Morrison takes credit for conservation legislation that doesn’t seem to exist
May 2019
The Prime Minister claimed he had already “been taking action” on a landmark UN report about the extinction of a million different species by introducing and passing legislation on animal conservation. But no such legislation was passed or even seemed to exist.
In a damning United Nations report released on May 6, 2019, scientists revealed that 1 million species were at risk of extinction. On Tuesday May 7, Scott Morrison responded to the report saying: “We already introduced and passed legislation through the Senate actually dealing with that very issue in the last week of the parliament. We’ve been taking action on that.”
But as The Guardian reported, no legislation regarding animal conservation or the environment passed in the final week of parliament. When asked what the legislation was, the prime minister’s office did not reply. The office of the environment minister, Melissa Price, also did not respond when asked what legislation Morrison was referring to.
The only legislation regarding animals that passed within the last few months is the industrial chemicals bill 2017, which set new regulations on testing cosmetics on animals. It was passed by both houses on 18 February – not in the last week of parliament, which was in April.