Published April 2024
The Opposition is calling on Planning Minister Nick Champion to provide a substantive response to Parliament’s recent Urban Forest inquiry.
The Environment, Resources and Development Committee tabled its Interim Report into the Urban Forest on 19 October last year with 13 recommendations that focus on regulatory change to better value and protect existing trees and to facilitate the planting of more trees.
Nick Champion last month finally provided his formal response to the report where he glibly stated: “I can advise the Government has not implemented these recommendations at this stage.”
Shadow Assistant Minister for Environment, Jack Batty, said Nick Champion’s response flies in the face of Labor’s election promise to “ensure we have Australian best practice for tree loss regulation.”
“Labor has broken their promise to introduce the best tree regulations in Australia – and Nick Champion has basically admitted as much,” Mr Batty said.
“Labor has not delivered best practice tree regulation in the country and on many metrics they have delivered the worst.
“Recent reports indicate that Greater Adelaide is losing 75,000 trees every year. Today Green Adelaide have released damning data showing just 17% of metropolitan Adelaide is covered in tree canopy – well short of Labor’s targets.
“Labor promised to fix this but two years into Government all they have done is explicitly ignore recommendations on how we can protect and grow our tree canopy.
“The Liberals know the importance of our leafy green streets which mean cooler suburbs filled with habitats for biodiversity – that’s why we implemented the now scrapped Greener Neighbourhoods Grants program that saw nearly 10,000 trees planted across Adelaide.
“Labor talks a big game when it comes to the environment – but take no action. They have already scrapped tree planting programs, tried to develop the park lands, and now seem to be walking away from their commitments on tree canopy.
“Why doesn’t Nick Champion want to protect Adelaide’s tree canopy? While his broken promises grow, our tree canopy shrinks.”
