Great Australian Bight

The majority voted against a motion introduced by SA Senator Sarah Hanson-Young (Greens), which means it failed.

Motion text

That the Senate notes that:

(a) Norwegian company Equinor has an application before the National Offshore Petroleum Safety Environmental Management Authority (NOPSEMA) to drill for oil in the Great Australian Bight;

(b) NOPSEMA has rejected Equinor's environment plan stating that Equinor must provide it with further information about matters relating to consultation, source control, oil spill risk, and matters protected under Part 3 of the Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act 1999;

(c) modelling commissioned by The Australia Institute shows Equinor will pay the Norwegian Government more than it will pay in Australian Government taxes, and up to 27 times more than it will pay to the South Australian Government;

(d) if Equinor's application is ultimately approved by NOPSEMA, a foreign-owned company will therefore take the vast majority of financial gains while exploiting and putting at risk our precious marine and coastal environment, and tens of thousands of tourism and fishing industry jobs; and

(e) the ecological and environmental significance of the Great Australian Bight is, in fact, priceless.