Regional Australia suffers under draconian native vegetation laws
10-March-2010
The biodiversity of regional land and the productivity of regional Australia continue to be threatened by the NSW and Queensland governments’ native vegetation legislation, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Regional Development Mark Coulton has warned.
During a speech to Parliament House last night, Mr Coulton said that in the 12 years since the governments introduced legislation to lock up land and stop landholders from effectively managing their properties, farmers have seen a remarkable decline in productivity of not only individual farms, but of the country as a whole.
“While this may have been done with the best of intentions - or it may have been done to garner green preferences - time has shown that it was an ill-conceived concept,” he said.
“You cannot improve the biodiversity and environmental situation of land by locking it up.”
Mr Coulton said he was alarmed to see the extent of the degradation of land in Western NSW that had been locked up for environmental purposes during a tour of the region last week.
“While it has been a little difficult to see the full ramifications of this decision during the period of drought that a lot of areas have had for the last 10 years or so, what is very evident is that the areas that have been selectively cleared, with shade lines left, are vibrant, alive, productive and healthy,” he said.
“In contrast, areas that have been locked up have high infestations of woody weeds, pine and other regrowth and are quite sterile.
“The land underneath this timber is bare and there is no grass cover so with following the recent heavy rainfall it has been subject to quite serious erosion.
“This reinforces that it is a fallacy that locking up land is actually good for it. With the focus now on property rights and native vegetation in the context of emissions trading with carbon credits, it would be a very good idea if, as a country and as a parliament, we looked at this policy and reassessed whether it is the best thing to do for our environment.”
Mr Coulton reiterated his call for anybody who has been affected by these laws to put in a submission to the Senate inquiry into the matter.
“Sometimes, with the best of intentions, laws that have a detrimental effect are put in place, but it only becomes a tragedy if that is not realised,” he said.
“There is an opportunity to reverse this – to bring back the productivity of regional Australia and to bring back the productivity of regional Australia and make these areas sustainable into the future.”