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

I move:

That the Senate—

(a)

notes the financial plight of Tasmanian logging contractors, who have endured frequent cuts to timber quotas and shutdowns of mills and chippers; and

(b)

calls on the Australian Government to help the Tasmanian Government:

(i)

fund a financial exit package of a minimum of $20 million that allows those contactors facing financial ruin to leave the industry with dignity,

(ii)

assess fair compensation for those contractors leaving the industry,

(iii)

recover from Gunns Limited and Forestry Tasmania the total cost of the compensation package by the imposition of a levy on all future woodchip sales, and

(iv)

conserve an areas equivalent to the total contracted volumes of wood from those contactors who exit the industry.

Richard Colbeck (Tasmania, Liberal Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Mr President, I seek leave to make a short statement.

Alan Ferguson (SA, Deputy-President) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Leave is granted for two minutes.

Richard Colbeck (Tasmania, Liberal Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The coalition cannot support this motion and I will put on the record the reasons for that. Senator Brown belatedly comes to the aid of forest contractors in Tasmania but is effectively a wolf in sheep’s clothing when it comes to this particular motion. This motion is in itself a trojan horse. What it actually seeks to do, what its real aim is, is to reduce the resource available to forest contractors in Tasmania by removing additional resource from the capacity of harvest, which in turn will mean a greater loss of jobs and a greater difficulty for forest contractors in Tasmania. The opposition cannot support such a motion that pretends to be supporting forest contractors. It makes that pretence upfront but is really continuing the objective that Senator Brown has had all along, which is to close down the forest industries in Tasmania. The opposition will not support that and will not support the reduction in availability of resource to forest contractors in the state.

Joe Ludwig (Queensland, Australian Labor Party, Manager of Government Business in the Senate) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Mr President, I seek leave to make a short statement.

Alan Ferguson (SA, Deputy-President) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Leave is granted for two minutes.

Joe Ludwig (Queensland, Australian Labor Party, Manager of Government Business in the Senate) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

We empathise with the contractors. We know they are doing it tough. Some have gone to the wall. The GFC has clearly had a significant impact. Minister Burke is well aware of these challenges and has met many times with the Tasmanian Forest Contractors Association, TFCA, and with individual contractors. I am informed that Minister Burke has also discussed this issue with Tasmanian MPs and industry. Under the Tasmanian Community Forest Agreement, a number of programs have assisted contractors as well. The TFCA had one project funded under the Tasmanian Community Forest Agreement. This project paid $14,300 to assist in purchasing a harvesting simulator. DAFF committed around $24 million from the Tasmanian Community Forest Agreement industry development program to individual contractors for investment in equipment upgrades.

Many are doing it tough and that is why DAFF has arranged with FaHCSIA for Anglicare Tasmania, which operates the Commonwealth financial counselling program in Tasmania, to discuss with members of the TFCA the financial and decision-making support that is available for forestry contractors. This government do not think it is an issue that we should play politics with. It has had a financial toll as well as an emotional toll on many people.

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

Mr President, I seek leave to make a short statement.

Alan Ferguson (SA, Deputy-President) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Leave is granted for two minutes.

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

Firstly, to Senator Colbeck: I was moving motions like this in the Tasmanian parliament to protect and give a fair go to contractors long before he ever thought of entering politics, particularly during the resource security episode where his party and the Labor Party in Tasmania gave security of access to the Tasmanian forests—to Gunns effectively; that is where it ended up. But they refused to give an equivalent security to people working for Gunns on contracts, which means they are dismissible at any time and can go to the wall. I am very grateful to the member for Bass in the Tasmanian House of Assembly, Kim Booth, the Greens member, for the supporting letters which have come from the contractors themselves asking for this sort of assistance. Gunns is a multibillion dollar company. Forestry Tasmania has a multibillion dollar resource. The Labor and Liberal parties always use the cry for jobs but refuse this sort of effort to protect those jobs when people are in hard times.

Is it not reasonable that Gunns and Forestry Tasmania should be asked to put a 1c or 2c levy on the royalties they pay to ensure that these Tasmanian citizens who have invested so much in their interest are not simply thrown to the wolves, to use Senator Colbeck’s terminology? When it comes to the crunch, Labor and Liberal in this place as well as in the Tasmanian parliament have seriously abandoned these workers. The Greens have no trouble at all in saying: ‘Fair go. Give these contractors a fair go.’ This is a dinkum motion to give the contractors a fair go. It is up to Labor and Liberal to support this motion instead of dumping these workers. Real action is being proposed by the Greens.

Question put:

That the motion (Senator Bob Brown’s) be agreed to.