Catholic Religious Australia has urged the Albanese Government to reconsider its proposed environmental law reforms, saying the reforms fall short of what is needed to properly protect and restore Australia’s diverse plants, animals and ecosystems.
CRA lodged a submission to a Senate Inquiry into a package of bills that seek to reform the Environmental Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act 1999.
CRA expressed “deep concern” that the bills fall short of the reform of the act that is needed to properly protect and restore Australia’s diverse plants, animals and ecosystems, while acknowledging that some few components of the bills demonstrate positive changes to the act.
“A 2020 review of the [act deemed it ineffective in guiding sustainable development and in need of fundamental reform to halt significant damage to the environment. We fear that the currently proposed bills do not go far enough towards this required overhaul,” CRA President Br Gerard Brady CFC said.
“We echo the call of Pope Leo XIV for a radical transformation of culture to confront our environmental crisis,” Br Brady said.
National Environmental Standards were envisaged in the review of the act as being “the centrepiece” of reforms, containing clear requirements for protecting endangered species and other nationally significant matters for all actions made under the act.
CRA said the bills do not contain a clear requirement to establish standards and do not outline the matters the standards must address.
“In our submission, we have called for the bills to ensure that the creation of new standards is mandatory, and that they address the areas proposed in the 2020 review of the act, to truly improve environmental protection,” Br Brady said.
CRA national executive director Anne Walker said it was important that the standards are legally enforceable and not subject to the Environment Minister’s discretion, as the bills currently propose.
“It is clear that the bills need further strengthening to stop and reverse our destructive environmental trajectory,” Ms Walker said.
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