Page 4073 - Week 13 - Thursday, 31 October 2013
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This bill proposes to align the threatened species and ecological community categories for listing with the categories used under the commonwealth Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act 1999. A provisional listing is also proposed in the bill. This listing will ensure that an item is protected while a formal listing process under one of the threatened species or ecological community categories is progressed.
As well as the proposed amendments to the threatened species categories, amendments are also proposed for protected species with three categories identified. These are “of-trade concern,” “rare” and “data deficient”. While a protected species provision is provided in the current act, no categories were identified.
The arrangements for licensing of actions relating to plants and animals have been modernised. Many of the current arrangements for licensing are included in regulations and disallowable instruments. To aid clarity, much of this subsidiary regulation has been brought into the bill. The processes are not significantly different to those established previously, but now mirror those of the Public Unleased Land Act 2013.
A new licensing provision proposed in the bill relates to biodiscovery. This amendment will ensure that commercial benefits obtained through research or collection of flora and fauna in ACT reserves are shared appropriately with the ACT government and any traditional owners. This was prompted by Australia signing the Nagoya Protocol on Access to Genetic Resources and the Fair and Equitable Sharing of Benefits arising from their Utilisation, a global agreement made under the Convention on Biological Diversity in January last year. Australia has taken a leading role in its implementation, serving as a model for other countries.
The majority of the offences within the bill are continued from the Nature Conservation Act 1980. These have been reviewed and are consistent with comparable offences in other ACT laws or with similar offences in other jurisdictions. Provisions relating to offences and penalties have been revised to ensure compliance with the Human Rights Act.
The most serious offences within the bill relate to either clearing vegetation or damaging land in reserves. Penalties for these offences are on a sliding scale, depending on whether or not the offending action was intentional, reckless or negligent. The penalties also reflect the seriousness of the damage, with a higher level offence for clearing or damage that impacts on significant biodiversity assets. The range of offences for clearing and damaging land have not changed significantly from what was in the Nature Conservation Act 1980.
Enforcement powers of conservation officers under the Nature Conservation Bill are proposed to more closely align with conservation officers under the Fisheries Act 2000 and authorised officers under the Environment Protection Act 1997. This will allow additional certainty for officers, while authorisation under a range of acts will allow more effective and efficient regulation.
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