10 April 2024
By her own benchmark, Tanya Plibersek was meant to overhaul national environmental laws “before the end of 2023.”
But 100 days into 2024 and with a Federal election due within twelve months, Minister Plibersek has satisfied neither environment nor business stakeholders through a strangely secretive consultation process that hasn’t produced a skerrick of legislation for the Parliament to consider.
Minister Plibersek’s hapless approach will mean that the promised environmental laws overhaul will not be near as comprehensive as flagged and is likely to see the Government take a tokenistic approach to environmental law ‘reform’.
It may be that revamped environment legislation doesn’t even see the light of day this term of Parliament which would be a complete betrayal of the Albanese Government’s promises to the Australian people at the last election.
Shadow Environment Minister Jonno Duniam: “Tanya Plibersek’s overhaul of national environmental laws has been like watching a trainwreck in slow motion.”
“We were promised the world when it came to reforming our environmental laws. But Minister Plibersek and the Labor Government have proved hopelessly ineffectual.”
“The Coalition has offered to work with the Government to produce environment legislation that will endure, but our approaches have been met with silence. Minister Plibersek is disinterested in bipartisanship and this risks passage of any meaningful reform.”
“The Government is likely to side with the Greens political party to make changes that will not only be bad for business and the community, but bad for our environment as well.”
“We do not want the Greens political party anywhere near environmental approvals. It would spell doom for investor confidence that has already been dented by episodes like the challenges to the Barossa pipeline project.”