This week’s opening of the new Parliament represents the best opportunity to deliver on integrity and  the environment with saving Toondah a key measure of success in achieving this. 

There were three major casualties in the battle to save Toondah, two former Environment Ministers and one aspiring one. 

Firstly, Josh Frydenberg, the architect who enabled Walker’s success in fast-tracking approvals by overturning his department’s own advice the 3,600 unit development was ‘clearly unacceptable’ and would result in ‘permanent and irreversible damage to the ecological character of the Moreton Bay Ramsar wetland’. 

Replaced by teal independent Monique Ryan he will no longer be able to refer such developments as a ‘controlled action’ for Walker to do their own Environmental Impact Statement under the Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act. https://www.abc.net.au/news/2018-12-09/the-developer-the-whistleblower-and-the-minister-toondah-harbour/10487806?nw=0&r=HtmlFragment

The LNP’s former Environment Minister, Susan Ley is now in Opposition. Thankfully she may never be trusted with the privilege of acting as a guardian of Australia’s natural environment. The State of The Environment report is testament to her legacy. Her failure to protect a Ramsar-listed wetland in the Moreton Bay Marine Park a permanent stain on her record in office. 

Labor’s aspiring Environment Minister, the former Member for Griffith, Terri Butler MP, was voted out in favour of a more environmentally-focussed candidate Max Chandler-Mather from the Greens after Toondah featured in the election campaign. It was disappointing not to receive a reply to my request for a position on Toondah from Terri Butler or that she would not publicly state what Labor’s intentions were.  https://www.brisbanetimes.com.au/politics/queensland/controversial-toondah-harbour-project-may-depend-on-election-outcome-20220504-p5aids.html

So now to the future and hopefully a reversal of these previous positions in response to our nation’s environmental crisis and community voting sentiments. It is promising that the new Parliament has Labor saying ‘the environment is back front and centre’. It also has 3 new Green senators holding the balance of power and pro-environment ACT Senator David Pocock, 3 new Greens MPs, 7 climate action focussed teal independents, and independents Andrew Wilkie and Helen Haines. 

The pressure is now on for the Albanese Government to deliver on integrity and the environment. It’s encouraging to have an experienced Minister in Tanya Plibersek who has committed to protecting 30% of our land and 30% of our oceans by 2030. 

The test of its success will be if it can put words into action by honouring Labor’s National Platform Conference position that its ‘commitment to Ramsar is clear… Australia’s unique and internationally renowned natural environment must be protected’. 
https://independentaustralia.net/politics/politics-display/albanese-refuses-to-back-alp-decision-on-toondah-harbour-development,15005

Surely, as per Article 2.5 of the Ramsar Convention, it is in the ‘urgent national interest’ to save Toondah’s irreplaceable mangroves, seagrass, inter-tidal wetlands and their marine and shorebird national treasures including critically-endangered shorebirds rather than destroying them. 

C’mon Plibersek, please save the bay!