Labor would prevent a contentious “national interest” exemption being used to approve coal and gas projects if the Greens agreed to support its nature laws, Guardian Australia can reveal.
The offer follows a groundswell of criticism about the discretionary power, including from the author of the review that inspired the new laws, Graeme Samuel, and the former treasury secretary Ken Henry.
The concession alone may not be enough to win over the Greens, who demand protections for native forests and consideration of the climate impacts of projects in exchange for backing the proposed overhaul of the Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation (EPBC) Act.
With the government desperate to pass the laws in parliament’s final sitting of the year, the environment
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