Address to the UDIA NSW Hunter Property and Infrastructure Forum

***Check Against Delivery*** Thanks for the invitation to join you this morning, to speak about a matter that is of critical importance to the Hunter region and the nation – how we get our environment laws working so we can build the homes, renewable energy and critical minerals projects we need, all while restoring our precious natural environment. It has been nearly six months since the Albanese Government passed our historic changes to Australia’s environmental laws.

The reforms to the Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act 1999 (EPBC Act) will better protect our environment while powering productivity through faster and clearer approvals processes. Since passing these reforms, we haven’t wasted a day putting them to work. Parts of the laws have already begun, and we have begun extensive consultation on the remainder, including the standards that will drive the legislation on the ground.

More housing is essential I don’t think I need to explain to this audience how vital it is that we build more homes, in this region and across the nation. For at least 40 years, governments at all levels have not built enough homes and have not had the regulatory settings to allow homes to be built at scale. Since election in 2022, we have worked hard to invest the funds needed and to free up those regulatory settings.

But the truth is, there is more to do. That’s why housing was such a focus of this year’s Federal Budget. It’s why the Budget committed unlocking 65,000 homes through the $2 billion Local Infrastructure Fund to deliver the essential infrastructure needed to unlock 65,000 new homes.

It’s why the Budget extended funding for our existing measures like our investments in social, affordable and crisis homes, our 5% deposit scheme for first home buyers and our Build to Rent reforms. And it’s why we made the hard, but necessary decision to reform our tax system to make it easier for young Australians to break into the housing market. Budget funding puts new laws to work It’s also why the Budget invested $500 million in new funding to help implement our landmark EPBC Act reforms.

Because we want those reforms to deliver the stronger environmental protections and the faster approvals that we need. The Budget locked in funding for the establishment of Australia’s first National Environmental Protection Agency, the National EPA, which commences on 1 July. The funding will ensure the National EPA can be a strong, independent regulator with a clear focus on ensuring better compliance and enforcement of our strengthened environmental laws.

It will also ensure the National EPA can support national productivity, through quicker, more streamlined approvals for projects important to our nation’s future prosperity, like affordable housing, renewables and critical minerals. The Budget also includes funding to streamline environmental approvals, unlocking investment in areas of national priority like housing, energy and critical minerals.

The Government will also provide funding to states and territories to encourage them to adopt and implement streamlined environmental assessment pathways that take advantage of the recent reforms. This will remove duplication, ensuring project proponents can benefit from quicker, more efficient environmental approvals. Because we want to ensure we’re building the houses and energy projects our country need to prosper, while protecting the environment.

Rollout of EPBC Act reforms As I said, implementation of our EPBC reforms is already well underway. The reforms will deliver a faster, simpler and more reliable experience for proponents seeking approvals under the EPBC Act. The result will be less process, more clarity, and more opportunities for development, including: Providing greater upfront certainty on the benchmarks for decisions, through new National Environmental Standards, as well as unacceptable impacts being clearly defined in legislation.

More options for proponents to meet their offset obligations - either delivering offsets themselves or paying for the government to do so via restoration contributions The ability to make rulings to provide clear guidance on how the law, regulations or Standards should be applied. Better access to information and an improved user experience for proponents, including through the use of AI, and better access to environmental data.

Faster assessments via new streamlined approval pathways, including accreditation and landscape-scale approaches, such as improved strategic assessments and bioregional planning. Bilateral agreements, strategic assessments and bioregional planning In the recent Federal Budget, we committed over $74 million over four years to fast-track bilateral agreements and those landscape-scale approaches.

Bilateral agreements, between the Federal and State Governments, offer an important path to removing the duplication and delay that comes from requiring separate Federal and State assessments and approvals. By empowering States to undertake both governments’ processes, alongside strong national standards, we can get projects through the system faster, without comprising environmental outcomes.

We are now working with jurisdictions to renew existing assessment bilateral agreements, to ensure state assessment processes meet new Commonwealth benchmarks, including assessment against National Environmental Standards. While New South Wales already has a bilateral assessment agreement in place, the reforms will improve the flexibility and operation of bilateral agreements, making the framework more responsive to change and more durable in the long term.

We are also working to move to approval bilateral agreements, which remove the need for Commonwealth approval altogether for relevant projects. You can see how proponents in states and territories with bilateral assessment or approval agreement will benefit from streamlined environmental regulation. This could fast-track new energy, housing and resources projects by combining federal and state assessments and approvals, reducing duplication in the assessment and approval process.

Strong environmental safeguards will remain in place, with projects required to meet the Commonwealth’s environmental standards, and all bilateral agreements will be subject to assurance by the new National Environmental Protection Agency. The government is targeting updated assessment bilateral agreements with all jurisdictions within the next financial year, and new approval bilateral agreements as soon as possible after the National Environmental Standards and relevant amendments have been given effect through legislation.

The Budget also supports states and territories to prioritise work on landscape-scale approaches through strategic assessments and bioregional plans. Working with either States or local government, strategic assessments will be an important approach to generating and green-lighting large-scale housing initiatives quickly, and with strategic conservation outcomes.

Bioregional planning is another landscape-scale mechanism to plan for the environment and manage development, both on land and at sea. It will provide clarity to developers about where and how to deliver projects with strong environmental protections. These will identify ‘go zones’ and ‘no go zones’.

Conservation zones will identify ecologically sensitive areas where development will not be permitted, while projects in development zones can proceed without needing separate approvals. The Commonwealth is already working with the NSW Government to pilot bioregional planning guidance for the Central Coast and Lake Macquarie LGAs. While this pilot will not establish ‘go’ or ‘no‑go’ zones, it will develop practical guidance to support sustainable urban development.

The guidance products are expected to be delivered by the end of 2026. Housing strike team So there’s a lot happening to implement the EPBC reforms, but we haven’t been resting on our laurels in the meantime. Following our Government’s Economic Reform Roundtable in August last year, I established a housing strike team within my department, with a target of assessing 26,000 new homes by July this year, to help clear the backlog of referrals.

I’m pleased to report that we didn’t just meet that target, we smashed it out of the park paving the way for the development of more than 35,500 new homes across Australia. All up, the strike team has given the green light to 21 metropolitan developments supporting 19,906 homes and 13 regional developments supporting 15,769 homes. This includes 11 projects in NSW supporting 14,026 homes.

These 35,500 new homes build on the Government’s other housing supply measures, including: unlocking 65,000 homes through the $2 billion Local Infrastructure Fund as part of the 2025/26 Budget delivering 55,000 social, affordable and crisis homes through programs like the Housing Australia Future Fund delivering 100,000 new homes for First Home Buyers unlocking 80,000 new long-lease rentals through Build to Rent reforms.

Of course, it’s not just housing that will benefit from the EPBC reforms. We are making great strides in setting Australia up for a future powered by renewables, which is the cheapest and cleanest energy available. Since May 2022, our Government has given the green light to more than 140 renewable energy projects.

This includes 10 in the Hunter Valley/Newcastle region, including four solar farms, four wind farms, a Battery Energy Storage System and a transmission project. These 10 projects will generate enough energy to power 1.9 million homes, reducing greenhouse gas emissions by 10.3 million tonnes of carbon dioxide per annum, which is equivalent of taking more than 3.3 million passenger cars off the road.

What’s next In a few weeks’ time, Australia’s first National Environmental Protection Agency will be established. The National EPA is a cornerstone of the reforms and will be a strong, independent regulator which will support national productivity through quicker, more streamlined approvals for projects. All of the EPBC reforms will commence no later than 1 December – this is when new approval tests will apply and the restoration contributions holder will be able to take contributions.

Where possible, we will bring forward elements of the reforms to provide greater clarity for proponents, and time to prepare before the new arrangements start. We continue to hold consultations on each tranche of the reforms before they roll out, as well as the National Environmental Standards. Consultation on the National Environmental Standard for Matters of National Environmental Significance and Environmental Offsets has now closed and the feedback is being considered The Community Engagement and Date and Information Standards are currently open for consultation.

I encourage you to take the opportunity to help shape the reforms, to make sure they work on the ground and deliver benefits for industry. So as you can see, we have been incredibly busy delivering on the reforms we passed last year. Putting in the work to ensure that these laws achieve the objectives that we all want to see from these changes.

There is no doubt at all that Australia needs more homes and our historic EPBC reforms will make a massive difference to that task. I’d like to finish by thanking the UDIA in particular for the way that they worked with my team, the government and the Department during the design and passage of the legislation. It’s no mean feat to do the biggest rewrite of the nation’s environmental laws in six months, but that’s what we did.

And we did it in an open and consultative way, but that requires all sides to come to the table to make their views known and to hear the different viewpoints from across the community. The contribution from the UDIA and the wider industry was invaluable in us arriving at such a balanced set of laws that will hopefully get the mix between powering productivity and protecting our environment.

Thank you very much for your time today. We acknowledge the Traditional Owners of country throughout Australia and recognise their continuing connection to land, waters and culture. We pay our respects to their Elders past, present and emerging.