On behalf of Mr Jihad Dib: I move:

That this bill be now read a second time.

The Government is pleased to introduce the Environment Protection Legislation Amendment (Stronger Regulation and Penalties) Bill 2024. This bill is the largest environment protection amendment bill since the Environment Protection Authority [EPA] was created in 1991. The bill makes urgent changes to protect the environment of New South Wales and the health of the State's people. It increases penalties for those accused and found guilty of environmental crime. The recent discovery of asbestos‑contaminated mulch in New South Wales has been alarming and has triggered one of the largest investigations the EPA has undertaken in recent decades. To date this has included the deployment of 130 EPA staff, support from agencies like Fire and Rescue and testing of over 340 sites, costing into the millions.

While those investigations are still underway, it is clear that there are gaps in EPA legislation that need to be addressed. These gaps have been present for many years; the asbestos situation across New South Wales has made them starker. The Government went to the election with the promise of an EPA "with teeth". This is our first step in strengthening environmental regulation. This bill amends several environment protection Acts to strengthen environment legislation and ensure the EPA has the right frameworks and powers to deter environmental crimes and respond to pollution incidents. This includes increased penalties, new investigation powers and recall powers, improved protections for the public including a "name and shame" provision, and new offences and penalties to tackle illegal dumping. These changes will ensure that our EPA remains a best‑practice environmental regulator.

I now turn to the provisions of the bill. The bill makes changes to the Protection of the Environment Operations Act 1997, or POEO Act; the Protection of the Environment Administration Act 1991; the Pesticides Act 1999; the Protection from Harmful Radiation Act 1990; the Dangerous Goods (Road and Rail Transport) Act 2008; the Contaminated Land Management Act 1997; the Land and Environment Court Act 1979; and the Plastic Reduction and Circular Economy Act 2021. It also makes consequential amendments to other Acts and regulations to give effect to those changes.

I turn to increasing penalties. The bill proposes much‑needed increases to penalties for environmental offences. Penalties for serious environmental offences have not changed since 2005. Some penalties no longer act as a deterrent to environmental crime and they lag behind other jurisdictions. Most importantly, many current penalties do not reflect the seriousness of the offences. Therefore, this bill will increase the maximal penalties in the POEO Act, the Pesticides Act 1999, the Protection from Harmful Radiation Act 1990 and the Dangerous Goods (Road and Rail Transport) Act 2008.

Changes include doubling the maximum penalty for the most serious offences, known as tier 1 offences, to $10 million for corporations and $2 million for individuals. Maximum penalties for important tier 2 offences will also increase. Tier 2 offences involving asbestos will increase from $2 million to $4 million for corporations and from $500,000 to $1 million for individuals. These increases are designed to ensure the maximum penalties remain fair and proportionate to the harm that environmental crimes can cause. The bill will also increase penalty notice amounts—tier 3 offences—to further deter individuals and corporations. Tier 3 offences, such as licence breaches and water pollution, currently have a $15,000 on‑the‑spot fine for corporations and a $7,500 penalty for individuals. These are simply too low to deter poor practices and are often factored in as the cost of doing business.

For common offences under the POEO Act, the bill will enable penalty notice fines to increase by 50 per cent in the case of second or subsequent offences. In December 2023 the New South Wales Legislative Council inquiry into current and potential impacts of gold, silver, lead and zinc mining on human health, land, air and water quality in New South Wales recommended increasing the maximum penalty for tier 3 offences under the POEO Act to ensure companies are held to account. We have accepted this recommendation and are making these changes through this bill.

Recent asbestos‑contaminated mulch issues highlight that the current penalties for offences relating to resource recovery orders and exemptions are inadequate. With the current mulch investigation costs now into the millions, the current penalties of $44,000 for failing to follow resource recovery orders do not reflect the potential for serious harm. Moving these offences from the Protection of the Environment Operations (Waste) Regulation 2014 to the POEO Act will enable increased penalties of up to $2 million to apply, or $4 million for offences involving asbestos. Daily penalties will also apply. The bill also introduces new penalty amounts for littering and small-scale illegal dumping.

The bill proposes the introduction of a power to enable the EPA to issue environmental recall notices. Currently the EPA lacks the regulatory powers to issue a broad recall of material that may be posing this risk. To address this, the bill will amend the POEO Act to enable the EPA, with the approval of the Minister, to issue recall notices to persons or businesses involved in a supply chain that have distributed substances that pose a risk to human health or the environment. The bill will amend the POEO Act to give the EPA greater powers to warn the public about dodgy operators and matters of concern.

Public warning powers are already available under fair trading and food safety legislation to protect the people of New South Wales, and it makes sense to extend this to environment protection legislation. For example, people hire waste removal companies to cheaply dispose of waste, not knowing these businesses or individuals have a record of illegally disposing of this waste on public land or that of innocent landholders. A "name and shame" power will allow the public to be notified of activities or people that are subject to complaints or have been involved in pollution incidents. This also helps to level the playing field for the majority of operators that are doing the right thing.

The bill introduces amendments to help strengthen investigation powers and support early incident response. The recent asbestos events have demonstrated the utility of proactive preliminary investigations to quickly test substances of concern and secure sites if concerns are identified. To ensure that the EPA can quickly identify if there may be a pollution incident, the bill amends the POEO Act to introduce a new power to issue preliminary investigation notices. The bill also introduces an offence under the POEO Act for failing to comply with a preliminary investigation notice. The bill also amends the authorised officer seizure power to make it possible for officers to do their jobs and seize anything that they reasonably suspect has the potential to present a risk of harm to human health or the environment.

The complexity of the matters that the EPA regulates often involves related incidents across multiple premises—for example, the stockpiling of more than 5,000 tonnes of hazardous soft plastics in over 15 separate stockpiles following the failed REDcycle collection program. To streamline the EPA's response to incidents occurring at multiple premises, the bill amends the POEO Act to make it clear that a pollution incident can relate to a single premises or multiple premises, including premises in more than one local government area.

To ensure that existing clean-up notices are used in the most effective way, the bill also expands the definition of "clean-up action" to include testing or environmental monitoring and providing results to the appropriate regulatory authority. The bill will also allow the EPA to apply to the New South Wales Land and Environment Court to prevent serial and serious offenders from applying for an environment protection licence. Currently, those who are unfit to hold an environment protection licence can still apply for a licence. The EPA must prove that the applicant is not fit and proper before their licence application can be rejected. This is simply an inefficient use of publicly funded resources. The bill will enable the New South Wales Land and Environment Court, when sentencing an offender that has a poor compliance record, to prohibit them from applying for a licence or any involvement in licensed activities for a specified period.

The bill takes stronger action on illegal dumping. Amendments will help public land managers to tackle the issue of small-scale illegal dumping. That is a significant and persistent problem for public land managers, particularly local councils, but also a range of government agencies. It occurs frequently and, due to its covert nature, is difficult to prevent and regulate, and costly to clean up. Councils are collectively spending in excess of $20 million per year on managing illegal dumping. The bill proposes amendments to deter, prevent and clean up dumping. Illegal dumping is usually treated as a littering offence. However, the fines for littering offences are too low to deter small-scale dumping offenders.

The bill creates new offences specifically designed to target small‑scale illegal dumping and introduces penalties appropriate to the harm. Maximum penalties will be $50,000 for corporations and $25,000 for individuals. On-the-spot fines can also apply. If the waste is dumped in sensitive places, such as national parks, State forests, parks, beaches, childcare centres, hospitals or schools, corporations could face maximum penalties of $100,000 and $50,000 for individuals. The bill introduces new powers for authorised officers and also expands the clean-up notice provisions so they can clearly be used for littering and illegal dumping. Local councils have called for reform to regulation of illegal dumping. The amendments in the bill answer those calls and extend these improvements to other public land managers.

Lastly, the bill proposes a range of smaller amendments to ensure that our environment protection legislation remains best practice. Amendments clarify the EPA's existing statutory duties and functions to regulate the threats of climate change, reflecting the recent court decision in Bushfire Survivors for Climate Action Incorporated v Environment Protection Authority in 2021. It increases the jurisdictional limit for prosecutions brought in the Local Court. It amends regulation-making powers to enable the EPA to make further regulations on specific issues, such as allowing the establishment of a waste classifier accreditation scheme. These proposals will help to clarify existing functions and powers, reduce administrative burden and fix loopholes.

The bill is just the first step in how this Government will strengthen environmental legislation. The passing of the bill will send a strong message to those who feel they can operate outside the law and reflects the commitment of this Government to protecting the environment and the people of New South Wales. We will hold environmental criminals to account and ensure that we have the most effective penalties and regulatory tools to do so. I commend the bill to the House.