Native Vegetation Act

The Hon. M.C. PARNELL (17:41): I move:

That the regulations under the Native Vegetation Act 1991 concerning SA Motorsport Park, made on 28 April 2016 and laid on the table of this council on 17 May 2016, be disallowed.

As I said in relation to the previous motion, I think the question of native vegetation is at the heart of why the government has passed these two regulations. What I will be doing is pointing out why the passage of those regulations ought not be supported by the Legislative Council on account of them being an abuse of the process of delegated legislation.

The regulation that I am seeking to disallow is fairly simple. It basically adds an exemption to the native vegetation regulations that authorises the clearance of native vegetation at Tailem Bend for the SA Motorsport Park. In a nutshell, the new regulation adds a new regulation number 5(1)(zo). I make the observation that the government, over the last several years, has now introduced so many exemptions from the Native Vegetation Act that we are now up to paragraph (zo). If my sums are correct, that means we are now up to 41 individual named exemptions to the Native Vegetation Act.

As members would know, the Native Vegetation Act is the primary vehicle in this state for the protection of remnant intact native vegetation, so to now have 41 separate paragraphs of exemptions, with the SA Motorsport Park being the 41^st, I think is an indication that the system is not working.

The new exemption provides that if the clearance is undertaken in accordance with a management plan that has been approved by the State Coordinator-General, appointed under the development regulations, and if the State Coordinator-General is satisfied that the clearance is necessary and is satisfied that there will be some environmental offsets or they will pay some money into the fund, then it falls within the exemption category, which means that they do not need approval.

People might be thinking, 'Why don't they just go to the Native Vegetation Council and get their approval if they need to clear vegetation?' The answer is: they did and they were rejected. They went to the Native Vegetation Council. In fact, a number of people have been on a number of occasions, and the Native Vegetation Council has quite rightly determined that clearing some of this land is seriously at variance with the principles of clearance control set out in the act and that means they are legally obliged to say, 'No, don't do it.'

Let's have a look at what is on this site and what the proponents are trying to do. It might be timely at this point to remind people that the proponents are our good friends the Peregrine Corporation, the Shahin family, the owners of the On The Run network who have received a number of beneficial regulatory protections under the Development Act. People might recall that, because they got knocked back on one of their convenience stores and petrol stations, they went screaming to the Premier and got special exemptions written into law so that their petrol stations do not have to go through the normal planning process. That was an outrage. This is the same people using the same trick to get around South Australian law.

I need to put on the record why the Native Vegetation Council, quite properly, rejected the Shahin's application to clear vegetation. I am very grateful to the Nature Conservation Society of South Australia, which has done a lot of work researching the vegetation in this area, and they have provided me with some notes which I want to put on the record. According to the Nature Conservation Society:

The property is dominated by Mallee Box [Eucalyptus] porosa woodland and supports one of the largest…areas of this vegetation type in the district in an otherwise cleared landscape.

And when they say one of the largest, that is 130 hectares. It continues:

It also provides an important link to the Poonthie Ruwe Conservation Park (241 ha) that was established to protect a significant area of Lomandra grassland (immediately west of the application area across the Dukes Highway).

The northern part of the property is extensively covered by native vegetation and contains numerous large old hollow bearing trees that provide important wildlife habitat for 6 state rated fauna species including hollow-nesting birds and regionally rare mammals (possums, bats). Of particular significance is the range of grassy woodland bird species, including several bird species of particular conservation significance, which have been reported on the property during recent surveys including the Diamond Firetail, Elegant Parrot and White-winged Chough…

There is a full list of birds, which is available, but they are some of the most important. It continues:

These species have declined in woodlands throughout southeastern Australia. Studies have shown that many of these species occur at low density, indicating the importance of retaining large intact areas of woodland habitat such as occur on the property.

The proposed clearance covers 11.2 ha plus 108 scattered trees within the total property area of 700 ha. The assessment report—

That is, the assessment report from the native vegetation management people—

shows that 10.6 ha is considered as intact native vegetation and, therefore, the application would be seriously at variance with a number of Principles of Clearance under the Native Vegetation Act 1991 and the Native Vegetation Regulations 2003, specifically: Principles 1(a) Plant diversity, (b) Wildlife habitat, (d) Rare plant community and (e) Remnancy.

The Assessment Report concludes that Areas 1 and 3 support intact native vegetation and this conclusion was also supported by the Native Vegetation Management Unit because the tree stratum has not been substantially damaged in the preceding twenty years. Under Section 27(2) of the Native Vegetation Act the NV Council cannot give its consent to the clearance of native vegetation if the vegetation comprises or forms part of a stratum of native vegetation that is substantially intact.

Mallee Box…woodland is considered a rare vegetation type in South Australia and rated as Priority 5 for conservation…Areas 1 and 2 form part of an exceptional example of this vegetation type with a relatively diverse understorey, and is unique in the region in that it has not been significantly impacted by past stock grazing.

The application is located within the Hundred of Seymour and the Moorlands Environmental Region which are estimated to retain 12% and 5% native vegetation respectively. These figures indicate that the region has been extensively cleared, and that areas of remnant vegetation with a relatively diverse understorey that have not been significantly impacted by past stock grazing have very high value as a remnant of the grassy woodlands that were once widespread in the district.

I just pause there. Given that this area—depending on whether you look at the hundred as a geographical area or the environmental region—has only 12 to 5 per cent native vegetation left: in other words, 88 per cent to 95 per cent cleared.

What we are talking about is one of the last bits of intact vegetation that is left and the Native Vegetation Council said that it should not be cleared. The developers are not happy with that and they have gone crying to the government and the government has passed special regulations to allow them to clear what our publicly employed vegetation experts said should not have been cleared. Going back to the Nature Conservation Society's notes, they say:

It is noted that the DPA [that is the Development Plan Amendment] has created a new Motorsport Zone within the Coorong District Council Development Plan that includes Principle 7 of Development Control for the 'protection and restoration of important areas of native vegetation.' This is despite comments and input into the DPA and proposed development by the NVMU [Native Vegetation Management Unit] highlighting the importance of the woodland native vegetation in the north of the property.

I know I have put a lot of material on the record but, really, it comes down to a very simple proposition and that proposition is this: the parliament of this state over a period of about 30 years has supported and refined a system for the protection of what is left of native vegetation.

In particular, in areas that have been extensively cleared we have to protect what is left, and the process for protecting it is that we have a Native Vegetation Council and if someone wants to clear they have to go along and get a permit and satisfy the Native Vegetation Council that the clearance is necessary and that it cannot be properly offset through some other mechanism.

The developer in this situation has done that. They have gone to the Native Vegetation Council and the Native Vegetation Council said, 'No, there's hardly any of this stuff left. It's important habitat for birds and mammals. You should not clear it. The property is overwhelmingly cleared. You do not have to clear the last bit of this property for a dragstrip.' That is what this is for: it is for a dragstrip.

What the Shahins have done is what they did with their petrol stations: they did not accept the umpire's decision and did not accept what the Native Vegetation Council said. They have gone screaming to the government and said, 'We need special subordinate legislation, we need special legislative provisions that mean that we don't have to go through that process. We want an exemption.' The exemption that has been granted is to leave it up to the Coordinator-General. Leave it up to a bloke in the planning department, a government-appointed person to decide whether the clearance is necessary and how much money you should have to pay into the fund to do it.

In other words, this is a complete kick in the teeth for the Native Vegetation Council, the people in this state charged with balancing development and environmental decisions. They have applied the law that we the parliament have set for them, the principles of clearance. They have applied those, they have actually determined that most of the scattered significant trees, even those with nesting hollows, can go. They gave permission for those to be cleared but the intact native vegetation they said should be protected. The developers of the motorsport park have not accepted that, they have gone to the government and the government has passed these regulations.

I think when you look at the rules around subordinate legislation, you look at the ability of either house of parliament to disallow those regulations, when we look at, I would say, the corruption of the process that is inherent in this case, I think the Legislative Council owes it to our hardworking officials in the native vegetation section to debate this regulation, and I would say that it is deserving of disallowance.

If the government wants to come clean and bring back to parliament that native vegetation is no longer important in this state, then that is a separate decision that we can make. With those words, I commend the disallowance motion to the house.

Debate adjourned on motion of Hon. T.J. Stephens.

Sitting suspended from 17:54 to 19:45.