Bob Brown (Tasmania, Australian Greens) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I ask the Minister for Fisheries, Forestry and Conservation, who in his last answer called for practical, well thought out solutions to reduce carbon dioxide emissions, how on earth this government could be contemplating one of the most greenhouse dirty projects this century in Australia or elsewhere—that is, Gunns’ polluting pulp mill. Is it true that this pulp mill will consume some 200,000 hectares of Tasmanian native forests and belch out 110 million tonnes of greenhouse gases in its 25-year lifetime? Does the minister believe in the principle of ‘polluter pays’ or will this be free pollution of the nation’s atmosphere by Gunns?

Eric Abetz (Tasmania, Liberal Party, Minister for Fisheries, Forestry and Conservation) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

If you want to eat meat, you have to accept that there are going to be abattoirs. If you want to use paper for your mammoth number of press releases, you have to accept that there will be paper machines and pulp factories around the world to create that paper for you. So it is singularly disingenuous of the honourable senator to suggest that somehow this would be a dirty, polluting, nasty pulp mill. If we do not build this pulp mill but the insatiable desire of the Australian Greens for their press releases continues, where will they get the paper from? They will get the paper from dirtier mills in Japan. Yet their slogan is: ‘think globally, act locally’. No, they are saying, ‘Think locally and put all the pollution and other things somewhere else in somebody else’s backyard.’ They think that is somehow meeting their responsibility to the world environment. That is fraudulent; it is disingenuous to suggest to the Australian people that a cleaner pulp mill in Australia would not be better for the world environment than the dirtier mills everywhere else in the world.

Bob Brown (Tasmania, Australian Greens) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Mr President, I rise on a point of order. The question was not about the minister’s press release output; it was about whether Gunns’ polluting pulp mill will put 100—

Paul Calvert (President) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

What is your point of order, Senator Brown.

Bob Brown (Tasmania, Australian Greens) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The point of order is that the question is: will the pulp mill put 110 million tonnes of greenhouse gases into the atmosphere? Could the minister answer the question?

Paul Calvert (President) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

There is no point of order.

Eric Abetz (Tasmania, Liberal Party, Minister for Fisheries, Forestry and Conservation) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Also for the benefit of the honourable gentleman, he will know that the power source for this proposed pulp mill will be renewable because, when you burn wood, you can grow a tree in its place. That is why most sensible commentators fully and utterly accept that wood is a renewable resource. Indeed, that is why countries such as France are now encouraging homeowners to switch to wood-fire power and heat generation in their own homes—because they acknowledge and accept that it is better for the environment.

I also understand from a good friend and colleague of mine that the Australian Greens Senate candidate has recently accepted a donation from the CFMEU, which is all very interesting in this context. If the actual concern is the power source, could I ask the honourable senator: what is the power source for all the other pulp manufacturers in Japan? It is coal, it is nuclear—energy sources that you oppose—but you still want to use paper. So the very simple question for the Australian Greens to answer is: if you want paper, how are you going to manufacture it? You want paper without trees.

Bob Brown (Tasmania, Australian Greens) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The question was whether this pulp mill—

Paul Calvert (President) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Senator Brown, is this a supplementary question or a point of order?

Bob Brown (Tasmania, Australian Greens) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

No, it is a point of order. I draw your attention to the question about 110 million tonnes of greenhouse gases being emitted from the pulp mill over 25 years. Will the minister be directed to answer that question?

Paul Calvert (President) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Senator Brown, I will not direct the minister how to answer the question.

Eric Abetz (Tasmania, Liberal Party, Minister for Fisheries, Forestry and Conservation) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The Australian Greenhouse Office itself—

Bob Brown (Tasmania, Australian Greens) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Senator Bob Brown interjecting—

Eric Abetz (Tasmania, Liberal Party, Minister for Fisheries, Forestry and Conservation) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Make my day, Senator Brown, and ask me a supplementary as well. The Australian Greenhouse Office itself has told the Australian people that the forestry sector in this country is the only greenhouse-positive sector of our economy. And yet that is the sector of our economy that the Australian Greens, in their manic opposition to anything to do with forestry, oppose. It is disingenuous, and, what is more, their policies actually harm the environment, which they profess to champion.

Bob Brown (Tasmania, Australian Greens) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Mr President, I ask a supplementary question. After the minister agreeing with my figure by default, my question is this: is the Gunns’ polluting pulp mill going to be fired by a wood furnace burning 500,000 tonnes of native wood resource each year, polluting the atmosphere with greenhouse gases from an irreplaceable and unsustainable resource, and will that be sold under this government’s greenwash to the Melbourne market as green power through Basslink? If so, does the minister not agree that that is an absolute sham and con on consumers wanting this government to do better on the environment than polluting the atmosphere with greenhouse gases?

Eric Abetz (Tasmania, Liberal Party, Minister for Fisheries, Forestry and Conservation) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

What a ramble of a supplementary question, but the answers would be, in order: no, no, false, even more false and wrong. What I say to the honourable senator is simply this: you know that the throughput of the pulp mill is not the only material being burnt. It will be the waste material not used in making the paper that you use each and every day. It is a waste product that will help fire and make renewable energy. That is the great thing about this—subject to other environmental factors, this pulp mill has every possibility of being a win-win for the economy, for jobs in Tasmania and, most importantly, for the environment and renewable energy. It is about time Senator Brown got his thinking into the 21st century. (Time expired)