FORMER Labor leader Mark Latham has turned his criticism of the party on to Tasmania’s Premier, Paul Lennon., says the ABC
Some excerpts:
Mr Latham claims Mr Lennon is in the pocket of the forestry industry.
“I think the issue down there is that the company, the timber industry, there runs the state,” he said.
“They run the state Labor Government, they run Lennon, and the industry brokered all these things and old Lennon there, he wouldn’t scratch himself unless the guy who heads up Gunns told him to.”
Mr Latham accuses the Premier of cutting a deal with the Liberal Party when negotiating the Community Forest Agreement.
“Right through 2004, we were trying to get out of him a policy we could deal with,” he said.
“I don’t know where his loyalties lie but they certainly weren’t with the federal Labor Party in that environment and he cut the deal with [Prime Minister John] Howard that we would have grabbed, if he had presented it to us just eight or nine months earlier.”
Mr Latham’s criticisms were made in an interview with ABC TV’s Lateline program but have been aired on Insiders.
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A Green perspective:
MEDIA RELEASE
Sunday, 18 September 2005
Lennon forestry stance a tragedy for Tasmania
Former Labor leader Mark Latham was simply the latest leader to face the problem that has beset Tasmania for years in developing a sustainable forestry policy; namely the forest industry is the de facto government of Tasmania, Australian Greens Senator for Tasmania Christine Milne said today.
Earlier today Mr Latham said Labor Premier Paul Lennon was in the pocket of the forestry industry and had thwarted federal Labor’s attempts to reach agreement on a solution to Tasmania’s conflict over logging high conservation value forests.
“Long before Mark Latham became federal Labor leader and since he left the post the problem in Tasmania has been that the government’ and Gunns’ position on forestry is one and the same,” Senator Milne said in Hobart.
“Anyone who tries to protect forests in Tasmania, to get transparency in the industry, runs up against the government, which is the puppet of Gunns.
“The tragedy for Tasmania is that Premier Paul Lennon repudiated $800 million from federal Labor to once and for all sort out the forestry industry.
“He preferred $50 million from the coalition, and his silence was tacit support for Prime Minister John Howard’s position.
“The forestry industry was a significant influence in the re-election last year of the Howard government and consequently, a resolution of the forestry issue in Tasmania is nowhere in sight.”
