23 February 2018
Report exposes deep divisions in Berejiklian Government over environmental policy
Reports in today’s The Australian confirm deep internal divisions in NSW Government over environmental policy, including land-clearing laws that are the subject of legal action by the Nature Conservation Council. (Full text of the article is attached.)
“The explosive article in The Australian shows the National Party is dictating environment policy to the whole of NSW and that there are deep divisions within the Berejiklian government on these issues,” Nature Conservation Council CEO Kate Smolski said.
“The article suggests Environment Minister Gabrielle Upton was not given time to properly assess the environment impact of new land clearing laws before she signed off them.
“The report also shows Ms Upton being bullied by senior Nationals Ministers, including Primary Industries Minister Niall Blair and Deputy Premier John Barilaro.
“Premier Berejiklian should step in to defend the Environment Minister and pull these rogue Nationals into line to prevent the plundering of our forests, woodlands and water supplies.
“The Nationals have shown they can’t be trusted to manage land clearing and water resources, and they are continuing to push to open our beloved national parks to logging.
“The environment of NSW belongs to us all – it is not the plaything of the National Party to do with what they will.”
The Nature Conservation Council is taking legal action to overturn the government’s land-clearing codes, because the codes were made before the Environment Minister had given her concurrence (as required by law) and because the government did not properly consider the principles of ecological sustainability when it made the codes.
The court case is scheduled to be heard in April.
The Nature Conservation Council is calling on the government to revise the codes to make many important changes, including making the following places off limits to tree clearing:
- potential koala habitat
- threatened ecological communities (could say ‘threatened habitat’ which is more punter friendly’)
- travelling stock reserves
THE AUSTRALIAN ARTICLE
NSW cabinet ministers clash over environment
February 23, 2018
The Berejiklian cabinet is in open warfare on environment policy, with Primary Industries Minister Niall Blair swearing and screaming across a table at Environment Minister Gabrielle Upton at a recent “crisis meeting” of ministers set up by the Premier to set an “environmental narrative” for the next state election.
Mr Blair is blaming Ms Upton for a failure to sign off on a land-clearing code in time, which is one of the grounds for which the Environmental Defenders Office, representing the Nature Conservation Council, is challenging the state land-clearing laws in the Land and Environment Court.
The government faces potentially having to redo the code and risks all decisions it has made on land clearing since August.
The NCC says the code is invalid because the Minister for Primary Industries did not obtain the agreement of the Minister for the Environment before the code was made.
Ms Upton is understood to have signed off on the code and dated her letter a day after Mr Blair’s letter last year.
At one point in the meeting a fortnight ago in Premier Gladys Berejiklian’s office at parliament, Mr Blair reportedly said words to the effect of “Why didn’t you bloody sign off on it in time?” to Ms Upton in relation to the land-clearing code.
He is also reported to have said to Ms Upton, “You could not even get Return and Earn (the container deposit scheme) right”, in reference to the project under which only one in 10 bottles is being returned for recycling even though drinks in the state have gone up 10c cents a bottle under the plan.
Ms Upton has been accused of not rolling out enough reverse vending machines, making bottle returns inconvenient.
Other ministers at the meeting convened in the Premier’s Office in parliament included Deputy Premier John Barilaro, Treasurer Dominic Perrottet, Education Minister and former environment minister Rob Stokes, Planning Minister Anthony Roberts and Energy Minister Don Harwin.
Kevin Wilde, Ms Upton’s chief of staff, is said to have had to step in several times to defend the minister, who reportedly did not appear to be on top of her brief.
There was another heated exchange in which Mr Barilaro accused Ms Upton of not moving to allow timber workers back into log river red gums in the seat of Cootamundra as had been promised six months ago during the Cootamundra by-election.
Ms Berejiklian is said to have then challenged the minister, saying “Hang on, are the logs still there?” and that she had been down to the area herself during the by-election campaign to promise that logging would resume.
Ms Upton is then said to have said to Mr Barilaro they could “discuss the issue offline”, after which the Deputy Premier threatened to walk out before he was calmed down by Ms Berejiklian.
A spokesman for Ms Upton declined to comment yesterday.
A spokeswoman for Mr Blair said: “We do not comment on internal conversations.”
https://www.theaustralian.com.au/national-affairs/state-politics/nsw-cabinet-ministers-clash-over-environment/news-story/a83568119449af6c374ef9ac587047a1
Tags
Forests and wildlifeMarine ConservationClimate and energyNSW ParliamentRivers and wetlandsCoal and gas
Let others know about this issue