I got a text from a biodiversity advocate around midday on Thursday asking me: are you glad, or sad?

I wasn’t sure how to reply.

The Australian parliament is amending the country’s environment laws. Thanks to negotiating by the Greens, the amended laws will not enable the fast-tracking of coal and gas mining, which the government had proposed. Decisions about coal and gas mines that harm water resources will be retained by the commonwealth and not given over wholly to state governments as the government had proposed. That is an enormous relief.

And yet, I am filled with foreboding.

The bill introduced into parliament only a few weeks ago proposed to take the country backwards in environmental protection. It sought to strip communities of participation in environmental decisions, hand decision-making about environmental harm to the states and territories and give the environment........

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