Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Amendment (Board of Management Functions) Bill 2025

Senator LIDDLE (South Australia) (17:54): I rise today to speak on the Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Amendment (Board of Management Functions) Bill 2025. We're actually here today because the Labor Party hasn't done its job. This bill actually addresses that.

The coalition, however, supports this bill. We do so because it delivers a necessary and practical fix to ensure continuity and the management of jointly managed Commonwealth reserves—Kakadu National Park in the Northern Territory, Uluru-Kata Tjuta National Park in the Northern Territory and Booderee National Park in New South Wales. These places are not just world-renowned landscapes; they are land leased to the Commonwealth and co-managed in partnership with traditional owners, bringing together Western science and traditional knowledge of local ecosystems.

This bill corrects a technical flaw in the existing EPBC Act. Under current law, when a park's management plan expires, typically every 10 years, the board of management loses its ability to make operational decisions. It can advise, plan and draft, but it actually can't decide.

The management plans for Booderee and Kakadu are both due to expire within weeks, for Booderee, and early next year, for Kakadu. Uluru-Kata Tjuta is not due to expire until 2030. This bill sensibly allows the boards to continue making decisions consistent with the most recent management plan until the new one comes into force.

It ensures continuity of governance, avoids bureaucratic paralysis and ensures Indigenous participation in environmental management continues, regardless of the expiry date on the plan. The coalition supports that intent, but the failure to plan to deliver on a key deliverable is the case for this new bill. While we support the bill, we do so with significant concerns about how the Albanese government has managed this process.

Let's be clear that this bill is necessary only because the government failed to renew the management plans on time. Labor had 3½ years to oversee that work. The agencies with responsibility to assist in the delivery of plans had 10 years.

The expiry date for each plan is actually set in the plan itself. Yet we are here, scrambling for a legislative fix, just weeks before the deadline of one of those plans. This is not proactive governance; it's another example of a government that struggles on detail and delivery.

This bill is a small, technical measure, but the government has still managed to turn even this into a symbol of delay. The Senate Environment and Communications Legislation Committee, which examined this bill, noted that it was being introduced urgently to preserve the decision-making powers of the boards for Booderee and Kakadu before expiry. The committee also acknowledged that broader EPBC reforms remain incomplete.

That is the larger story. Three and a half years into the Albanese government, we are still waiting for the promised overhaul of that act. The so-called nature positive plan has become a bureaucratic nightmare—a plan with no timetable, no clear definitions and no balance between conservation and the economy.

Labor's first attempted environmental law reform was frankly a debacle. The proposed environmental protection authority was to be a new bureaucracy with unclear powers, larger penalties and no guarantee of faster decisions. The coalition believes that you can protect the environment and support development at the same time.

You can have both conservation and commerce. Labor's approach risks losing both. I was reminded of the potential of co-management on the weekend at the 40th anniversary of the Uluru-Kata Tjuta handback.

It was a moment of reflection—40 years since the Crown formally recognised Anangu ownership and established joint management as a guiding principle. The anniversary celebrated the fusion of Western science and traditional knowledge—two systems of understanding the land that, when brought together, strengthen each other. Co-management must go beyond cultural symbolism.

It must maximise economic opportunities, and they can coexist. Before the pandemic, annual tourist spending around Uluru exceeded $400 million, yet too little of that wealth has flowed to local Aboriginal people to build and strengthen their communities. The coalition believes these management frameworks should not only protect the environment but also help Indigenous Australians harness tourism, employment and enterprise.

The current operator of Ayres Rock Resort, Voyages, employed 272 Indigenous Australians in 2022-23, down from 338 when the coalition was last in government. In 2019, it was actually 400. It's a decline that must be reversed.

The coalition supports a vision of Australia where Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people escape the cycle of welfare dependency and enter real jobs, not the Albanese government 'real jobs program'. Under this legislation, land councils can act on behalf of traditional owners in drafting management plans. Effective consultation is crucial, of course, to avoid future conflict.

The coalition urges the Albanese government to strengthen the governance safeguards and provide for greater scrutiny of the consultation process. It's a process open to public and interested stakeholders and is not limited to Indigenous bodies or land councils. The EPBC Act, though, does not describe how deep or inclusive that consultation must be—leaving those decisions to the discretion of the Director of National Parks and the Minister for the Environment and Water.

That is why all traditional owners who have an interest in these parks need to watch this space and ensure those consultations, like this legislation, are not rushed through in the same way. These are important consultations. This legislation before us fails to impose any clear timeframe for when expired management plans must be renewed.

Section 366(3) of the EPBC Act merely requires boards and the Director of National Parks to act 'as soon as practicable'. It's open ended and unenforceable, and that's simply not good enough. Without a defined deadline, the government risks allowing these plans and the oversight they provide to drift indefinitely.

Labor spent its first 18 months consumed by a $450 million referendum rather than practical action. This distraction left, on the shelf, so much of what was important. Issues important to Indigenous Australians got reprioritised as the Prime Minister took the nation on the divisive journey that was the referendum on the Voice to Parliament.

The coalition's approach is grounded in three principles: firstly, practical empowerment, ensuring Indigenous Australians can benefit directly from economic activity on their land—that means better training, better business partnerships and a focus on outcomes, not administration—and, secondly, sound governance. Funding must only go to organisations that have demonstrated accountability, transparency and compliance with the requirements of any regulator.

The coalition, when last in government, commissioned reforms to streamline environmental approvals and strengthen Indigenous participation. Labor blocked them then and is now belatedly trying to reinvent them. They've also invented this fixation that the coalition is not interested in Indigenous advancement or in the environment.

The first IPA, Indigenous Protected Area, in Australia was created in my home state of South Australia in 1998. An Indigenous Protected Area is managed to ensure the survival and support of threatened species—flora and fauna. IPAs were put in place under John Howard and his coalition government.

I've also worked, before coming into this place, on projects that have actually been about the preservation of threatened species. I've done the fire work that needs to be done, and I know how important that is. The Senate committee that looked at this legislation did note some concerns about decision-making under expired management plans, particularly whether such decisions would reflect up-to-date science and cultural knowledge.

That's why this can't go on indefinitely. The coalition expects the minister for the environment to report regularly on progress of new management plans for Kakadu and Booderee. We expect transparency in how those plans are developed, including the degree of consultation with traditional owners and local communities.

And it should be with not just those who are agreeable—others should be at the table, too. The bill also includes a safeguard requiring the Director of National Parks to notify the minister if a board's decision is contrary to the most recent management plan that is appropriate. Ultimately, the real test will be delivery.

In closing, it cannot be ignored that this bill exists because the government failed to do its job to ensure that others did theirs. I commend this bill to the Senate.