Mr BAYLEY (Clark) – Thank you, honourable Deputy Speaker, and minister, thanks for your spray. I beg the question, what have you got to hide? You have the report; you articulate that your ministers have 600 pages to work through, but you are willing to give members of this House a weekend to work through it before Budget estimates. It is not particularly charitable when you have the thing on your desk at the moment. It costs you nothing apart from a bit of additional scrutiny to table it now so that we have a fair opportunity to consider those 600 pages as well. I do not know whether your comment about timelines is a comment about ministerial capability to get across that information. They need extra time to get across that. You have had a couple of weeks already, and you are giving members of this House a simple weekend to work through it before budget estimates.
It is good to see you acknowledge scientists. I also acknowledge advocates and activists because yes, Tasmania is stunning; yes, Tasmania is remarkable. However, in many cases, that is only because of the efforts of those who have stood up to the likes of your government and your actions and your policies that have kept it that way. An extended Tasmanian Wilderness World Heritage Area, reductions in the levels of native forest logging, people have fought you every step of the way. Do not worry, they are still fighting. It is ironic that you pick native forest logging as the one battleground to tackle here in this place.
Let me just say up front that the State of the Environment report is bigger than just native forest logging. It goes to pollution and waste issues in the waterways. It goes to climate change. It goes through a whole range of threatening processes. However, your selective science when it comes to native forest logging is telling in itself. The reality is that science shows that native forest logging increases bushfire risk. I do not know what you are talking about when you say we have no solution when it comes to bushfires. That is what the science says, that native forest logging increases bushfire risk. Native forest logging also decreases species’ habitat.
If you do not believe it, have a look at your own recovery plan, that your government’s logo is now on, for the swift parrot. This is one of the most stunning little species that this state has. It has been in terminal decline for many years now and one of the reasons is native forest logging. If you do not want to take it from me, take it from your own recovery plan, which basically says that this species will see habitat loss and alteration due to forestry and land clearing, ‘Loss of potential breeding habitat in Tasmania by clearance for conversion to agriculture’.
Native forest logging and intensive native forest silviculture practices continue to reduce the amount of available swift parrot nesting and foraging habitat and it therefore remains a significant threat to the continued persistence of the species. There you have it. This is why we need a State of the Environment report. On one hand, your policy agenda does one thing and on the other hand, the science and the scientists and some of your own documentation such as this recovery plan says a very different thing. That basically says we need to protect more swift parrot habitat if we are going to save the species in the future.
You trade on our net zero status as a jurisdiction. The only reason we have net zero is because we have got more forests protected over the last 20 years and because we reduced the amount of native forest logging. You say 50 per cent of Tasmania is protected. That is fabulous, but not all of that 50 per cent of Tasmania is protected from logging or protected from mining. In fact, you have a policy to reduce that 50 per cent to below 50 per cent. You want to log 39,000 hectares of some of the most spectacular and verified high conservation value forests and that will bring it below 50 per cent.
Mr Ellis – You did not include it in the deal that you were part of and you know it.
Mr BAYLEY – We do not support this amendment. We think it is entirely reasonable and entirely legitimate for the minister to table the State of the Environment report tomorrow. It is on his desk already. There is no reason why it should not be on ours. There is no reason why we should not have an extra week to study those 600 pages so that we can see exactly what you are doing well and exactly what you are not doing well. We do not support this amendment. We think the motion stands strongly on its own two feet to have you table that report by 5:00 p.m. tomorrow 12 September.
