|
senate vote 2024-09-09#3
Edited by
mackay staff
on
2024-09-15 09:25:49
|
Title
Bills — Illegal Logging Prohibition Amendment (Strengthening Measures to Prevent Illegal Timber Trade) Bill 2024; in Committee- Illegal Logging Prohibition Amendment (Strengthening Measures to Prevent Illegal Timber Trade) Bill 2024 - in Committee - Extend definition of illegal logging
Description
<p class="speaker">Jonathon Duniam</p><p>I indicate to the Senate that the opposition won't be proceeding with any of the amendments it circulated. Off the back of very constructive discussions with stakeholders and the government, we don't need to proceed with those amendments.</p>-
- The majority voted against an [amendment](https://www.openaustralia.org.au/senate/?gid=2024-09-09.46.1) introduced by Tasmanian Senator [Nick McKim](https://theyvoteforyou.org.au/people/senate/tasmania/nick_mckim) (Greens), which means it failed.
- ### Amendment text
- > *(1) Schedule 1, page 4 (after line 29), after item 4, insert:*
- >
- >> *4A Section 7 (definition of illegally logged )*
- >>
- >> *Repeal the definition, substitute:*
- >>
- >> *illegally logged, in relation to timber, means authorised for harvest, harvested, processed, or transported in contravention of laws, including laws related to:*
- >>
- >>> *(a) the protection of plants;*
- >>>
- >>> *(b) the protection of the environment;*
- >>>
- >>> *(c) human rights;*
- >>>
- >>> *(d) bribery;*
- >>>
- >>> *(e) money laundering;*
- >>>
- >>> *(f) tax evasion;*
- >>>
- >>> *(g) fraud; or*
- >>>
- >>> *(h) other financial crimes;*
- >>>
- >>> *in the place (whether or not in Australia) where the timber is to be harvested, or was harvested, transported or processed.*
- >
- > *(2) Schedule 1, page 13 (after line 3), after item 21, insert:*
- >
- >> *21A Subparagraph 14(3)(a)(iii)*
- >>
- >> *Omit "harvested", substitute "authorised for harvest, harvested, processed, or transported".*
- >
- > *(3) Schedule 1, page 20 (after line 13), after item 37, insert:*
- >
- >> *37A Subparagraph 18(3)(a)(iii)*
- >>
- >> *Omit "harvested", substitute "authorised for harvest, harvested, processed, or transported".*
- >
- > *(4) Schedule 1, item 27, page 33 (line 15), omit "harvested", substitute "authorised for harvest, harvested, processed, or transported".*
<p class="speaker">Nick McKim</p><p>Firstly, it always concerns the Australian Greens when we hear about constructive discussions between the opposition and the Labor Party on forestry matters. Let's be very, very clear about what's happened for decades in this country—that is, the Labor, Liberal and National parties have got together and stitched up the ongoing destruction of our native forests. That means the native forest logging industry in Australia has turbocharged the breakdown of the planet's climate. It means the native forest logging industry in Australia is logging species like the swift parrot and the masked owl, in Tasmania, into extinction.</p><p>The swift parrot—that beautiful little bird, the fastest parrot in the world, one of the only migratory parrots in the world—is being logged into extinction by a mendicant industry that only survives because of public handouts it gets. Because of the stitch-up between the establishment parties in this country, that beautiful little bird is being logged into extinction. There are around 500 birds left, down from vast flocks of tens of thousands of those beautiful little birds. It is crashing in number because its feeding habitat and its breeding habitat is being destroyed. That's what the stitch-up between the establishment political parties looks like. It looks like the destruction of biodiversity and the destruction of nature, because that is exactly what is happening.</p><p>While our planet is literally cooking, while our ecosystems are crumbling around us, while species after species is either going extinct or sliding towards extinction, the major parties are colluding to exempt the forest industry from our national environment laws, weak as they are. The major parties are colluding to continue to pump, even just in my home state of Tasmania, tens of millions of dollars a year so that this mendicant industry can continue. The major parties, for base political purposes, are logging habitats of critically endangered species and logging those species into extinction. It is profoundly distressing.</p><p>Of course, what the major parties fail to understand is humans are actually part of the ecosystem as well. We are part of the biodiversity of this planet, and when the ecosystems crumble, in all their complexity and all their magnificence, it affects us. As our climate continues to break down, in all of its complexity and all of its magnificence, it affects us—it affects humans. We are already seeing large—massive—displacements of human beings around the planet because of changed weather and rainfall patterns and the resulting impacts on the availability of food and drinking water. We are already seeing mass biodiversity collapse on this planet as a result of climate change and the ongoing poisoning of nature, yet the Labor and Liberal parties get together and keep stitching it up for their own base political purposes. It's profoundly disturbing that we stand here today, with all of the scientific knowledge that we have and with everything that we know about ecological collapse and climate breakdown, and we fail to take action to stop species like the swift parrot being logged into extinction.</p><p>Just today in Tasmania we had an editorial in the <i>A</i><i>dvocate</i> newspaper from Mr Anthony Haneveer, the editor—someone, I might add, who is straight out of the Liberal political offices in Tasmania, as Senator Duniam well knows. In fact I'm not certain about this, but I expect they worked together at some stage. I wouldn't be surprised at all if they worked together in the office of the Tasmanian Premier at some stage. Mr Haneveer editorialised this morning in the <i>A</i><i>dvocate</i> newspaper in Australia in relation to the Maugean skate. There are fewer than 150 of these amazing creatures left in Macquarie Harbour in Tasmania, and this is what Mr Haneveer had to say about that skate, which is sliding into extinction because of the industrial fish-farming industry in Tasmania:</p><p class="italic">This might sound a little controversial, but I do not really care about that damned fish.</p><p class="italic">Sure, it would be unfortunate if the Maugean skate were to go extinct, but I wouldn't lose any sleep over it.</p><p>That is an incitement to extinction. That is an incitement to the industrial salmon-farming industry in Tasmania to continue to act in a way that the science is telling us is sliding the Maugean skate into extinction. It is so profoundly distressing. Whether it's the Maugean skate and the industrial salmon-farming industry or the beautiful little swift parrot and the industrial native forest logging industry in Tasmania, these two species—so different but so amazing, so beautiful and so intricate, and each the result of millennia of evolutionary forces and ecological processes to arrive where they are today—are being logged and fish farmed into extinction while the establishment parties in this country sit on their hands and do nothing about it.</p><p>Here's something for Mr Haneveer: I do care about that damned fish. The Greens do care about that damned fish. We will lose sleep over the fate of that fish—we are losing sleep over the fate of that fish—unlike Mr Haneveer and the establishment political parties in this place. I've got another thing for Mr Haneveer and the establishment parties: we will fight to defend that fish—that beautiful, ancient fish that's been around since the time of the dinosaurs. We will fight for the swift parrot—that beautiful little parrot, one of the fastest parrots ever to have lived on this planet—that is being logged into extinction. We will fight for those species in this place and we will fight every day to protect them from the establishment parties and their agents, like Mr Haneveer and many, many others in the Tasmanian media ecosystem.</p><p>Minister, I've got some questions in the committee stage for you on the interrelationship between some of the standards covered in the draft rules that have been published. My first question is: does the Responsible Wood sustainable forest management standard—which is the PEFC endorsed Australian standard—meet the PEFC sustainable forest management requirements? This is critical because it goes to whether it is an auditable condition for forests to be legally logged in order for them to be certified.</p> <p class="speaker">Anthony Chisholm</p><p>We're endeavouring to get an answer to that. If you bear with us, we'll do our best.</p> <p class="speaker">Nick McKim</p><p>I appreciate the minister's response. I do have a couple more observations to make and then I will come back to that matter and an ancillary question that I have in regard to it. I understand this is a bill about logging, but it does go to whether or not logging is legal, both overseas and here in Australia, and that, of course, raises threatened species issues. I will just explain why that is.</p><p>In Tasmania, as I've just said, there is this beautiful little bird, the swift parrot. In many forest practices plans, which are part of the framework which purports to govern the native forest logging industry in Tasmania, there is a requirement that, if there is a credible sighting of swift parrots, the logging needs to cease. We've seen repeated scenarios where there have been credible sightings of swift parrots reported to people conducting logging in particular coops and that logging has not ceased.</p><p>Now, in my argument, that means that that logging is illegal. There are court cases afoot around the country in regard to testing whether logging of particular forests is legal or illegal. There have been plenty of court findings, including in Victoria, where we had the shonky practices of VicForests exposed, that made it very clear that there is a lot of illegal logging that goes on in Australia. That illegal logging has consequences for threatened species, and the swift parrot is one of those species.</p><p>The parallel here is that the political stitch-up between the establishment parties in this country is sending the swift parrot sliding into extinction because that stitch-up is enabling the industrial-scale destruction of its habitat by the native forest logging industry. In the same way, the political stitch-up between the establishment parties is tragically sliding the maugean skate into extinction because the major parties, the establishment parties, are united behind the salmon-farming industry in Tasmania.</p><p>I want to say this to Mr Haneveer, the editor of the <i>A</i><i>dvocate</i>: editorialising in the way that you did, which is basically an incitement to extinction, and basically cheering on as the maugean skate, which has been with us since the age of the dinosaurs, slides into extinction because of the actions of the industrial salmon farming industry in Macquarie Harbour—doing those things—mean that you should resign. He no longer should sit as editor of the <i>Advocate</i>. If he won't resign, Australian community media should sack him.</p><p>It is a disgrace to incite extinction at a time of ecological collapse, just as it is a disgrace to incite the logging and burning of our native forests at a time when the planet's climate is breaking down around us. Whether it be Mr Haneveer or any of the senators who represent the establishment parties in this place, it is time to go, because you are not acting in the best interests of the ecology and the climate that actually underpin human life in this country and on this planet.</p><p>So, Minister, the reason I'm asking about the Responsible Wood sustainable forest management standard and whether it meets the PEFC sustainable forest management requirements is that, basically, this legislation aims to prevent illegally logged timber from entering the supply chain in this country. Processors and importers, for that matter, have to exercise due diligence to assess the risk that raw logs actually are from illegal sources. If a raw log is covered by a forest certification standard, then a simplified assessment applies. So the applicable standards named in the draft rules are the FSC forest stewardship principles, the FSC chain of custody certification, the PEFC sustainable forest management requirements, which I'll shorten as the 'benchmark standard', and the PEFC chain of custody standards. PEFC, the Programme for the Endorsement of Forest Certification, is a global network of national standards, represented in Australia by Responsible Wood.</p><p>I'll pause here to give a little bit of history, which is that Responsible Wood was formerly the Australian Forestry Standard. I'm not sure if Senator Duniam was around at the time, but I certainly was when, in the early 2000s in the Tasmanian parliament, the Australian Forestry Standard was developed by the logging industry in Australia because they knew they wouldn't be able to meet Forest Stewardship Council certification standards. So they invented their own certification standard: the Australian forestry standard. It was an industry standard designed so that the industry could certify itself. What could possibly go wrong?</p><p>Anyway, the AFS, the Australian Forestry Standard, is now Responsible Wood. So the PEFC benchmark forest management standard requires organisations to comply with all applicable laws, and the Responsible Wood sustainable forest management standard is the corresponding PEFC endorsed Australian standard. It's therefore supposed to conform with the PEFC requirements and has been accepted as doing so, but—and here's the nub of the matter, Minister—the Responsible Wood sustainable forest management standard doesn't appear to have an auditing requirement for logging to be legal. That is the crux of the matter.</p><p>So the position is that the legislation and the rules taken together require logging to be legal by reference to the PEFC standard. The certificate that would be presented to a processor to verify legality would be a Responsible Wood forest management certificate, which does not, it appears, require logging to be legal. Therefore, my question is: does the Responsible Wood sustainable forest management standard meet the PEFC sustainable forest management requirements, and, in particular, does it require logging to be legal as an auditable condition for forest management to be certified?</p> <p class="speaker">Anthony Chisholm</p><p>Thanks, Senator McKim, for your patience on that. In regard to the first point that was raised that I'm seeking some clarity on, it's my understanding that the Responsible Wood national standard is consistent with the global PEFC standard for sustainable forest management. How matters are dealt with under these standards is obviously a matter for the PEFC and Responsible Wood.</p> <p class="speaker">Nick McKim</p><p>Thanks, Minister, for your response. So you've just informed the Senate that the Responsible Wood sustainable forest management standard is consistent with the PEFC sustainable forest management requirements. Is that correct?</p> <p class="speaker">Anthony Chisholm</p><p>Yes.</p> <p class="speaker">Nick McKim</p><p>That's correct. Thank you. So I understand that it's consistent. Does it meet all of the requirements under PEFC sustainable forest management?</p> <p class="speaker">Anthony Chisholm</p><p>Yes, that's my understanding.</p> <p class="speaker">Nick McKim</p><p>Therefore, Minister, does the Responsible Wood sustainable forest management standard require logging to be legal as an auditable condition in order that forest management can be certified?</p> <p class="speaker">Anthony Chisholm</p><p>It's a level of detail that I don't have with me at the moment. Again, we'll try and seek some clarity for you on that, Senator McKim.</p> <p class="speaker">Nick McKim</p><p>Perhaps you could indicate that you'll try and come back to us, either to the chamber or to me directly, once you have any further information that you're able to provide?</p> <p class="speaker">Anthony Chisholm</p><p>Happy to.</p> <p class='motion-notice motion-notice-truncated'>Long debate text truncated.</p>-
-
|