Hi, I’m Jess, a dedicated environmentalist and climate advocate.
I live on the south coast, where I am raising my kids on a permaculture property and working towards self-sufficiency, installing solar panels and batteries, growing our own food, and working on a revegetation project to improve water quality and wildlife habitat.
I was raised in South Africa and moved to Perth at the end of primary school with my family. After graduating from school, I began a politics and economics degree at UWA, which turned out to be a launching point for me in finding my place in the environment movement.
In May 1997, I joined an old-growth forest blockade in Giblett Forest and went on to spend the next three years living in the blockade camps throughout the south-west, fighting every day to protect as much forest as we could with an incredible group of people. I have been deeply involved and committed to the environment movement here in WA ever since.
I graduated from university with an environmental science degree and worked for many years as the campaign director for the WA Forest Alliance. This saw me representing WAFA’s member groups and ultimately leading the campaign to end native forest logging. After our success in protecting the forests from commercial logging – recognising that much still remains to be done – I moved to the Conservation Council of WA to become the Executive Director.
I’m running in the upcoming state election because after nearly three decades in the environment movement, I’ve formed the belief that we will only get the action we need for nature and climate when we have enough Greens members in Parliament.
We cannot protect the forests, or any other places we love, unless we deal with climate change. Heat and drought are already having profound impacts and will only get worse if we keep burning fossil fuels. I’m particularly concerned about Woodside’s proposals to extend the export of climate-wrecking gas until 2070, and to tap the Browse Basin, which would involve drilling 50 oil and gas wells around the incredibly beautiful Scott Reef.
These proposals are pure madness, and must be stopped – but it is clear that the major parties are too beholden to the interests of multinational corporations to do the right thing. That’s why we need the Greens to have the balance of power in WA parliament, with a strong environmental movement behind them.
We have a brilliant team standing for parliament at the next state election, and with us all there, we can transform WA from a climate laggard into a renewable energy leader and focus on the protection and restoration of our incredible natural environment.
