Greens promise to force government to spend 1% of budget on environment if they hold balance of power

The Guardian

02-04-2025

The Greens have promised to push the government to boost environment spending to $7.8bn – 1% of the federal budget – next financial year if they hold the balance of power after the election.
The minor party made the pledge as Labor faced calls to explain its nature policy after Anthony Albanese promised he would establish a federal environment protection agency (EPA) if re-elected. The prime minister said it would not be the 'same model' as one his government abandoned in this term of parliament after a backlash from Western Australia, but released no details.
The Greens leader, Adam Bandt, said Labor had broken a promise to protect the environment and Peter Dutton 'doesn't even pretend to care'. Bandt said his party's position was in line with expert calls for a large increase in spending on nature protection to prevent species going extinct and help halt a documented decline in environmental health across the country.
The Greens plan included $7.8bn funding in 2025-26 and an additional $17bn over the following three years. If delivered, the commitment would at least double government spending on nature, according to analysis by the Parliamentary Library.
The party said the commitments should be paid for by increasing taxes on 'big corporations and billionaires' – similarly to its other major platforms, such as adding dental to Medicare.
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Bandt said 'far more public money is spent subsidising [nature] destruction than protection' and the Greens were 'the only party with a comprehensive plan to address the biodiversity crisis'.
'In a minority parliament, the Greens will keep Peter Dutton out and get Labor to act to protect and restore our precious natural environment,' he said.
Australia has more than 2,200 native species and ecosystems listed as threatened with extinction. Scientists and conservationists have described it as a world leader in mammal extinction, and a global deforestation hotspot.
Labor promised to revamp the Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation (EPBC) Act – which has been widely criticised as failing business and the environment – and create an EPA in this term, but neither commitment was delivered.
Last week it was accused of weakening nature laws after it joined with the Coalition to amend the EPBC Act to protect salmon farming in Tasmania's Macquarie Harbour. The amendment was welcomed by the salmon industry, unions and the Tasmanian Liberal state government.
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Albanese this week said a returned Labor government would consult the states and industry and conservation groups on new laws and a different EPA model. He said the final legislation would offer 'certainty for industry … but also provides for sustainability'.
The director of the Biodiversity Council, James Trezise, said the prime minister had not included any detail 'beyond a loose commitment to further consultation'. He said the point of an independent EPA was 'to deal with the influence of vested interests in decision making', but that this seemed a 'moot point' as vested interests 'appear to have the ear of the PM, whether it's around salmon farming in Tasmania or the design of a new environmental regulator'.
Trezise said Labor should again back the recommendations of a review of the EPBC Act led by the former competition and consumer watchdog Graeme Samuel, particularly his call for the establishment of national environmental standards against which development proposals could be measured.
Trezise said while Labor was yet to provide detail of what it would do, the Coalition had 'so far presented no clear plan for the law reform or the environment, beyond slashing the public service in Canberra'.
The Greens environmental policy wishlist includes reforming nature laws, banning native logging, spending $20bn on biodiversity restoration over the next decade and dedicating $5bn over four years to a new 'protected areas fund'.