Nature Law reform fails to deliver for birds and nature

Nature Law reform fails to deliver for birds and nature

Birdlife Australia is warning the Albanese Government that without crucial amendments, the Nature Law reforms introduced to Parliament today could weaken protections for Australian birds.

“The current amendments not only fail to protect nature, they risk making things even worse for threatened species,” said BirdLife Australia CEO Kate Millar.

“Australians expect that when a species is formally recognised as being driven toward extinction, the Australian Government will make every effort to bring them back from the brink,” Ms Millar said.

“As it stands, 14 out of 18 Critically Endangered birds already lack an up-to-date recovery plan. Instead of addressing this, the proposed changes fail to mandate recovery, protection or threat abatement plans for threatened species, leaving the development of plans to ministerial discretion.

“At a time when the government should be acting to safeguard birds, they have proposed a change that could significantly weaken existing protections.”

Alongside mandating plans for species recovery, BirdLife Australia is also urging the government to unambiguously safeguard nature from destruction.

“Recognising damage to critical habitat as an unacceptable impact will be an improvement if applied correctly, to enable a ‘fast no’ when the case is obvious. It shouldn’t require our community to fight for a decade to save important sites like we did to save Toondah harbour in Queensland.

“We still need clear, robust, limits on habitat destruction in the form of legally enforceable, national environmental standards to set the benchmark for decision making, and a truly independent Environment Protection Authority (EPA) to be ultimately responsible for environmental approvals. By increasing the opportunity for decisions to be made at a minister’s discretion, these amendments have widened loopholes already big enough for bulldozers to drive through.”

BirdLife Australia stands alongside the broader environment and conservation sector in calling for an end to native forest logging and proper consideration of climate impacts to be embedded in the Act.

“Threatened birds are being driven toward extinction, habitat destruction is rampant, and H5 bird flu, which has devastated wildlife overseas, is knocking on our door. Significant work is needed to strengthen this Bill for nature. Australia’s birds can’t wait another two-and-a-half decades, the time to get this right is now.”

BirdLife Australia is calling for:

• Mandatory recovery plans to bring species back from the brink of extinction
• Clear, robust limits on habitat destruction in the form of national standards
• An independent referee (EPA), protected from interference

“We call on Prime Minister Anthony Albanese to work with the parliament to strengthen these laws and uphold Australia’s commitment to ending extinctions.”

BirdLife Australia Media Enquiries: Please contact James Johnson on 0423 659 324 or at media@birdlife.org.au

BirdLife Australia’s EPBC reforms scorecard is available below.