Federal budget: Half-a-billion dollars for the Great Barrier Reef

The Turnbull government will deliver the largest single environmental protection package in Australian history by committing half a billion dollars to protect the Great Barrier Reef from climate change and pollution.

The Great Barrier Reef, the largest living structure on the planet.

The investment, to be detailed in the May budget, will aim to shore up support in key Queensland seats ahead of an election in the next year, as the Coalition tries to balance environmental concerns with its pro-mining jobs focus through the Adani coal mine.

Read the story by Eryk Bagshaw from The Age - “Federal budget: Half-a-billion dollars for the Great Barrier Reef.”

(Don’t fall for this, it is political and rhetorical trickery. If the Federal Government was serious about saving the Great Barrier Reef it would tell Mr Adani to take his money, return to India and leave the coal he was so anxious to exploit in the ground. Climate change is the main player in the destruction of the reef and if Mr Frydenberg and his coalition counterparts were serious in their intentions to save the reef they would make climate change mitigation its first priority and that means an immediate shift from the use of any fossil fuels - Robert McLean)