Environment Protection Reform Bill 2025, National Environmental Protection Agency Bill 2025, Environment Information Australia Bill 2025, Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation (Customs Charges Imposition) Bill 2025, Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation (Excise Charges Imposition) Bill 2025, Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation (General Charges Imposition) Bill 2025, Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation (Restoration Charge Imposition) Bill 2025

Ms JARRETT (Brisbane) (21:29): I rise in support of the multiple environmental reform bills that are before the House. Whether it's from the Great Barrier Reef to the Franklin, from K'gari to Pilbara, Australia's environment is one of the best in the world, and it is worth protecting. We all know that Labor is the only party that will deliver for the environment.

We look across our great country and we see the beautiful ecosystems and national parks that Labor governments have continued to protect over the years. You can see one of these places as you follow the Great Dividing Range, which snakes up Australia's east coast. On the great escarpment you'll see the ancient rainforests, recognised as Gondwana Rainforest of Australia.

Some of these rainforests are located a short drive from my electorate of Brisbane. The beautiful rainforests of Lamington, Springbrook, Mount Barney and Main Range are places that not only hold outstanding universal value; they are special places people from Brisbane and nearby have visited or hiked at least once in their lives. If anyone in this chamber has been there, you'll understand why.

These ancient rainforests have an important lineage and a history dating back to an ancient land, as Australia was connected to Antarctica and was part of a supercontinent more than hundreds of millions of years ago. First Nations people—including, in the Queensland section, the Yugambeh, Yuggera, Ugarapul and Githabul people—have had continuous and enduring relationships with the rainforests of Gondwana, and I acknowledge the First Nations stewardship and enduring connections to these rainforests over tens of thousands of years.

Lamington National Park and its mountains are a sacred and spiritual place for First Nations communities, who are connected by ceremony, language and traditional pathways. When you go and walk through the rainforest, you really feel something very special. The temperature drops, the lyrebirds' songs can often be heard floating through the forest, and, if you're lucky, you might even get to see the blue Lamington crayfish scuttling along the ancient forest floors.

I'm an avid camper and an avid hiker, and I've spent many a time getting lost in our beautiful environment. Places like these were protected by the Labor government led by Bob Hawke. It was under the leadership of a Labor government that the Gondwana Rainforest became internationally recognised and protected.

Labor is the only party that has delivered every single major environmental reform in Australia's history—whether that be creating Landcare, which has led to more sustainable agricultural practices, or protecting ecosystems across Australia. It was Labor that protected the Franklin River, Kakadu, the Daintree, K'gari and the Great Barrier Reef. Across the states, Labor has built a national park system which has attracted thousands of tourists every year and is the envy of the world.

This is our legacy, and it is one we must defend. Australia's national parks are one of Labor's greatest and proudest achievements, and these bills that have been introduced into the House are steps towards protecting our national environment. It is clear that the current laws are not working and are in need of urgent reform.

It's widely accepted that change is needed to deliver stronger environmental protections while supporting the infrastructure we need as a growing nation. The Samuel review, which was undertaken when those opposite were in government, recommended an overhaul of the EPBC Act as it was not delivering for the environment, for business or for the community. The opposition leader was handed the Samuel review five years ago, a report that she commissioned and, sadly, did nothing with.

On this side of the House we understand the need to act now. We can't afford the same old climate wars building yet again. Every minute we delay is a minute too long.

These reforms we have before us align with the three key pillars identified in the Samuel report: (1) stronger environmental protection and restoration, (2) more efficient and robust project assessments, and (3) greater accountability and transparency in decision-making. Under the proposed reforms, Australia's first ever independent national environment protection agency will be established, the NEP.

This newly established NEP will be a strong, independent regulator with a clear focus on ensuring better compliance with and stronger enforcement of Australia's new environmental laws. It would exercise a range of powers independently of the minister, such as compliance and enforcement of the laws and of project conditions, and auditing of state and territory processes for government assessment and approvals against the new environmental standards.

It is proposed that the National EPA will also be responsible for education, compliance and enforcement, issuing permits and licences, assessing projects and setting approval conditions. A national EPA is something many environmental groups across Australia support and have been calling for, and I want to acknowledge the hard work of the rank-and-file members of the Labor Party who have spent many years campaigning for this commitment, alongside the Labor Environment Action Network, LEAN.

Also part of the new EPBC Act will be new ministerial powers to make national environmental standards. That's fantastic. These standards were a key recommendation of the Samuel review.

The standards will protect the environment, give business clear rules and help decision-makers be fair and consistent. The standards aim to protect, conserve and restore important environmental areas and species. They truly make up for environmental damage, deliver a net gain for our environment, support better decision-making and help the public understand and comment on projects.

This will give greater certainty to the community, environmental groups and industry around environmental outcomes. This bill also provides the offset framework, which assesses ways to avoid, mitigate, reduce or offset the impacts of actions impacting the environment. Steps must be taken to compensate or make up for any potential damage.

This is called an environment offset, and the offset could take the form of an action or a payment, or in some cases both. The improvement framework will require net gain, and that ensures that environment offsets support and restore—rather than just mitigating harm—leaving the environment in a better state than the proponent found it. Amendments will define what are considered to be unacceptable impacts for each protected matter which cannot be improved.

This will provide critical safeguards against impacts that could cause irreversible loss in biodiversity and heritage. The reforms also introduce new emissions disclosure requirements. There are requirements on proponents of major emitting projects to disclose estimates of scope 1 and scope 2 greenhouse gas emissions as part of gaining federal government environmental approval.

Proponents will also be required to disclose their plans to reduce those emissions and explain how those measures are consistent with government laws and policies. We still have our safeguard mechanism, sitting under the National Greenhouse and Energy Reporting Act 2007. That provides another level of accountability, requiring major emitters to cut their emissions by five per cent and reach net zero by 2050.

That is still there. As we know, the way projects are currently assessed under the EPBC Act also needs to be improved. Regional planning will streamline developments in areas with low environmental impacts, while avoiding development impacts in areas with high ecological value.

What this means is less delay for the building of vital infrastructure such as housing and renewable projects. Assessment pathways will be streamlined, removing three of the six existing assessment pathways. A new streamlined assessment pathway will be introduced to provide faster approval for proposals which provide better information upfront.

This measure alone is estimated to save about half a billion dollars across our economy, and potentially as much as $7 billion. The current system of multiple layers of federal and state/territory approvals will also be streamlined. This will happen by removing duplication in the approval and assessment systems through new and updated bilateral agreements with states and territories.

The government will also encourage the uptake of landscape-scale mechanisms by reforming provisions for regional planning and strategic assessments, effectively providing go zones and no-go zones for approval. The Samuel review recognised that, for some bad actors, breaching the law is just the cost of doing business. While we know that most proponents follow the law, we do need a modern, fit-for-purpose tool to respond to the most serious of breaches, and the reforms increase penalties for the most serious and significant breaches.

This is a big step to improve environment protection and give weight to the legislation. They will allow the courts to respond proportionately to the most egregious breaches. What the proposed changes to the EPBC Act do is include higher maximum penalties for serious breaches, new environment protection orders to quickly manage urgent environmental risks and damage—that's very important—and expanded audit powers to improve monitoring and compliance.

These reforms aim to ensure breaches are managed properly and wrongdoers are held to account. The reforms also codify the involvement of First Nations people in environmental governance and decision-making through the Indigenous Advisory Committee. The reforms also create a new statutory advisory function for that committee in the development of national environmental standards and in species listings and conservation planning.

This is just common sense, given First Nations have had continuous custodianship of our land for millennia. But, once again, these reforms are at risk. It really is groundhog day.

The question now is whether the opposition and the Greens will stand on the side of the environment or stand in the way of progress. The message from the last election is clear, and the message from Brisbane and Queensland is clear. I spoke to so many people in our community who didn't want delays.

They're sick of inaction and sick of the cynicism peddled by others in this chamber. During the last election campaign, I doorknocked every suburb across the Brisbane electorate, and people wanted action on the environment. People want to see delivery, they want action, they want stability.

They don't want the opposition and the Greens to form a 'no-alition' again. My question is: will the Greens political party really vote against the delivery of the new national environmental standards, higher penalties for environmental wrongdoers and the establishment of an EPA? Voting against the protections for the environment is just wrong and damaging.

As for the coalition, where do I start? They're still debating whether or not climate change is real. The climate wars have to stop now.

Industry and business are crying out for political stability, and nothing the opposition is giving at the moment provides that any form of stability. These reforms do. The message from environmental groups and industry has been very clear.

They want parliament to get on with the job of reforming Australia's environment laws, and this government intends to deliver this. Just like we saw in the past when Labor governments led the building of our national parks network, we are actually at a turning point. It's the same when the government legislated for net zero; that was a turning point.

Now these reform packages are at a turning point. We are at a turning point to create a future Australia that delivers increased environment protections, brings in hefty penalties and establishes the EPA, amongst other things. This is an historic moment for the environment, and we must pass these laws.

When we look to the future and our vision for the future, I know that in my electorate of Brisbane the people want to see delivery, they want to see more homes built and they want clean energy. They also want to be able to have breakfast with the kangaroos and swim in our pristine oceans. They don't want to see us go backwards, or for the perfect to be the enemy of the good.

It doesn't have to be either/or. This bill package strikes the right balance to achieve this future. It means stronger environmental protections to protect and restore our precious natural habitats while also creating more certainty for business.

It means modernising our environmental laws to reflect a modern Australia. This bill package includes many positive reforms that will better recognise and protect our unique Australian environment. After more than a decade of inaction by the coalition to protect the environment, and the Greens teaming up to block reforms, we need to act now.

As a representative in this House, I will be listening to our communities. We need to get on with the job. I urge all those opposite and on the crossbench to help take that big leap forward to better protect our environment and create a more robust system.

I commend this bill and these reforms to the House. The system will deliver everything we need for our environment.