Great turn out and inspiring people at the March in March in Denmark today. Forests are certainly right up there in peoples minds on the south coast. Big thanks goes to Sarah Martin and the other organisers and Denmark Friends of the Forests and all the forest volunteers. Heres what WAFA convener Jess Beckerling had to say: I’d like to acknowledge that we’re meeting on Nyungah country and pay my respects to elders past and present. Nyungah people have been looking after and honouring this country for more than 40 000 years and are the oldest, continuing civilisation on Earth. I reckon Tony Abbott and Colin Barnett could learn a thing or two from them about care and respect of country and community, and about considering the long term, if they’d learn first to listen. The other day Tony Abbott addressed a loggers’ convention. He said that we have too many National Parks, that the environment is meant for every man to husband (whatever that means) and he described today’s industrial scale logging and clearfelling operations as being conducted by the ‘ultimate conservationists’. Fancy thinking that people who are clearfelling and then burning ancient ecosystems at taxpayers’ expense, and threatening several whole species with extinction, are the ‘ultimate conservationists’! I realised listening to his speech that we are in far worse hands than I had known. His speech was actually pretty vacuous, and light on policy, but what it meant was that he has no idea what the conservation of ancient ecosystems we can never replace, even means. Abbott doesn’t care about our forests or cockatoos, or numbats or the fungus or the water quality, or any of these things. He doesn’t care about the Great Barrier Reef, or good healthy food that we can trust, about a safe climate or humane and compassionate treatment of refugees, or equal rights to marry. Because Gina and Twiggy and Rupert don’t care about these things. He, like Barnett, has a very clear agenda and that is to remove obstacles for industry so that the wealthy few can become wealthier, even in the end if it comes at their own, and their children’s expense. Their capacity to destroy what should be timeless while they are in power is frightening. And can only be diluted, and stopped, by our actions. So, until these dangerous fools are out of Parliament, it is down to us to protect the places that we love and the social justices that we expect. There is a powerful and exciting resurgence of peaceful, fun and effective direct action growing around the country. In Challar forest, north of Walpole, people have kept the loggers out since January with a beautiful treehouse about 40m up in the canopy of a karri tree and a great, comfortable camp that has been occupied 24/7 for the past 7 weeks. Challar is one of these places that we have to protect. It is an ancient karri and jarrah forest ecosystem with the Deep River running through it. Half of it is in National Park, and the other half was left out when the Walpole Wilderness Area was formed. This half remained State Forest and therefore available for logging. Challar forms a link between the two parts of the Walpole Wilderness Area and is a Priority One catchment for the Deep River – the cleanest river left in WA. If it is logged as planned there is a high risk of salinity to the Deep, and a high risk that the area will be infected with dieback. The impacts on all the flora and wildlife there will be immediate and profound. This whole southern forests area is worthy of World Heritage status and the Deep River, the integrity of the national parks down here, and the survival of the threatened species who inhabit them, is critical to that coming about. We won’t ask Tony what he thinks of that idea though. Tony Abbott is wrong when he says that we have too much forest in National Parks. He is crazy when he says that protecting forests locks people out of them, the very opposite is true. When forests are clearfelled and all the animals move out or die and the area is replanted with only one kind of tree, all in rows, and clearfelled again in 80 or 100 years, that’s locking people out. It’s turning forests into tree farms. And tree farms can never have the same ecological value, or appeal to people, as ancient, complex, mysterious and beautiful forest ecosystems do. It won’t help for us to leave here today with our heads full of bad news stories that we feel we can’t do anything about. We have to find ways to turn our despair about this appalling Government into action. For the sake of our sacred and beautiful places, and our social justices, and our children’s futures we all need to find ways that we can participate in ensuring that these things are protected while the Federal and State Governments have such small minded, short term and destructive policies. I’d encourage you all to come to Challar and spend a night or several under the canopy. You will find that direct action to protect forests and justice for the natural environment and wildlife is empowering and invigorating and that it gives you a sense of hope for what can be achieved when people come together around a common goal that offers them no personal gain other than the satisfaction of having been a part of doing something so profoundly important. I can let you know that the Senatron, the actually truly honorable Scott Ludlum will be in Challar on Saturday the 29th of March to show his support for native forest protection. You’re invited to join us there to welcome our Abbott proof fence to Challar. It is critical that Scott keeps his seat and if you don’t usually vote Green, keep this in mind – WA is in a rare position right now. It’s akin to being in a poker game in which we’ve seen the other hands. We know that Abbott will retain his majority, and now we can choose to also have a voice for the environment and social justice in the Senate, representing the long term interests of this country. Scott is a world class member of Parliament and we need him in there, perhaps more than we’ve ever needed him before. The WA Forest Alliance is running a great social media campaign at the moment, uploading photos of people saying I stand up for WA Forests to the Premier and onto facebook. If you stand up for the karri and jarrah forests, and disagree with Abbott that clearfelling them is the ultimate act of conservation, come and put your name to it and help us to build this back up to the place it needs to be for all of us to be able to celebrate the day when the south-west’s karri and jarrah forests, and all the wildlife who rely on them, have finally been protected. Come over to our stall and get involved. We’re a few pages in to the next major chapter in the protection of our forests, and the more of us who’re involved, the sooner it will happen. Thank you.
Posted on: Sun, 16 Mar 2014 08:10:10 +0000
Trending Topics
Recently Viewed Topics
© 2015