“I am under arrest for upholding the laws of nature and the international Biodiversity Convention,” Bob Brown said today from Tasmania’s north east forests, where logging is destroying habitat of the critically endangered Swift Parrot.
Three of my companions are currently on site, one in a treesit, and all may be arrested. The arresting officer told Jenny Weber: “we don’t have environmental police”.
This Northeast Highlands area of Tasmania is harbouring nesting and foraging swift parrots which are rapidly approaching extinction due to loss of forest habitat. Other endangered species in the forest include Tasmanian devils and Tasmanian masked owls.
Bob Brown told the arresting officers that there was no public evidence that this logging is legal. The arresting officer told Brown that the logging was getting rid of sugar gliders (a threat to Swift Parrots).
Brown is calling on Prime Minister Albanese to end the logging of Australia’s wildlife-rich native forests as New Zealand did 20 years ago. “We have more than enough plantations to meet the nation’s wood needs. In this extinction crisis, the government will get majority public applause if it ends the unnecessary native forest carnage”.