Dr WOODRUFF (Franklin – leader of the Greens) – Honourable Speaker, it will be no surprise to people watching that the Greens do not support this motion, because this is a motion that is trying to rewrite the facts of what has been happening in Macquarie Harbour. I listened very carefully to the Leader of the Opposition’s rewriting of the history of Macquarie Harbour. Let us just say that I have been in this place a lot longer than you and I was here through the times shortly after the senate inquiry into Macquarie Harbour, which found a gross misuse of intensive salmon farming and the impacts it was having nearly a decade ago on Macquarie Harbour.
The things that came to a light from that senate inquiry, and in the short years after that between 2015 and 2018, showed how the industry, the three salmon farms – Tassal, Huon and Petuna – at every step did everything they could and worked with the EPA, with the facilitation of this Liberal government, to find administrative loopholes and workarounds in the legislation so that – regardless of any damage and harm that was occurring, regardless of the scientists who were desperately trying to point out the changes that they were seeing in the harbour in the lower levels – they were able to continue operating.
What we saw was the use back then of Dorvilleid worms that were an indicator species that live at the bottom of Macquarie Harbour. At the bottom of the harbour, they were there and were used by scientists and by the EPA to make sure that there was no impact of salmon pollution on the lower levels. When Dorvilleid worms exist in the salmon excretion, that is an indicator of harm. That is an indicator of an oxygen-dead area. When that was happening, that was an alarm. The Dorvilleid worms were so successful that the companies successfully lobbied to make sure that they were removed as an indicator species, precisely so that the EPA, the regulator, would not be told pesky details about the fact that the bottom of Macquarie Harbour was losing oxygen at a rapid rate.
In the years from 2015, 2018 and 2020, what we saw in the hot summers was millions of dead fish – dead salmon occurring on a gargantuan scale. That was also a sign that there was not enough oxygen in the water at the top levels and we were getting scientists from IMAS telling us increasingly in the regular reports that the oxygen was going down-down-down in the lower waters to it being reported at zero per cent oxygen in the lower levels of Macquarie Harbour over years .
What we had in 2023 was the IMAS report that said this intensive salmon farming is the key issue, the key driver for the loss of oxygen that is continuing to occur in Macquarie Harbour. Unless salmon farming is removed, the Maugean skate will go extinct. We had scientists coming out and saying – putting it into real person terms – there is no time to wait: the salmon pens have to come out before next year. That meant before summer of last year. They were sending a warning on the basis of the science we had. Since then, what has happened? No action, except that the salmon industry, backed by the Liberals and supported by the industry’s champions, the Labor Party, has been going into overdrive, writing a false narrative about what is really going on. It has been trying to discredit the science that was done, trying to throw roadblocks in the way of the genuine solution needed to save a species from extinction.
The problem with the Labor Party’s view of the world is that there should be no checks at all on using the environment, so that industry can go ahead.
Ms Butler – No, that is not true.
Mr Winter – We said the opposite to that.
Dr WOODRUFF – No limits for Labor. That is what the opposition leader just said: there should be no limits at all.
Mr Winter – I said they want regulation.
Dr WOODRUFF – How can you have people and life on the planet without having some limits on how we use the environment that sustains us? We live in a natural system, we do not control it. The patriarchy, Christianity, see the environment as being subservient to whatever they want to happen.
Ms Ogilvie – Hey, hang on, you are going a bit far there with that Christianity comment.
DEPUTY SPEAKER – Ms Ogilvie, please.
Dr WOODRUFF – This is exactly where this comes from. It is this idea that we can use nature for our purposes and it will be there forever, forever providing, there will always be wild fish in the sea and a harbour that can replenish and restore itself. It is not true. We are seeing the environment falling apart around us. The atmosphere is not coping with the amount of carbon dioxide we are putting into it. The fish in the sea around Tasmania trying to live where they have lived for millions of years are not coping with the level of pollution that salmon farming is putting into our inshore waters, into Macquarie Harbour.
As any recreational fisher will say that we are seeing a loss of flathead. We have already seen the loss of scallops in many areas. We are seeing the loss of seahorses and sea stars. We are seeing the loss of all the beauty of our rivers, the Huon River, the Channel. They are still coming for more by expanding into Frederick Henry Bay, Norfolk Bay and another huge expansion into Storm Bay.
The Greens are saying, along with the scientists, that there are limits. The problem with the Liberal and Labor parties’ policies is that they see nature as something to be endlessly exploited and are even prepared to have extinctions on their watch. That is what we are walking into unless we pull salmon farming out of Macquarie Harbour.
Mr Bayley – Go to the State of the Environment report. It says it all.
Dr WOODRUFF – Yes, thank you, Mr Bayley. The State of the Environment report is devastating. It shows deterioration, with 55 per cent of indicators going backwards rapidly. We have a government that, after stalling a State of the Environment report for over 10 years, is now stalling in providing their response. We know the government has had it for a long time.
Ms Ogilvie – Sorry, what are you talking about? We said you would have it by Christmas.
Dr WOODRUFF – They should have accepted the recommendations. When you see the State of the Environment report provided to us in parliament, the only sane thing to do would be to take stock of what we are doing, to stop it, and say that we need to respond to the environment that is the basis of all life and prosperity in Tasmania.
It is obviously the case that there is great work being done by scientists at IMAS and there is exciting work being done on the breeding program of the Maugean skate. However, there is no point having a captive breeding program if there is not a viable system to put our species back into. Otherwise, all we are doing is having an extinction in the wild and creating a zoo. What an awful tourism drawcard for Tasmania. We have made the species go extinct but here is a little zoo where you can come and look at them floating around in tanks. What an awful idea.
Ms Ogilvie – What are you talking about? Nobody has suggested that. It is just silly.
Mr Abetz – People will go to the west coast to see the Maugean skate.
Dr WOODRUFF – Why do the Liberal government and the Labor Party not put up propositional ideas for how to support workers in the north-west? Should that not be what they are doing? Should they not be looking at transitioning that industry, which is not sustainable by any measure?
Mr Winter – It is.
Dr WOODRUFF – It is not, because it is relying on having to use the waters and causing a species to go extinct to continue to operate at the level it is operating at. Why not move an industry out of that harbour, out of the inshore waters? This is what the Liberals promised to do five years ago: move them towards closed‑loop and on‑land systems. Why not move them towards sustainable feed? At the moment, what they are setting up is another plundering of wild fish through the small pelagic fish, including sardines. This is a new industry the Resources minister, Mr Abetz, wants to set up. That would go straight into salmon feed. That is plundering a wild species and putting it into farmed salmon, which through the way salmon‑farming operations are run under the Liberals’ regulations are designed to cause harm to marine systems in our bays. Long Bay used to be a beautiful pristine area. Now, it is full of green slime, it is full of brown snot, as is the Huon River. The Huon River is not recognisable as the place it was even five years ago, let alone 25 years ago.
Mr Winter – Honestly.
Dr WOODRUFF – Mr Winter can moan, but he does not live on any of the bays I live near in the upper reaches of the Huon River. It is unrecognisable because it does not have the species that used to live there. It does not have the diversity and the beauty and the clarity of the water, and the joy of seeing surprising little seahorses and sea stars. It was just the other day that I went swimming and thought, I do not recognise this dead seascape. This used to be a different place and I have only been living there for nearly 20 years. I talk to people who have lived their whole life there and they do not go swimming and they certainly do not go fishing there any more because it is unrecognisable.
We will move an amendment. I move –
That all the words after “the House” be omitted and the following words be inserted instead:
“supports transitioning the salmon industry workforce and removing fish farms from Macquarie Harbour to save the Maugean skate”.
How long does this get?
DEPUTY SPEAKER – Another 30 minutes.
Dr WOODRUFF – How long do we have in this?
DEPUTY SPEAKER – You have until 7.14 p.m.
Dr WOODRUFF – I will certainly be happy to hear other people’s views on this. I think the Greens in the election –
Mr ABETZ – Point of order. This is a complete negation of the motion originally moved. I would ask for your ruling as to whether this is an amendment or a complete negation.
DEPUTY SPEAKER – The practice of the House is that it is an amendment, and so it can be accepted.
Dr WOODRUFF – It is not a complete negation because this refers to the motion, which is about what should happen in Macquarie Harbour and what should happen with the salmon industry. The point is that the salmon industry does need to be sustainable and that means that salmon workers need to transition out of operations in Macquarie Harbour.
Mr Abetz – You want to stop it.
Dr WOODRUFF – The industry there has to be wound up and there needs to be a plan to have salmon farming become closed‑loop and moved onto the land. If the government had a mind to look into the future and what would really protect regional communities, you would be applying yourself to the sort of workforce transition that is needed for those people and those communities. The Greens did that. We had a go. We have been up and spoke to the West Coast Council and we are continuing to talk to people about this. You have to do the work, but it is the job of the government to do this work, to look at what we can do to both protect the Maugean Skate – an incredible ancient species, older than the dinosaurs – and look at other options for employment in the north‑west to support workers and to make sure that they have real and meaningful jobs, because there are plenty of other opportunities if the government puts its mind to it.
The Greens have a policy suggestion, and I would welcome people’s input. We sought the views of the mayors and staff on the west coast, and we will continue to talk to people about how we can have better regional jobs that are sustainable and do not rely on causing a species to go extinct. It would be a terrible thing for the Tasmanian salmon industry, but more importantly for the people of Tasmania, if a species went extinct as a result of an industry that the government so fulsomely supports.
We hope that members will support this amendment. It is the only sensible thing to do and it is fully backed by the science. We do not support Tanya Plibersek sitting on the decision. She should get on with the job that she has, which is to protect the environment and to set limits. The work of the EPBC Act (Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act) is to protect the environment and make sure it is not used to a point where it is broken and where species go extinct. We will continue to advocate, as Peter Whish‑Wilson, Senator for the Greens, does in Canberra, for Tanya Plibersek and Labor to get on with making that decision.
We are dismayed that Labor have kicked that can down the road. For a minister who came in and said she would have no extinctions on her watch, she is getting very close to having one by her inaction. We hope members support our amendment and we look forward to the conversations.
