Greens vs

Greens .v. Greens in Tassie

separates the realists from the extremists

By Jim Adams*

The “Statemen= t of Principles” signed by the timber industry, the timber union and environmental organisations late last year is e= asily the best chance for decades to end Tasmania’s debilitating “for= est wars.”

Every single organisation that signed on took a risk. A risk that the process would foun= der through Government intransigence, a risk of being outflanked and denounced = by opportunists within their own constituencies, a risk that circumstances may deliver outcomes for their traditional opponents, but not for their own interests.

One of the most fas= cinating issues now that we have started to move into the ‘delivery’ pha= se however is the high stakes power play developing between the “environmental” greens and the “political” greens.<= /span>

The environmental g= reens, while still leery of the pulp mill and its State approvals process, realise that the mill as now approved is a much better project than that approved by the State.&n= bsp; In fact it could be argued that the state approved mill is dead and buried and has been replaced by a federally approved mill which is much bet= ter and represents a huge environmental win for those actually genuinely concer= ned with the environmental outcomes around this project.

While they will nev= er come out and actually support the pulp mill the environmental greens also recognise that the mill is an essential part of the v= ery necessary restructuring of the Tasmanian timber industry and that such a restructuring has the potential to also deliver them a very significant environmental reservation outcome, while also ensuring otherwise inevitable levels of social disruption are mitigated as far as possible.

The environmental or “small G” greens understand that this outcome is only available= to them through the Principles process – if they can give a little on the pulp mill they will get a little in terms of the high conservation forests = that will be “saved.”

On the other hand t= he political or “capital G” Greens have a vested interest in perpetuating the war in the forests as a way of maintaining relevance, fund= ing, and political power.

They have no actual environmental objectives in relation to either the new, federally approved = pulp mill or the Statement of Principles. They have however put a line in the sa= nd over the pulp mill and now find themselves conflicted between their politic= al self-interest and the environmental outcomes that one might reasonably expe= ct them to support.

The foot soldiers o= f the political greens include the likes, the Huon Environment Centre and the group Still Wild Still Threatened. Their actions and public statements are clearly designed to destroy and undermine the Statement of Principles chances of success, because success would involve compromising t= heir political positions.

So to maintain poli= tical purity and that “self-righteousness” factor that is such a motivator for such groups, the political Greens and their foot soldiers are attempting a classic “flanking move,” to position themselves as= the true custodians of Green Purity and to demonstrate to the wider green commu= nity that they will not compromise. In reality in doing so they are prepared to forego all of the actual potential positive environmental outcomes of the Statement of Principles.

This is the true na= ture of the so called “split” in the greens that we are currently witnessing.

There is another gr= oup who would also pose as “greens”, those who simply want to extract vengeance on Gunns with whatever perceived justification they can muster. These people have the least justification for their actions than any other and are motivated in large part by the most infantile form of grandstanding. This group inc= ludes the wannabe high profile “talking heads” that have emerged duri= ng the talks.

The situation in Ta= smania constitutes a “coming of age” morality tale for the environment= al movement in Australia. Will t= hey accept that compromise is necessary to achieve outcomes, or will the self-r= ighteousness factor and political self-interest win out?

* Jim Adams is = the CEO of Timber Communities Australia, a signatory organ= isation to the Statement of Principles.