Malcolm Roberts (Queensland, Pauline Hanson's One Nation Party) Share this | Hansard source

As a servant to the many different people who make up our one Queensland community, I speak in favour of Senator Duniam's motion. The timber industry is an essential industry to maintain Australia's way of life. How can Labor Premier Andrews eliminate native timber production while at the same time Labor Prime Minister Anthony Albanese is promising to build 30,000 new homes which require timber? As a famous robot once said, 'That does not compute.'

Native timber forestry does not harm the environment. Sensible native timber logging has been going on in Australia for 150 years, and the forests are still here, the fauna and flora are still here. Until these Labor and Greens ideologues declared war on sustainable timber harvesting, the jobs in the timber industry were still here, the communities that rely on these jobs were still here. Not any more—Dan Andrews has done them in: no jobs in forestry in Mr Dan Andrews's socialist state of Victoria. The truth is native timber logging disturbs a few per cent of the total forest area every year. Logging reduces the forest fuel loads to protect us from bushfires. We also saw how badly some areas of forest burned in the deliberately lit bushfires a few years ago, Some areas have still not recovered thanks to Greens and teal policies—clearly, not areas that were logged and the fuel loads removed. One Nation stands as a strong supporter of the logging industry and a strong supporter of humanity. Timber is essential.