The former competition watchdog chief Graeme Samuel says the government should axe its proposal to allow the environment minister to make decisions in breach of national laws if it is deemed in the “national interest”.
Samuel, who led a 2020 review of the Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation (EPBC) Act, also argued a loophole that effectively exempts native forest logging from the laws “shouldn’t be there”.
He made the comments to a Senate committee examining the Albanese government’s bills to reform national nature laws, which Labor hopes to pass before parliament rises for Christmas.
In his written submission to the committee he said “national interest” should instead be incorporated as a consideration in new national environmental standards.
“I hate the [forestry] exemption. It shouldn’t be there,” Samuel told the committee.
He said if the government did retain it, the agreements “should be governed by a very tough national environmental standard”.
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The former Howard government environment minister Robert Hill – who introduced the original act in 1999 – said tighter regulation of land-clearing should be the “highest priority” of the reforms.
In a submission to the inquiry, Hill also said that there was “no credible argument” for retaining the logging exemption.
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While welcoming the bills as achieving “80% of the aspirations” of a consultative group formed during the review process, Samuel said the government’s proposed national interest exemption could lead to the abuse of the power vested in the minister.
Adopting similar language to the former treasury secretary Ken Henry, Samuel warned the exemption could lead to lobbyists seeking favourable decisions.
The proposed exemption would allow the minister to approve projects that do not comply with environmental laws if the approval was considered in the national interest.
“There’ll be a conga line of lobbyists that will be outside their door saying, ‘Well, look, you just use the national interest exemption’,” he said.
“So I would take it out of the legislation and simply say it is now a balancing matter that ought to be taken into account in determining approvals and assessments.”
Hill, in a submission co-written with Atticus Fleming, a former deputy secretary of the New South Wales National Parks and Wildlife Service, wrote that the “primary shortcoming” of the existing laws had been their failure to address the impact of land-clearing on Australia’s biodiversity.
“Given the impact on biodiversity, and the failure of state governments, the effective regulation of land clearing must be the highest priority for the EPBC Act,” the submission states.
Hill and Fleming suggested changes including provisions that would require land-clearing above certain thresholds to be assessed for impacts on threatened species and ecosystems.
They also said “there is no credible argument for maintaining a blanket exemption for the logging of native forests” and the bills should be amended to remove it.
“Logging operations should be subject to the same rules as mining, agriculture, urban development and so on,” they wrote.
