Article by Rosie Lewis & Brad Thompson, courtesy of The Australian
Anthony Albanese has personally intervened to scuttle a deal with the Greens on a signature plank of his environmental platform after appeals from WA Premier Roger Cook, again overriding his Environment Minister Tanya Plibersek just months out from the federal election.
Several sources familiar with negotiations between Ms Plibersek and the Greens on establishing a new environmental watchdog told The Australian a deal had been all but sealed on Tuesday but Mr Albanese later stepped in and called the minor party to say the agreement was off.
Ms Plibersek found out the deal had been scuppered on Tuesday afternoon.
The Australian has also been told WA minister for mines and petroleum David Michael told a Chamber of Minerals and Energy WA Christmas event on Tuesday night that Mr Albanese had contacted Mr Cook about a potential deal with the Greens on the proposed nature positive laws.
Mr Michael told the Christmas event, attended by about 200 industry figures, WA had received an assurance there would be no deal. His comments were greeted with applause.
The Prime Minister’s office declined to comment.
Mr Cook confirmed he had “received assurances from the highest levels of government” that the EPA bill wouldn’t go ahead in its current form this week.
“There were difficulties with its current form. It was going to disadvantage Western Australian industry, it was going to be a risk to Western Australian jobs,” he said.
Mr Albanese’s intervention follows warnings from the nation’s biggest employers that an EPA supported by the Greens would cause “significant economic harm”, and comes as the Prime Minister attempts to hold on to Labor’s seats in the resources rich state of WA after the party’s primary vote surged there at the last election.
The Greens have accused the Prime Minister of again being bullied by the mining and logging lobby, while the Coalition insisted Mr Albanese would try and get a “super charged” EPA up under a Labor-Greens alliance in the event of a hung parliament.
“The Greens put a deal on the table and the government has walked away,” Greens environment spokeswoman Sarah Hanson-Young said.
“Gina Rinehart and the logging lobby seem to have more influence than the rest of the country. The Greens want to get laws that would actually provide some protection for nature but Labor couldn’t even entertain protecting forests and critical habitat in an extinction crisis.”
The Greens had dropped their demand for a climate trigger and instead were pushing Labor to remove the Regional Forest Agreement and Continuous Use exemptions in environmental laws, as they call for the end of native forest logging.
The Australian was told there wasn’t much in the deal for the Greens, which didn’t include a ban on native forest logging.
The parties had agreed the Minister would be given the power to create new environmental standards, though under existing laws these would be used as guidance for companies who wanted assistance on where to build a project.
The standards would only have legal under an overhaul of the country’s environmental laws, which is the next stage of the government’s nature positive plan and is highly unlikely to occur before the election.
CME WA chief executive Rebecca Tomkinson declared “sensible minds have prevailed” in there being no Labor-Greens deal on an EPA.
“The CME has always said the nature positive laws have to deliver benefits for the environment and for industry. The current package doesn’t achieve that,” she said.
The Coalition’s most senior West Australian MP, Michaelia Cash, said her constituents shouldn’t take solace in the fact Labor “has been unable, so far this week, to do a deal with the Greens”.
“Prime Minister Anthony Albanese is desperately trying to fool Western Australians that he supports our mining sector when his wheeling and dealing with the Greens over Nature Positive laws proves he hates our State’s most important industry,” she said.
“Although Mr Albanese has run out of time in this parliament it is clear if re-elected in minority, and a Labor-Greens alliance government is formed they will bring back a super charged environmental protection bill that will cripple mining in Western Australia.”
The Prime Minister has ruled out any deals with the Greens if there is a hung parliament.
In September, Mr Albanese ruled out adding a climate trigger or considerings to his proposed environmental watchdog, to be called Environment Protection Australia, after Ms Plibersek confirmed such a measure was being discussed in negotiations with the Greens.
