Rosalie Woodruff MP | Greens Environment spokesperson
The Minister for Primary Industries, Guy Barnett, must come clean on reports of mass salmon escapes in degraded Macquarie Harbour. Tasmanians need to know how many salmon have escaped and why.
The mass escape of farmed salmon from Storm Bay in 2018 included allegations some escaped salmon were infected with pilchard orthomyxovirus (POMV).
Minster Barnett must also confirm these harvest-size fish don’t pose a similar biosecurity threat to Macquarie Harbour.
There needs to be an investigation into the environmental and biosecurity risks associated with this mass escape, including the impact of tens of thousands of feeding salmon on the harbour’s native plants and animals.
Macquarie Harbour is already seriously degraded as a result of over-farming salmon. Private companies who operate in public waterways must be able to assure the community their activities will not threaten existing native wildlife and industries.