Councillor Chris Harris

The NSW Opposition cannot hope to win any credibility on the environment as long as the National Party continues to call for windbacks of land management practices, said Greens MLC Ian Cohen.

“The Labor government has let down the conservation movement in key areas of land management, leading to massive amounts of land clearing and destruction of threatened species. The Greens are the only viable opposition on this issue, as the Liberal/National Coalition would make the situation far worse.” Mr Cohen said.

“While the Greens work towards improving the government’s land management, the National Party threatens to take us back 50 years.

The Nationals have promised to:

• Reverse National parks in western NSW
• End sanctuaries zones in Marine Parks
• Send coastal rivers westwards with no consideration of environmental impacts
• Allow cattle to graze in National parks
• Allow commercial logging to be considered a routine agricultural management activity and not be subject to environmental regulation

“Land clearing in NSW generates as much as 35 million tonnes of greenhouse gas emissions each year, which is the equivalent of more than 7 million new cars on our roads. The NSW Labor government needs to show its commitment to ending broadscale land clearing, which it promised to do by the year 2000.

“The Greens will work towards closing the loopholes in Native Vegetation legislation including:

• Ensuring that a stringent code of practice is introduced and enforced for Private Native Forestry.
• Amending the loophole for ‘invasive native species’ clearing to ensure sustainable management of thickening native scrub.
• Mandating the use of appropriate satellite technology for monitoring landclearing.
• Ensuring that on the ground monitoring and compliance are enforced.”