Roger Cook hits back at Peter Dutton’s Environmental Defenders Office defunding pledge
West Australian Premier Roger Cook has slammed Peter Dutton over his ‘knee-jerk’ promise to pull federal funding for the Environmental Defenders Office.
West Australian Premier Roger Cook has slammed Peter Dutton over his “knee-jerk” promise to pull federal funding for the Environmental Defenders Office, while confirming that the resource-rich state would continue to direct funds to the body.
The federal Opposition Leader on Tuesday used an address to the WA Chamber of Minerals and Energy to promise to withdraw financial support for the EDO, following recent Federal Court fundings that were damning of evidence put forward by the organisation in an ultimately unsuccessful legal challenge against Santos’s Barossa gas project.
Mr Dutton said the EDO was “a bunch of radical environmentalists who are not approaching the situation objectively”.
“We’re not going to allow activists to hold sway over our industries, our economy, and our elected governments,” he said.
The Albanese government, he said, had given the EDO millions of dollars of funding to wage “lawfare” against big resources projects. “They’re a proxy for the government’s true intent in relation to addressing projects which have already had valid approvals,” he said.
Mr Cook said while the development of resources was important for WA jobs and prosperity, the EDO played an important role in making sure all voices were heard in the environmental protection debate. “To simply move to the idea that you can defund the EDO is a knee-jerk, political retail sort of response to the situation,” he said.
“We know the people of WA and Australia want to protect our environment and see the responsible development of our resources. Making sure all voices are heard in that process is an important part of that.”
Beyond the EDO’s recent involvement in the Barossa challenge, it was also involved in recent court action that tried to derail Woodside Energy’s $16.5bn Scarborough liquefied natural gas project.
Mr Cook has previously promised to maintain state funding to the EDO.
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