The Liberals twin announcements on forestry and bushfire risk couldn’t have been more ill-fitting if they tried.
The single biggest factor driving increased bushfire risk in Tasmania is climate change, which didn’t rate a mention in the Liberals’ policy announcements today.
Not only do the Liberals not have a real plan to deal with climate change, they’re intent on making it worse through the logging and burning of native forests.
Labor are supporting them every step of the way.
Every year the logging burns conducted in clearfelled native forests release millions of tonnes of carbon emissions, and contribute to accelerating climate change. Burning native forests is the Tasmanian equivalent of burning coal. It’s a climate crime.
Any government serious about protecting Tasmania from bushfire risk would be doing everything they could to take real climate action. The Greens have a plan to do just that. The Liberal and Labor parties do not.
Rather than escalating the destruction of our native forests for political and ideological purposes, the Liberals should be using the skills and expertise of forestry workers to help build more bushfire resilient communities, to restore forests and retain water in the landscape, and to deliver climate solutions.
The Greens have always supported evidence-based policies to tackle bushfire risk. The question for the Liberals is, why aren’t they listening to the evidence of climate emergency, and developing a plan to take action that also ends the logging and burning of native forests?
