Community Open Letter: Shaping Our Future

This is a crucial moment for our decades long campaign for national nature laws that actually protect nature. Without urgent reforms to the EPBC Act, the decline of Australia’s unique plants, animals and ecosystems will continue.

At our event Shaping Our Future, a Nature Law Forum & Film Screening of Antarctica - the Giant Awakens on Thursday, 29 August, ACF Community Northern Beaches asked MP for Mackellar, Sophie Scamps to personally pass on this open letter to Environment Minister Tanya Plibersek and PM Anthony Albanese. it was signed by 150 people in the room that night - can you add your voice to supercharge our community ask, and make sure the Environment Minister knows that we're following and watching closely?

Full text of the open letter

Dear Prime Minister Albanese and Minister Plibersek,

We are community volunteers, conservationists and friends from the electorates of Warringah, Mackellar and surrounds who write to you with serious concerns about the indefinite delay of the reforms to Australia’s national environment law – the Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act 1999 (EPBC Act), as promised in the Government’s Nature Positive Plan.

Australia has one of the worst extinction records on Earth and many iconic species and ecosystems continue to be threatened by human activity including mining and development. Once these species and habitats have gone, we’ll never get them back and our children and grandchildren will never experience the Australia we all know and love today.

Much of this will not be news to you Minister Plibersek as we know in your role as Environment Minister you have pledged to attempt to end extinctions in Australia and to work to provide better protections for Australia’s wildlife.

While we welcome your government’s plans to introduce a national Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and an Environmental Information Agency (EIA), we are concerned that these agencies will be left enforcing the weak and ineffective EPBC Act, which has overseen the continued destruction of animals, plants and their habitats and fails to address climate impacts.

Without urgent reforms to the EPBC Act to strengthen nature protections, the loss of species and habitat will continue. We also feel that funding for the environment in the federal budget is simply insufficient to bring about the sort of necessary change to reverse the decline of Australia’s unique plants, animals and ecosystems and make these laws fit for purpose.

We and millions of other Australians care about our natural heritage and work tirelessly to support and protect it. We urge you to step up and do your part to address Australia's environmental decline and save our threatened species and habitats before they disappear by:

• Improving protections for nature in the existing EPBC Act, including the consideration of climate risks and impacts, alongside introducing a strong and independent Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and an Environmental Information Agency (EIA)
• Committing to a clear plan for developing and delivering the rest of the urgent reforms to national environment laws within this term of government
• Increasing federal funding to protect and recover Australia's threatened plants, animals and places.

Thank you for your consideration of the above, and we look forward to hearing your response.

Yours sincerely,