15th Jun 2020, 4:32 PM – Senate Motions - Environmental Conservation: New South Wales - Convert to national park

The majority voted against a motion introduced by NSW Senator Mehreen Faruqi (Labor), which means it failed.

Motion text

That the Senate—

(a) notes:

(i) that the New South Wales (NSW) government has included the former IBM site at 55 Coonara Avenue West Pennant Hills in its planning acceleration program, despite the proposal for rezoning from Business to Residential and Environmental use being opposed by the Hills Shire Council and Hornsby Shire Council,

(ii) that the proposal for high-density residential development on the site requires the removal of 2,000 trees, including Blue Gum High Forest and Sydney Turpentine-Ironbark Forest in the Sydney Basin Bioregion, both of which are listed as a critically endangered ecological communities under the Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act 1999 (Cth),

(iii) the sustained opposition of local residents, civic associations, environmentalists and elected councillors to the development,

(iv) that the NSW Natural Resource Commission has identified the Sydney Basin Bioregion as being at "high biodiversity risk", and

(v) that land clearing has turned Australia into a global deforestation hot-spot and is exacerbating the climate emergency;

(b) opposes the destruction of ecological communities listed as critically endangered under the Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act 1999 (Cth), and

(c) calls on the NSW Government to reject Mirvac's rezoning application and instead convert the Cumberland State Forest and adjacent forest at 55 Coonara Ave West Pennant Hills into national park.