2018-03-20
A petition signed by more than 15,000 people asking the McGowan government to honour its pre-election promise to protect high conservation value (HCV) forests should be a wake-up call to the government that the community is determined to hold them to account, Greens Forests spokesperson Diane Evers MLC said.
On the eve of a rally at the WA Parliament to mark the petition being handed to Environment Minister Stephen Dawson, Ms Evers said: “I urge the McGowan Government to listen to the community and enact the promises it made in the run up to last year’s election to immediately protect more than 100 forests across the South-West of the State classed High Conservation Value.”
“The ALP came to power on that promise to provide protection for some of WA's most threatened wildlife including the forest Black Cockatoos, Western Ringtail Possums, Numbats and Quokkas – by protecting HCV forests.”
“A year on from their election, and this has not yet happened; meanwhile communities are having to fight to save their local amenity and wildlife. It’s time to come good on that promise and deliver the protection the community is calling out for.”
The petition is one of the biggest to be tabled in the WA parliament this century, with 5,000 more signatories than the petition calling for a referendum on Daylight Saving in 2007.
“To have more than 15,000 people sign this petition is a clear indication of the strong feelings the community has about the government honouring their promise to safeguard our high conservation value forests rather than turn them into low-value wood products,” Ms Evers said.
Ms Evers will address the Forest for Life rally, as will Environment Minister Mr Dawson.
“South-West communities see their futures to be in tourism, including forest-based nature tourism and agriculture. Logging native forests is a regressive and financially irresponsible course for the government to pursue,” Ms Evers said.
Fact File
- High Conservation Value forests are those deemed to contain or provide habitat for threatened plants and animals, and they may also provide protection of important water ways; wildlife corridors or Indigenous or European heritage values.
- The former Gallop Labor Government extensively reviewed more than 100 High Conservation Value forests between Perth and the South Coast in 2002 and then was supposed to move to protect them.
- But many of these forests, which include recognised pockets of old growth, are still not part of the conservation estate, and worse, many are proposed to be logged this year or within the next three years.
- Forest for Life rally 12 noon Wednesday 21 March, on the steps of Parliament House - organised by WA Forest Alliance