The former Howard government minister Philip Ruddock has raised concerns about his own government’s plan to stop environmental groups using legal challenges to “sabotage” mining developments.
The fate of the controversial decision to amend the federal environment law – made in reaction to a legal case that delayed the $16bn Carmichael coalmine in Queensland for a few months – rests with the Senate after Labor said it “would not support weakening environmental protections or limiting a community’s right to challenge government decisions”.
The attorney general, George Brandis, took the plan to Tuesday’s meeting of the Liberal and National parties, saying it was needed to combat “green vigilantism” and “lawfare”, but Ruddock – the longest serving MP and a former attorney general – told the meeting he “had a problem” with it.
Brandis said the government was repealing section 487 (2) of the federal environmental legislation – the Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act – because it “provides a red carpet for radical activists who have a political, but not a legal interest, in a development to use aggressive litigation tactics to disrupt and sabotage important projects”.
But Ruddock told the meeting any attempt at vexatious litigation could be stopped by forcing groups to promise to pay costs if it was determined that their case was wasting the court’s time. He said that if the problem was an abuse of process then it was best to use the courts to solve it.
Section 487 (2) of the EPBC Act, introduced by the Howard government, extends the definition of who can take legal action to include “individuals and organisations engaged in the protection, conservation or research into the environment within Australia and its territories”.
The decision immediately became a key part of the government’s question time attack, with Tony Abbott saying it would prove whether Labor stood with “greens” or the jobs of hard working Australians.
Brandis said it was “now for the federal Labor party to show that it cares more about jobs than inner-city greens”.
But Labor’s environment spokesman, Mark Butler, said the EPBC Act had been federal law since the Howard government passed it 15 years ago, it had not impeded the mining boom and Labor would not support changes to it.
Abbott repeated the claim that the Adani mine would bring 10,000 jobs to Queensland even though the company’s own financial officer told a court only 1,464 jobs would be created.
He told his party room “green activists” were “sabotaging” projects that could be bringing growth and jobs to Australia.
The approval of the $16bn Carmichael mine, to be located in Queensland’s Galilee Basin region, was set aside earlier this month following a legal challenge by the Mackay Conservation Group.
The federal environment department said it would take six to eight weeks to reassess the project after it emerged the environment minister, Greg Hunt, had not properly considered the mine’s impact on two vulnerable species – the yakka skink and the ornamental snake.
The Queensland Resources Council said the situation was “preposterous” and called on the government to “step up and close the loopholes” that allowed activists to stymie large mining projects.
The government’s plan was attacked by green groups and by farm groups protesting against coal mines and CSG wells.
“If George Brandis has his way, local landcare groups like ours would have no right to challenge the federal approval of a devastating coalmine like Shenhua,” said Nicky Chirlian, a member of the Upper Mooki landcare group challenging the NSW state government approval of the Shenhua Watermark coalmine on the Liverpool Plains.
“The Carmichael mine was rejected because the minister made a mistake. Now the government are using this error to cut Australians’ rights to protect the environment,” said Greenpeace chief executive David Ritter.
The Minerals Council of Australia has attacked the Adani decision in similar terms to the government.
“The gaming of the environmental approvals processes by a handful of protest groups now borders on the farcical. The inevitable dividend from continuing green sabotage is fewer jobs, lower real wages and lower living standards,” chief executive Brendan Pearson said.
