Cassy O'Connor MP | Greens Leader and Forests spokesperson
The Hodgman Liberals today declared war on 400 000 hectares of Tasmania's globally significant, carbon rich forests which were set aside under the Tasmanian Forest Agreement to be formally reserved, then placed in a moratorium until 2020 by the Liberals.
These forests in places such as Bruny Island, Wielangta, the Blue Tier and the Tarkine should be formally protected in reserves due to their ecological, social and economic value to the State.
Instead, the Liberals want to plunder these natural treasures and restart the forestry wars in Tasmania.
The Liberals want to take Tasmania back to the dark ages.
Minister Barnett recently took offence to being described as a climate criminal in the Parliament, but today he proved that is exactly what he and his Liberal colleagues are. Deforestation and land clearing are leading contributors to runaway global warming.
The Greens will fight the Liberals' destructive, regressive native forest logging agenda every step of the way.
We believe we have the strong support of a significant percentage of Tasmanians to protect this island's extraordinary high conservation value forests from the Liberals' attempt to plunder them at public expense.