CCIWA is calling for controversial environmental approval reforms currently before the Senate to be taken off the agenda, as Parliament resumes for the year next week.
CCIWA Chief Economist Aaron Morey
The ‘Nature Positive’ Bills are listed for debate in the Senate next Thursday.
The Bills establish a new Canberra-based bureaucracy with unprecedented power to block major projects in areas like housing, clean energy, mining, public infrastructure and agriculture, without the need to consider the social and economic benefits they would bring.
CCIWA Chief Economist Aaron Morey says despite a reprieve over the summer break after intervention from WA Premier Roger Cook, the Nature Positive reforms are still very much on the table next week.
“The Bills are on the notice paper, scheduled for debate on Thursday. If it was truly off the table, it would not be listed for debate,” he says.
Morey says it is clear that the reforms as they are currently written would have an oversized impact on the WA economy.
“These reforms would do widespread damage to the WA economy. It will stymie job creation in our most important industries and push up housing costs by stalling the construction of new supply.
“Ironically, these reforms would also slow the energy transition by making it more expensive and time consuming to build clean energy projects and new transmission lines. That could also flow on to higher energy bills.”
CCIWA is urging the Federal Government start again in the next term of Parliament to ensure it can achieve environmental laws that are better for the environment, and better for business.
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