Ian Macdonald (Queensland, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

Thank you, Senator Ronaldson; Mr Latham. He was going with the environmentalists because he thought it meant votes in Sydney and Melbourne, and it did not matter that it was not very good policy.

The forestry industry in Tasmania is world class. It is better than any other forestry industry around the world. Yet the Greens have been on this campaign for 20 years, trying to shut down that industry, so we can import into Australia logs that are taken from forests in the Solomons and Indonesia which used to be raped by people who had no idea of how to run a sustainable forestry industry. It seemed to me that then Senator Bob Brown was all in favour of the rape of the forests of the Solomon Islands, Indonesia and Malaysia, and importing that all into Australia when Australia's most sustainable industry in the forestry industry was being shut down by the Greens political party.

What encouraged me to leave the work I was doing in my office and come down and participate in this debate was the fact that Mr Will Hodgman has just won an unprecedented victory in the Tasmanian election. His proposals for the forestry industry were not hidden. Everybody knew what they were. Did they vote for Mr Hodgman or did they vote for the Greens political party?

It is a rhetorical question. We all know that the Greens were annihilated and, if it had not been for the strange system in Tasmania, they would have been off the map. Ten years ago I predicted that the Greens had reached their peak and that they were on the downward slide. I think the result in the Tasmanian election—the heartland and place where the Greens political party was formed—has demonstrated that, as a political force, the Greens are finished. People have woken up to them. And that is a fact. People now understand that they cannot believe anything that the Greens political party tell them. They have only got to see what happened to all the sustainable logging just south-east of the city of Canberra. It was the most controlled industry of any in Australia.

I well remember, back in 1990, then Senator Richardson, with the urgings of the Greens, shutting down the forestry industry on the Atherton Tablelands, in northern Queensland. I well remember him going there and saying, 'This forest is so sustainable, we've got to protect it.' But, as the locals pointed out, it had been logged for 100 years. Yet former Senator Richardson and the Greens thought it was a pristine forest. Similarly, my colleague Senator Colbeck has over the last few weeks been pointing out photos of parts of the Tasmanian forest which are described as pristine but which have also been logged for 100 years. It is that sort of misrepresentation, those sorts of lies, which come from the environmental movement that the people of Tasmania eventually woke up to. The people of Queensland have woken up to them before.

There are all of these arguments that the Great Barrier Reef is going to be destroyed by spoil from the Abbot Point harbour project being dumped out on the reef. Of course, the spoil is being dumped tens of kilometres from the Barrier Reef—nowhere near it. If you looked at anything the Greens political party said, you would think the spoil was being dumped straight on the reef. This is just another example. Anywhere you see an environmental protest sponsored by radical groups, the Greens and GetUp, you will know there will be a fallacy in relation to it.

But do we hear anything about the Greenpeace ship that was in the Cairns harbour, with former senator Bob Brown on board? I think he is now the patron of Greenpeace or Sea Shepherd. Its ship is leaking oil into the Cairns harbour. Now, that will cause environmental damage. Do we hear the Greens moving motions about Bob Brown's ship in the Cairns harbour leaking oil into the Great Barrier Reef area? No. We do not talk about it. We only talk about it when we can attack the Liberal government here or in Tasmania. On the occasions that ALP governments have had the courage and intestinal fortitude to stand up to the Greens, the Greens attack them. But, when their ship in the Cairns port leaks oil into the Great Barrier Reef, there is not a murmur from the Greens political party. Can you imagine what would have been said if an Australian Navy vessel had done that? We would have had motions before this chamber and we would have had protests in the streets. But because Bob Brown is on board the Sea Shepherd ship, when it leaks oil into the Great Barrier Reef—not a word.

I conclude my remarks by saying that Will Hodgman was upfront and open about what he proposed. I cannot even tell you exactly what it was—I did not follow it that closely—but he was upfront. Yet on election night we have the Greens leader threatening Will Hodgman for honouring the promise he made and which the Tasmanian voters so strongly supported.

Question agreed to.