The Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act 1999 review was conducted by Dr Allan Hawke on behalf of the Minister for the Environment, the Hon Peter Garrett. SIBA Director, John Sheehan, wrote a response to the original discussion paper and subsequent Interim Report principally on behalf of the Australian Property Institute (NSW). As a result of this interest, John Sheehan and David Hocking were invited to attend a special meeting of key infrastructure groups that included the environment sector, energy companies, property sector, ports and bulk container organisations and water catchment authorities and the Minerals Council of Australia and of course the spatial industry.
SIBA put forward a very strong case for spatial data to be seen as a fundamental building block of a functioning EPBC Act. This position was taken up in the final report and in particular we were pleased with the recommendation on where funding for spatial data should could from. This was a commitment from Dr Hawke and SIBA congratulates the Committee on recognising the importance of this data.
For further information and a copy of the report go to http://www.environment.gov.au/epbc/review/publications/index.html for a full copy of the Final Report to the Australian Government.