Category: Environmental Management / Road Transport

WA environmental watchdog needs 'radical' reform

Tuesday, 17 May 2016 16:06:34 | Kathryn Diss

An independent review of the state's environmental watchdog has recommended a radical overhaul of its policy framework, saying it needs to be massively simplified and made clearer.

Key points:

  • EPA policies need to be radically simplified, review finds
  • Probe sparked by Roe 8 environmental approval rejection
  • EPA has welcomed the findings, says changes will be made

Environment Minister Albert Jacob initiated the review in December 2015 following a Supreme Court decision which ruled the environmental assessment for the controversial Roe 8 project - part of the planned $1.6 billion Perth Freight Link to connect the city's east to Fremantle Port - was invalid.

The Save Beeliar Wetlands group brought the case to court, arguing the Environmental Protection Authority (EPA) did not take its own policies concerning land offsets into account when it assessed the project.

The legal bid succeeded when Chief Justice Wayne Martin ruled the EPA's assessment and recommendation to Environment Minister Albert Jacob was invalid, along with his subsequent approval.

The review team, led by Peter Quinlan SC, found the Environmental Protection Authority had too many policy instruments with no clear hierarchy, and its framework should be updated.

"The EPA's website, for example, reveals a labyrinthine collection of various categories and types of instruments in various lists that cross-reference others," the report states.

"As a consequence, navigating the 'Policies and guidelines' section of the EPA's website is something of a Kafkaesque experience."

The report, published on May 6, also found the policies were not clearly linked to the legislation which the EPA draws its authority, the Environmental Protection (EP) Act.

The Review Team recommended the EPA develop and adopt a simplified policy framework arranged in a hierarchical manner, with the objectives and principles of the EP Act at its apex.

EPA chairman Tom Hatton agreed the authority needed a better framework.

"We need to have a simple framework for people to understand where our policies are, how they relate to one another and to improve the clarity of internal guidelines and we strongly support that recommendation," he said.

"We're going to be following the advice of the review quite closely, we will produce a logical, simple framework and we will revise our policies and put them in that framework as indicated in the review.

"As part of that we will also be going to our stakeholders and seeking their advice and comment on the proposed changes."

Dr Hatton said the review was wholly independent.

"We did not appoint the reviewers, we only met with the reviewers once in the whole process," he said.

"We had very limited input into the review, in fact the only input we had into the review apart from that one meeting was just to make sure the office of the EPA provided them with all the guidelines and policies we have, so it's been a very arms length process."



 

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