A collection of views, opinions, facts on what has happened with our governments at federal, state and local levels.
Threatened Species Commissioner
‘Worst it’s ever been’: a threatened species alarm sounds during the election campaign – and is ignored
The Guardian 25 April 2022 Lisa Cox
Gregory Andrews shares he:
“believes the state of the country’s natural wildlife and biodiversity is the “worst it’s ever been” and calls the ongoing destruction of forests and other habitat “crazy”.
…felt restricted due to climate denialism within the Coalition and the refusal to deal with habitat degradation.”
It is also noted:
“In the past term alone, three official reports, two from the Australian National Audit Office plus the independent review of Australia’s environmental laws by the former competition watchdog head Graeme Samuel, highlighted a litany of environmental failures.
A fourth, the five-yearly State of the Environment report, is also expected to highlight the ongoing decline. That report could have been tabled by the Morrison government before the campaign began but has been withheld.”
Management of Threatened Species and Ecological Communities under the Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act 1999
Australian National Audit Office 17 March 2022
“The department is unable to demonstrate it is efficient. There is limited evidence that desired outcomes are being achieved, due to the department’s lack of monitoring, reporting and support for the implementation of conservation advice, recovery plans and threat abatement plans.”
“…procedural guidance for undertaking listing assessments does not fully capture all relevant requirements of the EPBC Act and is not complete, up to date or consistently implemented”
“Procedural guidance for development needs updating and is not fully followed, and arrangements for review and update are not appropriate”
“Recovery plans, recovery plan reviews, threat abatement plan reviews and changes to the list are not completed within statutory timeframes. The department is unable to demonstrate that its efficiency has improved over time. “
“Measurement, monitoring and reporting arrangements are not sufficient to support the achievement of desired outcomes. The statuses of some threatened species are monitored, but most species are not. The statuses of ecological communities and key threatening processes are not monitored. There is no measurement, monitoring or reporting on progress, or on the contribution of listing assessments, conservation advice, recovery plans and threat abatement plans to their desired outcomes. Available information does not indicate desired outcomes have been achieved.”
The spin and secrecy threatening the Australian environment
The Monthly November 2021 Anthony Ham
“This obsession with secrecy, and with the suppression of potential bad news stories, is especially pronounced when it comes to science and the environment.”
“In 2019, Professor Don Driscoll of Melbourne’s Deakin University and immediate past president of the Ecological Society of Australia, surveyed 220 Australian ecologists, conservation scientists, conservation policymakers and environmental consultants. The results, published this year in the international science journal Conservation Letters, found that one-third of government employees who responded had experienced “undue interference” when it came to public communications about their research.”
“Fifty-two per cent of government respondents had been prevented from publicly sharing scientific information. Of these, 82 per cent had been constrained by senior managers and 63 per cent by a minister’s office. For those respondents who had communicated scientific information in the public domain, 42 per cent reported being harassed or criticised for doing so. Just over half of respondents (56 per cent) believed that the suppression of scientific communications had worsened over recent years.”
Quotes from the above survey include:
“It feels terrible to know the truth about impacts to the environment, but know you’ll never get that truth to the public and that the government doesn’t care at all. They want us to give them politically supportive information, not science.”
“I feel resentment when I am expected to “toe the line” and support decisions I consider wrong and not in the best interest of the environment and not based on sound scientific data.”
“In the absence of informed and objective scientific participation, said one respondent, fake news often fills the evidence void: “I could see that social and media debate was exploiting the lack of information to perpetuate incorrect … interpretations … to further their own agendas.”
LRC 