Mr BAYLEY – Minister, on the State of the Environment report, obviously it was well over a decade late and your government missed two statutory reporting cycles before getting this one going and tabled. The Planning Commission asked for an extra two months to finish the State of the Environment report from June to the end of August. What was the reason for the delay and does it point to the fact that the Planning Commission needs additional funding for staff to continue its role reporting on the State of the Environment report functions and requirements into the future?
Mr ELLIS – Thank you, Mr Bayley. Yes, we delivered the State of the Environment report and that was tabled in parliament on 17 September. Part of our obligations is to deliver one in five years’ time. The Tasmanian Planning Commission was originally allocated $400,000 in the 2023‑24 state Budget to complete the 2024 State of the Environment report, and as the project scope was developed, additional resources were drawn upon. We continue to work with the Tasmanian Planning Commission and other parts of government that were required to provide their part for it.
In terms of the extension that was requested by the Tasmanian Planning Commission, that request was made in June 2024 and I consented to a short extension of time for the submission of the report until 30 August 2024.
Mr BAYLEY – Was that a resource issue? What was the reason?
Mr ELLIS – The extension was to allow the Planning Commission sufficient time to finalise the 2024 State of the Environment report, including completion of its quality processes. There is significant data aggregation that needs to be done, and it is important to streamline the process for all that different data that’s held by different agencies and bodies into one readable and digestible format. I was happy to provide that extension so that they could work through that and, obviously, we’ve delivered the report now.
Mr BAYLEY – Can you give a commitment to commission and adequately fund the August 2029 version of the State of the Environment report? Is it your intention to meet the next statutory deadline and fund it adequately?
Mr ELLIS – Absolutely. I am very much looking forward to being in government in 2029, Mr Bayley –
Mr BAYLEY – You have to get it going well before then.
Mr ELLIS – We’ll be very keen to deliver that report. It’s an extensive report. Quite clearly, the Tasmanian Planning Commission has done significant work – more than 600 pages as part of that report and consulting broadly across government, the university sector and other organisations in our community and in our economy –
Mr BAYLEY – It is extensive and we’ve put on record our thanks to those people involved, but it also had a number of holes in it. There were a number of indicators where the State of the Environment report couldn’t report because it didn’t have enough data to determine their status. These are things like water, wetlands, rice grass and land use intensification. What will be done between now and commissioning the next State of the Environment report to ensure that there’s enough data to understand those environmental trends?
Mr ELLIS – We have Claire Hynes, the Acting Commissioner of the Tasmanian Planning Commission. We are talking about the data that wasn’t available on certain key indicators that were provided.
Mr BAYLEY – The question is – was that a resourcing issue? The question was really to the minister about a commitment to provide the commission with adequate resources to start the data collection now so that those indicators can be formed into the next State of the Environment report. That is something you have control over as minister.
Mr ELLIS – As I said, Mr Bayley, it’s not a resourcing matter, but where there’s a lack of data extant in different agencies, that’s something for us to look at. I’ll look to Ms Hynes to see whether there’s a further update that you can provide about the particular indicators that didn’t have much data.
Ms HYNES – As you can appreciate, it was a very complex project, led by a great team and a great steering committee within the commission. We worked very hard to make sure we could complete that within the timeframe provided by the direction of the minister.
The report speaks to itself and the comprehensive nature of the report. Volume 1 and volume 2 with the technical findings are all backed up by all the technical reports in volume 2. It’s a result of extensive consultation that the team undertook with government departments; we utilised all relevant data that was available not just within government but outside. All that data went through a rigorous process of checking and making sure that where there wasn’t data available, that was simply stated as fact.
Mr BAYLEY – Have you made a request to government, or have you had any indication to government about those data holes and the need to fill them for future reports?
Ms HYNES – Yes. Certainly, our focus was getting the report done. As you spoke about before, we sought that two-month extension and that was to go through our quality assurance processes, and we absolutely needed that time to complete that. Moving forward, we’re already undertaking a further audit review process looking at what we did, what we did well, what we could have done to improve, and moving towards how we are going to produce the next report within the five-year time frame.
Mr BAYLEY – Do you make recommendations around those holes in data?
CHAIR – That is the last question, Mr Bayley, and we will move on.
Ms HYNES – I believe it would be premature for me to discuss that at this point in time because that work is still ongoing. We’re working through the finding and what it looks like from here on.
Mr ELLIS – I might make a point as well around these point-in-time snapshot reports. For example, I have experience in terms of delivering the State of the Forests report as well last year. They’re interesting reports, but it does beg the question in the modern age in which we live, are there opportunities to, a bit like we do with our dashboards, provide a regular update. It would be a little bit like providing the State of the Housing report every five years where I randomly dump a whole bunch of data together.
It’s actually more useful being able to provide information in a continuous disclosure space so that you have not necessarily real‑time reporting, but more contemporaneous reporting. That helps to provide an ongoing picture of what our forests or our environment more broadly look like.
There are some challenges because in the State of the Environment report we deal with a lot of external agencies around their data. Some of that data provision might be a little bit more complicated, but certainly I know that it’s an area in which we’re going to have some big opportunities available to us over the next five years to better deliver those data so that we’re not waiting for a one in every five-year kind of comet to fly past us. Instead –
Mr BAYLEY – More regular reporting would be very welcome, provided it was credible and authentic.
Mr ELLIS – On recommendation 3, to develop an environmental data strategy, we have some information here that the Australian Government’s allocated $1.5 million over three years to each state and territory through the Digital Environmental Assessment Program initiative to enhance the capability of the Tasmanian Natural Values Atlas to exchange biodiversity data with a national biodiversity data repository that’s being developed.
The Natural Values Atlas is a web-based platform managed by NRE Tasmania that holds and delivers high-quality Tasmanian natural values information relied on for the development, assessment and approvals process. This enhancement will support better environmental assessment and decision‑making. Through the interjurisdictional environment data and information oversight committee we’re also engaging with the Australian Government on the establishment of Environment Information Australia and the development of a national environmental standard on data and information standards. We also collect reserve estate data feeding into the national Collaborative Australian Protected Areas Database.
There are some big opportunities coming up in the next five years and some of that technology‑facilitated data provision will be a really exciting space for those of us nerdy enough to be interested in it.
