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Executive summary

The approval of Referral 2019/8563 was issued to Victoria’s Department of Transport (DoT) on 25 June 2021 to upgrade the railway corridor of the Gippsland Line between Pakenham and Longwarry, Victoria (i.e. the Project).

In accordance with Condition 11 of the Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act 1999 (EPBC Act) approval (EPBC 2019/8563), within 60 days of every 12-month anniversary of the commencement of construction (15 November 2021), DoT must publish a report on the Vic Big Build website addressing compliance with each of the conditions of this approval, including implementation of the conditions under the EPBC Act set out in Annexure A of the Approval Decision notice.

This compliance report addresses the current status of the Project against the conditions for approval of the EPBC Act Referral 2019/8563 for the activities carried out between 15 November 2021 and 15 November 2022. This is the first report prepared under the EPBC Act approval 2019/8563 for this project.

Works conducted during the reporting period are compliant with applicable conditions of EPBC approval 2019/8563.

Purpose of report

The purpose of this document is to demonstrate compliance with the conditions of the EPBC approval for the Project (EPBC 2019/8563) and to satisfy Condition 11 of that approval, which states:

The approval holder must prepare a compliance report addressing each condition of this approval for each 12 month period following the date of commencement of the action, or otherwise in accordance with an annual date that has been agreed to in writing by the Minister. The approval holder must publish each compliance report on the website within 60 business days following the relevant 12 month period, notify the department by email that a compliance report has been published on the website and provide the weblink for the compliance report within 5 business days of the date of publication, keep all compliance reports publicly available on the website until this approval expires, exclude or redact sensitive ecological data from compliance reports published on the  website, where any sensitive ecological data has been excluded from the version published, submit the full compliance report to the department within 5 business days of publication.

This compliance report covers the reporting period between 15 November 2021 and 15 November 2022 in respect of EPBC Approval 2019/8563: Gippsland Line Upgrade, Corridor Works – Pakenham to Longwarry East, Victoria issued to the Department of Transport on 25 June 2021.