As at August 2014, 1334 Marine Park permits containing 2408 individual

ANAO Report No.3 2015–16 Regulation of Great Barrier Reef Marine Park Permits and Approvals 37 prosecution and the suspensionrevocation of permits. In the period from July 2012 to June 2014, there were 76 reported breaches of GBRMP permit conditions, which resulted in 59 investigations—with the issuing of advisory letters in 35 cases being the most common enforcement response. Recent reviews and major reports

1.18 In August 2014, GBRMPA finalised and released its Great Barrier Reef

Outlook Report 2014 and a Strategic Assessment of the Great Barrier Reef Region with the Queensland Government undertaking a parallel and complementary Strategic Assessment of the Great Barrier Reef Coastal Zone . The Outlook Report, produced every five years, confirmed that the Great Barrier Reef ‘is an icon under pressure’ with the major threats being ‘climate change, poor water quality from land-based run-off, impacts from coastal development and some remaining impacts of fishing’. The Outlook Report concluded that ‘even with the recent management initiatives to reduce threats and improve resilience, the overall outlook for the Great Barrier Reef is poor, has worsened since 2009 and is expected to further deteriorate in the future’. 40

1.19 The findings of the strategic assessment have informed a separate

Program Report for the Great Barrier Reef Region that detailed, among other things, GBRMPA’s future commitments to protect and manage matters of national environmental significance under the EPBC Act, including the outstanding universal value of the Great Barrier Reef World Heritage Area. The Program Report assessed GBRMPA’s permit system and made a number of specific commitments to progressively strengthen and, from time-to-time, amend its policies, guidance material and support tools for assessing and determining permits.

1.20 In March 2015, the Australian and Queensland governments issued the

Reef 2050 Long-Term Sustainability Plan that provides an overarching strategy for the management of the Great Barrier Reef World Heritage Area. The Plan sets out broad outcomes for the World Heritage Area through to 2050 and specific actions to deliver targets for the five years to 2020. 40 GBRMPA, Outlook Report 2014, August 2014, pp. v-vi.