it's got to stop joe

Earlier this week I joined with community members outside the offices of Joe Helper, Minister for Agriculture and in charge of VicForests, to protest to the ongoing logging in the Central Highlands, I was there representing the Shire of Yarra Ranges (I am a councillor there).

The Shire of Yarra Ranges council is opposed to the logging of Melbourne's water catchments and is also opposed to logging where it has significant effects on the local economy, tourism features and the environment. Thanks to Brent Lukey for the image.

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The protest was to highlight the ongoing destruction caused by logging burnt and green forests in the Central Highlands, an already fragile environment due to the Black Saturday fires.

Much wood has been logged after the fires, causing untold damage to the forest. Local residents angry about the constant stream of logging trucks on roads, angry about logging on prominent ridgelines in tourist towns and angry that the forests haven't been given a chance to regenerate naturally.

Thanks to Brent Lukey for this image.

Logging has also occurred in the Armstrong Catchment, one of Melbourne's closed water catchments, contrary to the advice given in the BAER report (a report from experts about how to best to deal with environmental impacts post fire).

Huw Slater, Greens candidate for Seymour, was there too.

The BAER report urged conservation action for a number of endangered species at risk, warned against salvage logging and also stated that no more than 236 hectares of burnt forest should be salvage logged. Contrary to this advice the government allowed more than 10 times this amount of forest to be logged setting our endangered species on a short trail to extinction.

The Greens want to see an end to industrial scale logging of our native forests. The role the forests play in securing water, storing carbon and maintaining a healthy biodiversity is far more critical than logging the forests for woodchips.

It was good to see today that the CFMEU agrees that there needs to be transition out of native forests and in to plantations. Plantation timbers can supply our timber needs and the Greens support a proper transition to assist those workers, their families and communities to move from native forest logging to plantation timber.

mcewen and seymour candidates launched

It was terrific to be part of the candidate's launch for the Greens in the federal seat of McEwen and the state seat of Seymour at Three Stories Artspace in Healesville.

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From left to right: Richard di Natale - for the senate, Samantha Dunn for Eastern Victoria, Steve Meacher for McEwen, Huw Slater for Seymour & David Jones for Northern Victoria.

Candidates who spoke on the night included Richard di Natale- The Greens Senate Candidate, Steve Meacher – Greens candidate for McEwen, David Jones – Greens Upper House Candidate for Northern Victoria and Huw Slater – Greens candidate for Seymour. Community members from near and far came out to support the launch and the Greens campaign.

Richard, a general practitioner and international public health specialist, has a keen understanding of the issues that impact on our health system. David was a councillor and mayor in the City of Greater Bendigo and has a wealth of experience representing community, Steve Meacher is well known to the people of the McEwen electorate and participates in many community based groups across the region, whilst Huw Slater, a local boy from Chum Creek, understands the things that matter to people in the electorate of Seymour.

All spoke with passion about the community and the issues affecting their respective electorates. They are a high calibre group of candidates and the community will be seeing much more of them as the Greens hit the ground running.