Australia's native species' future remains vulnerable, law council says

The Law Council of Australia is concerned Australia’s system of environment laws was failing to meet international obligations to protect its biodiversity.

In a submission to the Senate inquiry into the high rate of fauna extinctions, the council’s environment and planning law committee has called for reforms to reverse the decline in native species.

“The committee is concerned that the design and implementation of the current regulatory framework is inadequate to meet Australia’s international obligations to manage and reduce threats to biodiversity,” it said.

The submission called for several reforms, including “more rigorous identification, protection and restoration of critical habitat” and stronger obligations on governments to implement recovery and threat abatement plans for species.

For species that have recovery plans under Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act, there is no obligation on governments to implement or fund them.

The submission also recommended better alignment of state and federal processes relating to species protection and environmental impact assessment, and for laws to require “consideration of both indirect and cumulative impacts when assessing likely impacts of a proposal on threatened species”.

“Identifying critical habitat is important for prioritising recovery efforts and assessing the significance of impacts, particularly for endangered and critically endangered species,” it said.

It noted that although the federal environment and energy minister was required to maintain a register of critical habitat, it was at the minister’s discretion whether or not critical habitat identified in recovery plans should be put on the register.

Guardian Australia revealed in March that Australia had not listed any critical habitat for protection on the federal register in more than a decade.

“The committee supports all critical habitat identified in a recovery plan being registered and subject to the protection of section 207B (which makes it an offence to take an action that will significantly damage registered critical habitat),” the submission said.

The Senate inquiry was launched in June and is investigating the decline in Australian fauna and the adequacy of monitoring practices, habitat protection and funding for threatened species.

There have been 168 submissions published and the committee has received more than 12,000 form letters from the public.

It is due to hand down a report in December.