ADJOURNMENT

Senator McLACHLAN (South Australia) (20:11): There is a horizon most Australians will never see, yet one that belongs to every Australian: the Great Australian Bight. The landfall is one of the longest uninterrupted line of cliffs on the earth. The bight is a nursery for the southern right whale, and a cathedral of cold water upwellings and ancient reefs.

Senators will know that I've opposed drilling in the Great Australian Bight and I'm an advocate for its World Heritage listing. The last occasion I gazed upon this beautiful place was with two surfers, who I count as friends: Josh Kirkman from Surfers for Climate, and champion surfer Heath Joske. They have spent years in the cold swells of the bight, advocating, rightly, that the people who know these waters best are the ones who surf them, fish them, sail them and sing to them.

I thank them for their advocacy, which has played an important role in the community movement protecting the bight from drilling. In 1988, then senator and environment minister Robert Hill declared what was then the second-largest marine park on the planet across these waters. It was an incredible act of conservation for its time.

We now have an opportunity to build upon the great work of Robert Hill—an opportunity to demonstrate to the world that we, in Australia, are intent on being good stewards of our land and seas, rather than exploiting nature for profit alone. Further, the communities on the coastline that thrive sustainably off the bounty of the seas still live under the shadow of new attempts to drill in their pristine seas.

Importantly, a once-in-a-decade review of our marine parks is now underway, including of the south-west network within which the Great Australian Bight Marine Park sits. This review, open for public consultation until the end of September, is tasked with assisting with the delivery of our nation's commitment to protect 30 per cent of our oceans by 2030. By the government's own reckoning, that means identifying more than half a million additional square kilometres of protected water.

I say let's expand the current Great Australian Bight Marine Park to cover the entire basin—some 800,000 square kilometres. With one bold expansion, the 30 by 2030 goal can not only be met but exceeded by some 300,000 square kilometres. I assure senators that my support for World Heritage listing of the bight and the Nullarbor has not wavered by one degree of latitude.

That listing remains a prize worth fighting for. But heritage nomination is a journey measured in years—in some cases, decades—while the threat of oil and gas exploration in these waters is measured in months, lease renewals and ill-considered reactions to an oil crisis. We cannot ask a nursing whale to wait for paperwork.

An expanded, protected marine park can be created faster, defended more fiercely and enforced more immediately than any heritage title, and it can be won now through this very review. The government cannot claim it is beyond its capabilities to extend the boundaries of the south-west network. Only last month, it found the resolve to expand the Lord Howe and Norfolk marine parks by over 670,000 square kilometres.

We need to, once and for all, ensure that seismic testing and drilling in the Bight will not happen into the future. Expanding the park does not mean an end to fishing. The declaration of a special purpose zone (mining exclusion) closes the door on seismic testing and drilling permanently.

Recreational and commercial fishing can continue under the licences and regulations that already govern them responsibly. I'm not asking the fishers of Ceduna and Streaky Bay to abandon the waters that have fed their communities for generations. I'm seeking to ensure that oil and gas companies do not come this way again.

Being of a conservative disposition, the cornerstone of my ambition is to leave the earth in a better condition than when I was born upon her. It is not to spend my days advocating for those who seek to live unsustainably in the now, the present, justifying their pollution in the name of the false god of unlimited growth. Please join me to protect the Bight.

The ACTING DEPUTY PRESIDENT ( Senator Grogan ): Senator Whish-Wilson. Senator Scarr: I thought he just gave a speech! Senator Whish-Wilson: Can I get Senator McLachlan's extra five minutes?

I'm happy to join you on that Great Australian Bight adventure! But I have another very important topic to talk about tonight.