Disputed Pulp Mill to go Federal Again?

Community-based grassroots pulp mill campaigners Tasmanians Against the Pulp Mill (TAP) report that they have been shut out of negotiations between major players, as the pulp mill debacle enters its next phase under a Gunns now devoid of former chair John Gay.

Meanwhile, ramped up federal involvement may be on the pre-election horizon.

Concerns and community anger over the proposed, approved, stalled, and despised pulp mill are inherently tied to broader concerns about the practice of forestry in Tasmania.

A broadly inclusive forestry roundtable was proposed to thrash out points of contention and consternation between industry and communities, but, according to TAP, “has been sidelined in favour of private talks between environmentalists and the timber sector”.

John Day, TAP spokesperson, said “environmentalists do not speak for communities hit by aerial spraying, lost jobs in food production, depleted water supplies, and many other impacts from the way forestry is currently practised.”

“The fibre plantation wood supply for the proposed pulp mill is a major land use and imposes a huge burden on many for the benefit of a few,” said Day.

The group is calling for a comprehensive independent risk assessment which would also take into account the public impact of government subsidies directed away from essential services toward forestry, and the impact of plantations on Tasmania generally. Community resentment of supposedly green NGOs has been steadily rising in Tasmania as local residents and businesses find their needs and concerns absent from negotiations.

According to activists close to the new process, three closed-door meetings have been held amid rumours that Greens Senator Bob Brown has been mediating. Both factions of the internally divided Wilderness Society (TWS) have been involved, along with state and federal Greens representatives, local NGO Environment Tasmania, and frontman Barry Chipman from industry lobby group Timber Communities Australia.

TWS have apparently been canvassing publicly an approach that suggests a new federal push to resolve the issue of Tasmanian forestry once and for all. The group has been showcasing a proposal to lock up native forests in return for a growth in plantation-based forestry.

The same activists in Tasmania report that Federal Labor is looking for a solution with hopes to make headline-grabbing announcement backed by big money in the coming weeks. This, however, was before other headline-grabbing announcements were made. Speculation is that Labor Premier David Bartlett may have been tapped on the shoulder and urged to produce a federally acceptable solution as part of a push to shore up support in the bellweather seats of Bass, Braddon, and Lyons.

If there is substance to the speculation, one can safely bet that federal Labor won’t be revisiting Mark Latham’s billion-dollar industry restructure package, which was intended to save Tassie old growth but only succeeded in seeing the CFMEU campaign for John Howard.