Come clean on tree clearing, says McNamara

Sustainability, Climate Change and Innovation Minister Andrew McNamara has called on Opposition Leader Lawrence Springborg to immediately clarify his party’s plans on the resumption of broadscale tree-clearing.

Mr McNamara was commenting on reports Liberal National Party president Bruce McIver has confirmed the Coalition will scrap the Government’s historic 2006 legislation that ended more than 100 years of broadscale tree-clearing.

But he said Mr Springborg claims to have ruled it out and senior LNP figures were telling Green groups they had no plans to review tree-clearing laws.

“Who is running this show? Queenslanders have a right to know,” Mr McNamara said.

"It sounds very much like one message for the city and the opposite one for the bush.

“A return to tree-clearing is green poison. It was only this Government’s courage to put a stop to broadscale clearing that enabled Australia to meet our Kyoto greenhouse gas emission targets.

“It was a decision that the Liberal members of Queensland Parliament supported. Just how badly they have sold their souls must be starting to dawn on them.”

In 2004, the Queensland Government announced a two year phase-out period to end broadscale clearing of remnant native vegetation. The latest Statewide Landcover and Trees Study (SLATS) showed clearing had more than halved since its peak in 1999/2000 (758,000ha).

Mr McNamara said Opposition claims reported today that any plan to resume widespread clearing would have no effect on greenhouse gas emissions were ludicrous.

“This is climate change denial at its worst and is a telling insight into the forces really driving the Opposition,” he said.

More information: Scott Dixon 3336 8004 or 0439 761 416