FT MUST APOLOGISE AND COMPENSATE FOR PROVIDING FALSE INFORMATION TO POLICE AND COURTS

If FT Can’t Read Maps Properly, How Accurate Are Their Coupe Boundaries, and How Good is Their Governance?

The Tasmanian Greens today called on Forestry Tasmania (FT) to apologise, and to compensate those affected, after providing false information to Tasmania Police regarding the boundaries of an exclusion zone in the Upper Florentine Valley, a failure that led directly to Police wasting enormous amounts of public resources wrongfully arresting and charging dozens of people for walking through State Forest.

Greens Forests spokesperson Kim Booth MP said Forestry Tasmania’s patent inability to correctly read maps raises serious questions not only about the logging that is being, and has been, carried out across Tasmania in areas identified via mapping work done by FT, but also about the competence of FT at the highest level.

Mr Booth also called for Forestry Tasmania to provide the maps and information required to back-up their ongoing claim that 90 percent of the Upper Florentine Valley is protected from logging, a claim that has yet to be proven by FT despite being repeatedly called on to do so.

“FT’s inability to read maps accurately meant that Tasmania Police officers have wrongfully arrested dozens of people for walking through State Forest, and FT should immediately apologise to the people they caused to be arrested, to the Tasmania Police officers involved, and to the people of Tasmania,” said Mr Booth.

“Forestry should also compensate those convicted on false evidence, and pay the costs of legal action to set aside any convictions.”

“Forest coupes across Tasmania are being clearfelled and burned along boundaries that have also been identified by FT mapping techniques, and I have no confidence that any of these coupe boundaries are any more accurate than the incorrect exclusion area boundary being used in the Upper Florentine.”

“There have been repeated calls for FT to provide maps and information to back up their claim that 90 percent of the Upper Florentine Valley is protected from logging, and now is obviously an appropriate time for FT to release this information.”

“FT must apologise to all those arrested, to the Tasmania Police officers whose time and efforts were wasted, and to the people of Tasmania for demonising people who, it turns out, were arrested for simply walking through State Forest.”

“This is yet another example of this rogue agency out of control and Forestry Minister Llewellyn must take responsibility for the wrongful arrest of citizens who were lawfully going about their business until falsely accused by Forestry Tasmania of breaking the law,” said Mr Booth.
Kim Booth MP Greens Forests Spokesperson