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Speaker 1: Now the Labour Party is having another crack at the

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Speaker 1: government's fast tracked legislation. Under the new law, anyone wanting

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Speaker 1: to get a project fast track was invited to put

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Speaker 1: an application in in April, but we don't know exactly

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Speaker 1: who applied. Labour says we need to be told which

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Speaker 1: projects have applied before the fast Track Bill gets through

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Speaker 1: the select committee process. Rachel Brooking is Labor Party's Environment

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Speaker 1: spokesperson and with us now, hey Rachel, hello, Hi, why

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Speaker 1: do you want to know now?

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Speaker 2: We want to know now so we know what we're

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Speaker 2: talking about. And at the moment we can only guess

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Speaker 2: that it's going to be a coal mine and the

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Speaker 2: key we habitat and that's because of what ministers like

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Speaker 2: Shane Jones say. We have other ministers such as the

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Speaker 2: Prime Minister and Chris Bishop say oh no, no, we're

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Speaker 2: going to use this bill to do renewable energy projects

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Speaker 2: in the life. But the way the bill is written,

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Speaker 2: it could mean a whole lot of thing. So we

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Speaker 2: want to know what this project is and have an

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Speaker 2: opportunity for members of Parliament to talk about what those

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Speaker 2: projects might be. But also members of the public should

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Speaker 2: have a say too, because this is totally overriding all

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Speaker 2: of the community plans that are out there at the moment.

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Speaker 1: So my understanding, and please tell me if this is

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Speaker 1: right or wrong, But my understanding is that what the

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Speaker 1: government's plan to do is take the thing through the

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Speaker 1: Select Committee process, and then after it's gone through, but

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Speaker 1: before it gets passed by the House, then the list

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Speaker 1: of applicants is added to the bill. Is that right?

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Speaker 2: That's right. So that's in the committee stage of the House,

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Speaker 2: but the Select committee's finished its process then goes back

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Speaker 2: to the House for the second reading and the committee stage.

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Speaker 2: Then you can add amendments to a bill at that point.

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Speaker 1: Yeah. And so what that means is that before any

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Speaker 1: decisions are made by the experts or the ministers, we

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Speaker 1: will already know what the projects are.

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Speaker 2: Some of the projects, the projects that are on a

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Speaker 2: particular list are ones that avoid a referral process, so

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Speaker 2: they can go straight to the expert panel and then

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Speaker 2: the final decision is made by ministers. There's also other

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Speaker 2: processes in the bill for projects to be referred by

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Speaker 2: ministers that don't need to be on the list.

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Speaker 1: Okay, what's the point in I mean, Rachel, there's nothing

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Speaker 1: you or I can do right to influence whether something

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Speaker 1: gets given the go ahead or not. Because it's going

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Speaker 1: to this panel and it's going to the ministers. There's

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Speaker 1: no democratic process in here. So what's the point of knowing?

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Speaker 2: Well, I think a lot of the bill needs to

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Speaker 2: change for a start. You know, for a start, the

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Speaker 2: bill needs to not override all of our environmental protections

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Speaker 2: for the Minister's pet projects, and these are big projects

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Speaker 2: that for some reason don't have to abide by the

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Speaker 2: same rules that's what the projects have to so it

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Speaker 2: does need to change that. It's that then also the

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Speaker 2: expert panel that makes the decision based on those criteria

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Speaker 2: that we find in our environmental legislation.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, I get that, but we can't influence it, can we.

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Speaker 2: Well, we can always try and influence things and change

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Speaker 2: the bill. We've heard in Parliament today and question time

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Speaker 2: the Prime Minister was saying that he look at changes

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Speaker 2: to the bill that the Select Committee puts. So that's

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Speaker 2: why I'm talking to you and continuing to talk about

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Speaker 2: how the bill needs to change because we have had

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Speaker 2: fast track legislasion in the past. We've got some doubt

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Speaker 2: as well, whereby it is just that it's to fast

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Speaker 2: track a normal process where you have normal environmental protections

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Speaker 2: and you don't just have a politician deciding that something

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Speaker 2: will go ahead.

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Speaker 1: The thing I guess is this, I can see why

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Speaker 1: you want to know it. I mean, I can understand

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Speaker 1: because it's going to add some color to this, right,

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Speaker 1: it's going to flesh out the details, and we'll actually

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Speaker 1: know what we're debating. The problem with knowing in advance

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Speaker 1: maybe that we start debating these individual projects instead of

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Speaker 1: actually debating in the select committee process the merit of

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Speaker 1: the process, which that is what we should be debating.

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Speaker 2: Right, we can debate both because if the bill is

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Speaker 2: remains how it is at the moment and people don't

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Speaker 2: have a say on what's in that list either, then

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Speaker 2: you know, there's just no public process on what's on

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Speaker 2: those lists, and there'll be even more questions, you know,

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Speaker 2: very real, genuine questions from the public about what social

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Speaker 2: license post projects is.

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Speaker 1: All right, Hey, thank you, Rachel, really appreciate you appreciate

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Speaker 1: your time. That's Rachel Brooking, the Labor Party environment spokesperson.

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