While the debate over Labor’s proposed overhaul of the Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act is rightly focused on the likely (negative) impact on climate and the environment, all in the name of removing what is increasingly a political thorn in the government’s side, there’s a wider context.
The government is not merely proposing that there should be no independent approval process under the reformed EPBC — with politicians to exercise approvals rather than independent agencies (imagine politicians being the decision-makers on corporate regulation, or media law, or mergers approvals) — but also that it should have an override power too.