Skip Ribbon Commands
Skip to main content

Tabled Paper Details

Petition of more than 20000 signatures—Ms Tamara Smith—from certain citizens requesting the Legislative Assembly direct the Government to purchase critical koala habitat in Port Macquarie

Petition To the Speaker and Members of the Legislative Assembly, The coastal region of Port Macquarie Hastings LGA has one of the largest remnant populations of koalas in NSW. This was mapped as a koala hotspot for the NSW Koala Strategy 2018 by the Office of Environment and Heritage. In the Port Macquarie LGA, most koala habitat lies within private land, outside protected areas such as National Parks. The koala population suffered huge casualties with the 2019 bushfires. The remaining unburnt core habitat around Lake Innes has become critical to sustain those individuals that survived the fires. An assessment by DPIE’s Biodiversity and Conservation Division concluded that post-fire, the urban population of koalas is now critical to Port Macquarie-Hastings Council LGA overall population if it has any hope of recovery. However, their habitat is shrinking rapidly because of ongoing land clearing for greenfield urban development. 147 Ruins Way, at 200ha, is the largest piece of privately-owned unburnt core koala habitat east of the Pacific Highway and is currently on the market for residential development. The property also provides habitat for numerous other threatened species including the critically endangered Swift Parrot and Regent Honeyeater, plus threatened forest owls, Square-tailed Kite, Little Lorikeet, Varied Sitella, Glossy-Black Cockatoo and Grey-headed Flying Fox. We request that the NSW government purchase this land (e.g. with the $193 million set aside for koala population recovery) and protect it in perpetuity via a Nature Reserve or other secure, non-reversible tenure.”
Petition Response Response by the Hon. James Griffin—received 24 December 2021—to petition lodged 24 November 2021—Requesting the Legislative Assembly direct the Government to purchase critical koala habitat in Port Macquarie—(Ms Tamara Smith)
Tracking of Petitions with 500 or more Signatures
Petition Category20,000+
Number Of Signatories24,970
Presented BySmith, Tamara
Minister Responsible Minister for Energy and Environment
Debate DateThursday, 17 February 2022
Petition StatusResponse Received
Response DueWednesday, 29 December 2021
Response Received Friday, 24 December 2021
Registration Number/Qualifier3178
What each field means...

Following is a brief explanation of each of the fields that could appear for any particular paper on the register. It should be noted that not all of the following fields will appear on every entry.

  • Document Type - documents tabled in the Legislative Assembly have been loosely categorised as follows:
    Annual Report: Reports of Government Departments or Statutory Bodies which are produced detailing their operations on an annual basis;
    Bill; Committee Report: A report from a NSW Parliamentary Committee;
    Statutory Report: Reports apart from annual reports where legislation requires the report to be produced or tabled, for example statutory reviews of Acts, reports of royal commissions and organisations such as the Auditor General;
    Message: from the Governor or the Legislative Council;
    Statutory Instrument: including regulations and by-laws; and Petitions.
    Other Paper includes miscellaneous papers which do not fall into any of the other categories, for example transcripts or minutes of evidence from parliamentary committees, government responses to committee reports or petitions.
  • Tabled/reported - the date on which the paper was tabled in the Legislative Assembly. If the paper was received by the Speaker or Clerk when the House was not sitting, it indicates the date of receipt, at which point the report is "deemed" tabled.
  • Tabled by/Received from – the Member who tabled the paper, or the Speaker or Clerk where the paper was received when the House was not sitting. Where a Member's name appears followed by another Member's name in brackets, the first Member has tabled the paper on behalf of the Member whose name is in brackets.
  • Under the Act - the name of the Act of Parliament which requires the paper to be produced and/or tabled in Parliament.
  • Agency - the name of the organisation (e.g. Department of Local Government) the paper is produced by.
  • URL - If the paper is located on the Internet, the URL which is a hyperlink to the paper on the host organisation's website. Please note that although, at the time it is listed the link is valid, the Legislative Assembly is unable to guarantee that the link will remain active.
  • Notes - This records any additional information relevant to the paper.

Fields relevant to petitions only:

  • Presented by – the Member who lodges a petition to be tabled by the Clerk, or in the case of 10,000 or more signatures, the Speaker.
  • Minister Responsible - the Minister who holds portfolio responsibility for the petition of 500 or more signatures.
  • Petition Status - the tracking status of the response due for petitions of more than 500 signatures – either 'awaiting response' or 'response received'.
  • Response Due - the date that a Government response is expected to be tabled in response to the 500 or more signature petition.

Fields relevant to Committee reports only:

  • Committee – the name of the parliamentary committee the paper is produced by.