Again, in the Senate inquiry, the government tried to point out that it was agricultural land. I put it to the Senate today that this is nothing but a political grab to try to get votes for the Abbott government, and I would urge the World Heritage Committee not to agree. (Time expired)

Larissa Waters (Queensland, Australian Greens) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise to speak about the Abbott government's assault on our World Heritage areas, and, in particular, the Great Barrier Reef in my home state of Queensland. As we speak, the World Heritage Committee is debating this matter overnight to determine the future of the Great Barrier Reef and to decide whether or not to give this government a further extension until February to try to avert a World Heritage in Danger listing for the reef.

We all know that a World Heritage in Danger listing would be an absolute atrocity. It would, unfortunately, completely destroy the Great Barrier Reef tourism industry, threaten those 63,000 people who rely on a healthy reef for their livelihood and send a message that Australia simply does not care about its World Heritage obligations. It would be an international list of shame that Australia would be included on, joining war-torn nations like Afghanistan, the Congo and Yemen as one of the only developed nations with a site on that list.

It is not like we have not had any warning. For the last two years, the World Heritage Committee has been issuing stronger and stronger warnings and urging and pleading with both the federal and the Queensland governments to change direction and stop this mass industrialisation of the reef and avert that World Heritage in Danger listing. Just last month, the draft decision of the World Heritage Committee made some very, very clear recommendations, which we are anticipating will be adopted tonight.

They made special mention of the approval of the Abbott Point coal port—what would become the world's largest coal port, that so happens to be located in the Great Barrier Reef World Heritage Area. They begged the Australian government to hurry up and deliver a long-term sustainable plan for the future of the reef. They urged the Australian government to not ditch its powers to protect matters of national environmental significance and just palm them off to states or local governments, to postpone that and to reconsider it. The draft decision urged the government not to cut reef water quality programs, which, sadly, this government has done. And they urged the Australian government to lock in limits on damaging new and expanded ports into law.

But what does this government do? Instead of actually listening to those recommendations, acting upon them and putting them into law, they mount a lobbying effort to try and water down that decision. We have had folk from the Australian government over there for several days now trying to have that strong draft decision watered down so that it is less embarrassing for Australia. It would be less embarrassing for Australia if you fix the problem rather than lobbying to change the criticism. We will find out tonight how that lobbying effort went.

Last week Minister Hunt and the Queensland environment minister, Andrew Powell, released the annual reef water quality report. They tried to spin this as good news by saying that the reef's water quality had improved. It had gone from 'very poor' to 'poor'. I am afraid there is no way you can spin that. The inshore reef's water quality remains poor. Instead of actually backing in the reef rescue plan, the program which had helped start the trajectory of improvement by working with farmers to try to reduce run-off, the Abbott government has instead taken out 20 per cent of the funding for that program. Forty million dollars has been slashed from that program to go into some as-yet unidentified program, Reef Trust. In budget estimates they could not even tell me who was going to administer that program and what the parameters would be.

Instead of heeding the warnings that we have had for the last two years, we have seen this government approve Abbot Point coal terminal. We have seen them approve yet another liquefied natural gas facility in the World Heritage area on Curtis Island in Gladstone. This is despite input from the Great Barrier Reef Marine Park Authority's own internal scientific advice on Abbot Point which says that the offsets were unrealistic and urges rejection of the offshore dumping of five million cubic metres of sludge to be dredged from the Great Barrier Reef World Heritage Area. GBRMPA were ready to reject it; they said it had the potential to cause long-term irreversible harm to areas of the marine park.

It is not just the internal science that GBRMPA tried to tell the minister about. The industry actually knows that this is bad news. We have already had Rio Tinto, BHP, Anglo American coal and Lend Lease pull out of Abbot Point. They do not want the bad PR. They have heard the science, they have heard the community, and they have also cited the fact that there is excess port capacity and they actually do not need these extra ports, because the coal price is dropping, the world is embracing renewables, and they simply do not have enough to justify the need for new ports. We have just got Adani and GVK Hancock left at Abbot Point—Adani who are mortgaged to the hilt and who have been sued in own home country for breaching environmental conditions about port developments. These are the guys that this government has let loose on the Great Barrier Reef.

We know that, further south in the reef, Mitchell Group and Xstrata have also pulled out of their plans to put ports in the Fitzroy delta—that beautiful, pristine region that the World Heritage committee has singled out and said should be protected and should be off limits for ports. We saw some wonderful news in recent weeks. International banks are now saying they do not want anything to do with Abbot Point either. They will not put their money and the money of their investors into these damaging developments. I would like to praise Deutsch Bank, HSBC and, today, the Royal Bank of Scotland, who have ruled out using their money to fund this destruction. This comes off the back of other superannuation funds who are also divesting from fossil fuels that damage the reef and our climate.

We saw yesterday a pretty sneaky attempt by this government to try to fool the World Heritage Committee by deferring the decision on the Southern Hemisphere's biggest coalmine proposal, the Carmichael mine, proposed by Adani—that same mob that clearly have no respect for environmental rules. This is a 60-megatonne coalmine that would operate for 60 years. Minister Hunt has all the information he needs to reject that climate atrocity that would also damage the reef and have a terrible effect on groundwater. Instead, he sought to put it off until after the decision of the World Heritage Committee tonight. But the committee will not be fooled. They know what is going on, and we are anticipating a recommendation from the World Heritage Committee that we have until February to do better. Sadly, the approval of the Carmichael mine, which I expect this government to issue, will be forthcoming in a matter of weeks.

I have a bill before this place to implement the recommendations of the World Heritage Committee to try to save the reef and keep it off the list of sites in danger. It is a very simple bill, because they were very simple recommendations. They simply say: no new ports, no damaging port expansions. Just press 'pause' on development until you finish doing your long-term plan for the reef, and any development that is approved should have a net benefit. That is what the World Heritage Committee recommended to this government last year. I anticipate that they will repeat those very simple and very reasonable recommendations tonight. When will this government clean out its ears and start to listen?

Unfortunately, it seems that the government is continuing to favour the big mining companies and their overseas shareholders, the interests of those private profiteers, ahead of the interests of the Great Barrier Reef and of the 63,000 people who need the reef healthy for their livelihoods. This is, sadly, a theme that we see repeated on Cape York, in another attack on World Heritage value land. We see, sadly, that the Abbott government has reduced the staff working on that potential nomination from 5.8 down to 1.5. There is no commitment to World Heritage listing on Cape York by this government, despite the clear wishes of the traditional owners, who were so close to agreeing on a nomination and the boundaries and the lines on the maps before this government pulled the rug out from underneath them by ceasing and failing to continue the funding for that consultation.

There is no hiding from it. This government is launching an all-out assault on Australia's environment, and world heritage is at the top of its list. Tonight I fear that we will once again have a strong warning from the World Heritage Committee, and I fear that this will be the last warning that we will get. Three strikes and I think we are going to be out for the reef. We have until February. Please, this government needs to start listening to the hundreds of scientists, the internal advice of their own marine park authority, and the thousands of Australians who are concerned about the future of the Great Barrier Reef. Do what is necessary. Implement the World Heritage Committee recommendations, and start realising that Australians can be proud of their government again because it is looking after the environment rather than simply assaulting it from every angle.

Simon Birmingham (SA, Liberal Party, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister for the Environment) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The motion brought to this chamber today by the Greens is just another act of self-serving, promotion-seeking, attention-seeking, publicity from the Australian Greens that seeks to harm our economy and our tourism industries. If you listened to the contributions from Senator Milne and Senator Waters, you would be of the opinion that we are on the cusp of losing all of Tasmania's native forests and that the reef is going to be gone instantly almost. This seems to be the type of hysteria that they are trying to whip up, and of course it is all about creating this 'the end is nigh' type approach. They say the end is nigh so they can try to claim the supreme moral ground, which is what we get from the Greens all the time. In doing so, they can try to block any type of economic activity from any of the regions that might be in question. What the Greens are telling the chamber today does not reflect the reality. The reality is that there is enormous work being undertaken to protect Tasmanian forests and the Great Barrier Reef, and to ensure that their World Heritage status—which we as a government support and value—is protected for the future. We will continue to make sure we do that.

My colleague Senator Colbeck has touched significantly on the Tasmanian forests issue. In relation to the Great Barrier Reef, the management system put in place to protect the outstanding universal value and integrity of the Great Barrier Reef is one of the most rigorous and modern systems in the world. The 2014 State Party Report on the state of the conservation of the Great Barrier Reef World Heritage Area demonstrates that Australia is on track to meet all of the committee's recommendations within the requested time frame of June 2015. So—despite the fear we hear from Senator Waters—the work of the Australian government, the Queensland government and all relevant parties has us on track to meet recommendations to make sure we continue to protect the Great Barrier Reef. The draft decision on the Great Barrier Reef is currently being considered by the World Heritage Committee in Qatar, Doha. It welcomes Australia's progress in protecting the Great Barrier Reef, especially with regard to the improvements in water quality, focusing on port development in priority port development areas, and protecting greenfield areas from the impacts of port development. Good, positive steps are being taken, and reforms are being delivered by this government and by the Newman government in Queensland.

Just last week we had further commitments of work and effort to support the Great Barrier Reef. The Commonwealth and Queensland governments committed sums of money towards a whole range of initiatives for its long-term protection. There were investments from the new Reef Trust: a $5 million dugong and turtle protection plan; $2 million for crown-of-thorns starfish control; $5 million to improve water quality from run-off in the wet tropics region, in particular of nitrogen; and $3 million to improve grazing management practices in the Burdekin and Fitzroy regions to reduce sediment run-off. The Queensland government in their recent state budget committed another $35 million a year to reduce run-off and improve water quality. That is significant investment and action from our government and the Queensland government, because we put the Great Barrier Reef at the top of our list to make sure it is protected. We want to make sure we deliver the necessary protections to preserve this iconic tourism destination for all Australians and for all visitors to Australia to enjoy well into the future.

The Greens are not alone in trying to run fear campaigns when it comes to the Great Barrier Reef. They agitate as part of a global movement that seeks to ensure they get the maximum publicity, whether it is out of motions like this or out of the deliberations in Doha that Senator Waters alluded to. The Greens make sure they seize every possible opportunity to be on the front pages. They rope in world stars to join in this cause. Today we see publicity of what is happening in Doha, from that renowned marine scientist and marine biologist Leonardo DiCaprio. Leonardo DiCaprio has come out in relation to his concerns about the Great Barrier Reef. He is there in Doha. He, of course, obviously, will make sure that the World Heritage Committee is well informed, I am sure, when his considered opinions are taken into account.

Seeing the stance taken by Mr DiCaprio really made me think and took me back to that classic 2004 movie Team America and the way it portrayed how actors like to put themselves at the front of such causes and influence what is happening in the world. Janeane Garofulo was portrayed in Team America saying:

As actors, it is our responsibility to read the newspapers, and then say what we read on television like it's our own opinion.

That does seem to be the Hollywood way. The Greens are very adept—I congratulate them on this—at dragging their Hollywood stars in to make sure that they can get extra publicity for their fearmongering and their scare campaigns in relation to things like the Great Barrier Reef. The classic line from that Team America movie in relation to how actors are used in this regard was the Alec Baldwin parody:

By following the rules of the Film Actors Guild, the world can become a better place that handles dangerous people with talk and reasoning. That is the FAG way. One day you will all look at the world us actors created and say, 'Wow, good going, FAG. You really made the world a better place, didn't you, FAG.'

It is not about what the Film Actors Guild thinks. It is not about what the Greens think. It is of course about what the science shows and what the evidence shows, and we have faith in the work we are doing as a government, in the advice we are taking from scientists, in the work the Queensland government are doing, in the advice they are taking from their scientists and in all of those different agencies—that that will make sure that we protect the Great Barrier Reef, that we deliver for the Great Barrier Reef the type of policy framework and protections that will preserve its World Heritage status, that will preserve the iconic status it deserves as a unique, precious and valuable site in Australia and a location of great biodiversity and environmental significance as well as great tourism significance and great value to our economy.

What we do not need are people like the Greens coming in here, going out there in public or being joined by their Film Actors Guild colleagues like Leonardo DiCaprio whipping up some hysteria or some frenzy that only serves to damage Australia's reputation and only serves to hurt the tourism industry in Queensland. Senator Waters, as a Queensland senator, should be hanging her head in shame at the fact that she is harming the Queensland tourism industry by creating this scare campaign and suggesting the Great Barrier Reef is a lesser place to visit. It is not, and we will make sure it continues to be a great place to visit.

Debate interrupted.