Come dance with me! That was Environment Minister Murray Watt’s invitation to the opposition as he prepared to push through his reforms to the Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act.

Yes, get up and dance! That was business’s clear message to the Coalition. But it wouldn’t, or couldn’t agree with the government on mutually acceptable steps. The Greens could, and did. They won concessions on native forest logging and land clearing, and the exclusion of fossil fuel projects from the fast track approval process.

Finally, after more than five years, the EPBC job was done.

Watt always said he was open to dealing with either the Coalition or the Greens. The opposition is making all sorts of excuses, including that the legislation was rushed, but the bottom line is the Liberals failed an important test. It is the more galling because Ley, as environment minister, commissioned the independent review from Graeme Samuel that reported in 2020, on which this legislation is based.

The argument that the detailed legislation should have been held over until next year may appear superficially attractive but is flawed. The issue has dragged on for too long and more delay would only have invited slippage.

The government said the opposition was a shambles in its negotiations, including adding new demands as late as Wednesday. Among the Coalition negotiators Jonno Duniam, manager of opposition business in the Senate, seemed, according to Labor sources, the keenest to get a deal.

A week ago Duniam had certainly been confident there would be a Coalition-government agreement. Duniam was brought into the discussions in the last couple of weeks to........

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