A group of 15 crossbench MPs and senators has written to the federal environment minister calling on the Albanese government to end native forest logging, as pressure also grows within Labor for it to do so.
All seven teal independents, including Monique Ryan and Allegra Spender, the Greens, MP Andrew Wilkie and influential crossbench senator David Pocock have all called on Tanya Plibersek to end native forest logging in New South Wales and Tasmania as part of upcoming environmental law reform.
The call follows Labor MP Josh Burns urging the government to “act to save our precious natural environment and native wildlife” ahead of the Victorian budget, which will end native forest logging from 2024.
Labor’s Environment Action Network (Lean) is also pressing to end native forest logging and transition to 100% plantation timber, with 192 branches endorsing that call ahead of Labor’s national conference in August.
The crossbench letter, sent on Wednesday, argued that at the federal election millions of Australians voted to “lower our carbon emissions, care for our environment, and protect the futures of our children and grandchildren”.
It noted that Victoria had become the “second Labor government after Western Australia to end native forest logging”.
Last week, Plibersek told the lower house that Labor “believes that we need to protect more of what is precious, restore more of what is damaged and manage it better for the future”.
While it is “important to have a forestry industry here in Australia” and Labor supports expanding plantation forestry, Plibersek noted native forests are “very important carbon sequestration providers, [and] they are very important habitat”.
“So, we are determined to make sure, as we update the environment protection laws, that regional forest agreements come under new national environment standards.”
The crossbench welcomed this commitment but said instead of “tinkering around the edges” the Albanese government should be “brave … by ending native forest logging nationally”. Ending the practice in NSW and Tasmania “will save as many additional carbon emissions as removing almost two million cars from the road each year”, the letter said.
The crossbench acknowledged the “challenging” transition for workers and families involved in the logging industry, and called for an “orderly transition” to other opportunities in “responsible forest management, such as carbon offsetting, tourism, and bushfire protection”.
Plibersek has said she will unveil Labor’s proposed reforms to the Environmental Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act this year.
Lean convener Felicity Wade said “with native forest logging driving extinctions, the industry in crisis, having over-cut for years and wildfires being fed by the disturbance logging creates, it’s time to recognise this is not a 21st-century industry.
“Labor members across the country are joining with Lean in calling for a shift to a plantation-based industry creating high quality, sustainable value-added products.”
On Saturday the Nationals leader, David Littleproud, told Guardian’s Australia Politics podcast his party was concerned the EPBC Act reforms will add “another layer of bureaucracy that closes down and slows down investment” in forestry.
Littleproud accepted that the economics of native forest logging were “challenging” but accused the Victorian premier, Daniel Andrews, of “an ideological view without any practical understanding of the reality of the lives that he’s about to change” with the ban.
If the Coalition opposes EPBC Act reforms, Labor may need support in the Senate from the Jacqui Lambie Network, which was highly critical of the government for excluding native logging projects from its national reconstruction fund.
Earlier in May, Burns told Guardian Australia he “sincerely hopes to see the native forests that still exist preserved for conservation and recreation.
“It’ll mean generations to come will have a sporting chance at seeing the endangered wildlife we are duty-bound to protect.”
Labor also has internal stakeholders urging it not to ban native forest logging. Michael O’Connor, an official of the Construction Forestry Maritime Mining Energy Union representing timber workers, has warned against the cessation of the industry, saying it employs “thousands of workers” and is vital for the social fabric of many communities.
Labor MP Brian Mitchell has said the government supports “a sustainable, well-managed native forestry sector, which supplies vital hardwoods and speciality timbers”.
