Canberra Daily has asked organisations around Canberra for their perspectives on key issues, the ACT Government’s accomplishments, and what an incoming government should focus on. 

Dr Simon Copland recently became executive director of the Conservation Council ACT Region, the peak environmental advocacy organisation. Previously, he was executive director of Pedal Power ACT (see here for his election thoughts in that capacity), and worked for 350.org Australia, where he organised a climate tour of Pacific Islanders to Australia, which included a blockade of the Newcastle Coal Port. He has a PhD in sociology from the Australian National University.

What do you regard as the ACT Government’s successes in the current term?

The ACT continues to lead the country on climate action. We have a target of zero emissions by 2045, and all parties support this, which is very important. (However, we feel the target can and should be brought forward.) The Government is making good progress on reducing emissions. In this term, the Government has legislated a ban of new gas connections and a phase out of wood heaters, the latter of which will occur by 2045. The gas phase-out is really important to transition away from fossil fuels, and we’re happy to see the Government implement a proper phase-out plan.

On environmental protection, we’ve also seen some big wins. The Government has recently legislated a right to a healthy environment as part of our Human Rights Act. A nation-first piece of legislation, this will ensure that people can hold the Government accountable to ensuring they protect our environment. We also are happy to see the development of the Connecting Nature, Connecting People initiative, which is an important program to connect Canberrans with our nature. As part of this, the Government is improving 20 urban green spaces, which will enhance wildlife habitat, improve resilience to climate change, and enhance amenity to our city.

Finally, we are really delighted that the Government recently announced plans to put Bluetts Block into our nature reserve system. This is an area with high ecological values that was under threat from development at Molonglo. While we are keeping an eye on the Government to ensure this reserve is managed properly, we are very happy to see they’ve recognised how important it is to protect it. 

What could have been handled better – or left aside?

Despite some progress, there are also real issues. Unfortunately, since the last election, we’ve had five new species added to our endangered species list, including the iconic gang-gang cockatoo. This suggests that the Government really isn’t doing enough to protect our environment.

One of the big issues is that our environment legislation, the Nature Conservation Act, is out-of-date and designed to benefit developers over the environment. The legislation does not give enough powers to declare nature reserves, meaning that communities have to fight tooth and nail to see our environment protected. Instead, our laws are facilitating the Government approving massive land clearing to build unsustainable sprawling suburbs. 

At the start of this year, for example, the Planning Minister, Chris Steel, approved development at Stromlo Reach, which is being built on endangered woodland right on the edge of Bluetts Block. This development didn’t need to happen, and all the decision did was appease developers to build expensive, unsustainable houses. We need to be thinking a lot more about how we can densify Canberra rather than continuing a sprawl that is destroying our nature.

While we are making progress on phasing out gas, current policies still benefit the wealthy too much. Programs such as the Sustainable Household Scheme are valuable, but are only accessible if you already own property and have the funds to pay back the loans. The Government needs to do more work to assist people on lower incomes, or renters, to transition away from gas to electric. 

We also need to do a lot more to reduce Canberra’s transport emissions. Transport now accounts for over 60 per cent of Canberra’s emissions, yet the Government continues to invest hundreds of millions of dollars into road duplications that will just encourage more people to drive. We need to see much greater investment in active and public transport to help people get out of cars and into more sustainable modes of transport. 

What do you see as the major issues that an incoming government will have to deal with?

There are two major issues the next Government is going to face. First, how do we stop the decline of our endangered ecosystems, and instead start to regenerate areas. We should have two goals for the next term of Government – have no new species added to our endangered species list, and to have other species taken off the list as their numbers grow due to good management practices. As already noted, one big challenge here will be our environmental laws – they are being updated in 2025, and there is going to be a lot of work to ensure they are better than they currently are.

We also need to think about how we stop the unsustainable spread of our city to instead build upwards, instead of outwards. More suburbs are not the solution – not for our environment, nor the housing crisis. For example, the Government is still ‘exploring’ development in the Western Edge of our city (well beyond Molonglo). This would be an environmental disaster. We should be taking this off the table, and instead building within our current footprint.

The other big challenge will be getting us to net zero carbon emissions. We have already tackled most of the low-hanging fruit, and now we really need to do the hard stuff. While the Government has set targets to get off gas, we cannot wait until the 2040s to do all the work. Action needs to happen now.

The other big challenge is going to be transport – it’s not just how we get people into EVs, but also we improve uptake of active and public transport. This needs both huge investment but also cultural changes. 

What should the government’s priorities be? What policy initiatives or reforms might be useful to meet the challenges ahead?

There are several things we should be doing: 

Our major environment legislation, the Nature Conservation Act, is up for review and will be amended by 2025. This Act is currently failing, leading to more animals being put on our endangered species list. We think major changes need to happen, including the Act taking a more ecosystem approach, moving powers away from the planning directorate (whose main interest is in building houses, not protecting the environment), and increasing fines for dodgy developers who destroy our environment.

We’d like to see increased investment in nature protection, particularly through the implementation of a Territory-wide biodiversity network. Instead of declaring reserves on an ad hoc basis, or only as offsets, we should be proactively protecting all parts of our environment that have ecological significance. We should be thinking and proactively managing any part of our environment that has value – whether a national park, or a pocket park where birds like to hang out. We want to see a more systemic approach to our environmental protection.

We need to see more work to phase out gas, particularly providing assistance for those on lower incomes. At the moment, it is primarily the wealthiest who are benefiting from our transition to lower emissions technologies, leaving many Canberrans behind. We’d like to see real programs to replace gas appliances in public housing, and to force landlords to replace appliances in rental properties.

The Government needs to stop investing in road duplications that do nothing to stop traffic congestion, and instead spend more on public and active transport. We want the Government to fill in the missing links in our active travel network, build light rail faster, and improve investment to both increase bus services and transition our fleet to be fully electric.