Jonathon Duniam (Tasmania, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Environment, Fisheries and Forestry) Share this | Hansard source

In relation to the document relating to native timber harvesting in Western Australia, I move:

That the Senate take note of the document.

I will kick off and have a bit of a yarn about that because this issue is incredibly important. I cannot underscore enough for Australians exactly what is happening here in this country. We are dealing ourselves out of a sovereign capability, and that is the ability to supply our own timber needs. We know that demand for timber products that have the structural and appearance characteristics that are derived from native timber can only be sourced from that resource—from native timber forests—but we're finding, across the country, that Labor governments are shutting this industry down, not based on science but based on emotion and not based on fact but based on fiction. Again, a Labor government in Australia, the Western Australian Labor government, has made a decision to shut down this industry.

I quizzed the Minister for Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry, Minister Watt, at estimates about this—about exactly what correspondence he'd had with the Western Australian Labor government. Indeed, I asked him the same about the Victorian Labor government—about what correspondence, meetings and discussions he'd had with them. Very little, it would seem. I will point out for the chamber's benefit that we sought documents relating to both the WA native timber cessation decision and the Victorian decision, but we only got the Western Australian set of documents, not because the government didn't want to comply—they didn't want to comply with either—but because the Australian Greens didn't want to allow us to see those documents. Why would they want to hide such documents? What is there that we shouldn't be seeing?

A pattern is emerging. We've seen it at a state level. We've seen it in Victoria. Most alarmingly, we've seen it in Western Australia, and it's extremely alarming. The Australian government stand idly by, and what do they do? Not enough. The documents that we were provided with in response to the order for the production of documents reveal a government that is all concern but absolutely no action—all words and no response. There is nothing to actually aid this industry. Going through these documents, it becomes clear that the warning signs have been handed to this government, but they've chosen to do nothing.

It was a bit rich for Assistant Minister Chisholm to come in this place and give me a chip for not having stopped the Victorian Labor government from shutting down the native forestry sector. I tried to ring Daniel Andrews the night he made the decision, and I'm still waiting for a return phone call.