Meeting with the Acting Director General of the Department of Water and Environment Regulation

The Environmental Consultants Association (WA) Inc. Executive was recently invited to meet with Mike Rowe, the new Acting Director General of the Department of Water and Environment Regulation. Mike invited us to provide feedback on what we felt the various combined departments did well and where we felt they could improve.  Our discussion was far reaching, but the key points raised included:

• The standard of guidance and policy reform undertaken by the OEPA is of a high quality, and should be replicated through the other sections of the new department.
• The ECA has had a high level of collaboration with the EPA, and we are seeking to increase our level of engagement with the regulatory arm of the new consolidated department.
• We highlighted the value that we can bring to the consultation process undertaken by environmental departments.
• We suggested that under a single department, there was now opportunity for better integration between Parts IV and V of the EP Act, as well as other environmental regulation.
• We agreed to work through the Memorandum of Understanding between the EPA and ECA to ensure it remains relevant to today’s environmental industry.

We agreed to hold regular meetings to ensure we continue to provide feedback as well as keep up to date with developments within the department.  If you have anything you would like to see raised with the Director General, please let us know via EMAIL.