Australia's birds are not being protected by environmental laws, report says

BirdLife says loopholes, exemptions, omissions and powers open to politicisation have been exploited

Michael Slezak

Wed 21 Mar 2018 21.31 GMTLast modified on Wed 21 Mar 2018 21.33 GMT

Some of Australia’s favourite birds are threatened with extinction and Australia’s environmental laws are failing to protect them, a new report by BirdLife Australia has found.

The report identified in the existing laws a slew of loopholes, exemptions, omissions and discretionary powers open to politicisation, each of which have been exploited to allow the decline of birds including the Carnaby’s black cockatoo, the swift parrot and the southern black-throated finch.

“The Turnbull government must urgently reform our national environment laws and ensure they are properly upheld,” said Jenny Lau, BirdLife Australia’s acting head of conservation.

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The report attempts to build a case for what the Australian Panel of Experts on Environmental Law, working in conjunction with the Places You Love Alliance, called a blueprint for the next generation of environmental laws.

That blueprint called for national oversight to be expanded to cover land clearing, impacts on climate change and protected areas, as well as the establishment of a national sustainability commission, which would have real power to manage cumulative impacts on the environment that are often not considered over hundreds of individual decisions.

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