Justin Law

Forest & Wood Communities Australia has scored a win in the battle against activism in the media with the ABC conceding that it had misrepresented the timber industry in its article Deforestation in Australia: how does your state (or territory) compare?

You know your Federal Court Case is going bad when you resort to tired stunts like getting arrested at a harvesting coupe for a bit of cheap publicity. This is what is happening in Tasmania with Bob Brown getting on the catastrophe offensive to keep the donations rolling in.

Forest & Wood Communities Australia has condemned attention-seeking corporate activist, Bob Brown who was arrested for invading a lawful timber harvesting operation yesterday. FWCA Director Kelly Wilton said Mr Brown was wasting valuable police resources and sucking the media into free publicity to promote a pro-activism film.

Forest & Wood Communities Australia has welcomed the Federal Government’s proposed toughening of the legislation which will strip activist organisations which engage in illegal activity of their charity status. The announcement was made by the Assistant Minister for Finance, Charities and Electoral Matters last week and will give forest workers some reassurance that those who disrupt their workplaces and damage their equipment will have their funding streams cut off.

Forest & Wood Communities Australia has called on Tasmanian Work Health and Safety regulator WorkSafe to investigate continued breaches to the Tasmania Work Health & Safety Act by Bob Brown Foundation criminals. Yesterday members of the corporate activist group, which conducts illegal media stunts to create outrage as a funding source, invaded a harvesting coupe in Tasmania’s Eastern Tiers.

Forest & Wood Communities Australia has lodged a complaint to the Australian Press Council following an appalling hatchet job on the industry published in The Monthly. We have also complained directly to the editor and provided a detailed critique to outline dozens of issues with the author’s work which appears to be nothing other than fawning support for the timber industry’s most strident opponents.

The Weekend Australian Magazine recently ran a 4-page assault on Victoria’s native timber industry focusing on the recent Federal Court decision. We understand that some industry leaders were interviewed for an hour or more by the journalist Ricky French who then ignored their information and persisted with the activist perspective.

Forest & Wood Communities Australia added its voice the Victorian Government’s Inquiry into Ecosystem Decline in Victoria. The inquiry was the result of a motion by The Greens in October 2019 which was backed by the Labor Government. “We see this as yet another cynical move by The Greens and Labor’s green faction to increase the pressure on the government to lock up even more forest,” said FWCA managing director Justin Law.

Not since the Tasmanian ‘forest wars’ have timber workers and their communities felt more besieged by malicious and carefully co-ordinated attacks on forestry and their jobs. Corporate activist organisations have ramped up their efforts to close down the industry in Western Australia, NSW, Victoria and Tasmania, which comes on the back of rural communities already hit by drought, bushfire and short-sighted government policy. Piling on are the minnow groups, who peddle outrage like hemp shirts at a community market, as they fund vexatious litigation against forestry operations.

The decision by hardware retailer Bunnings to refuse to stock Victorian timber sourced from VicForests is a hypocritical knee-jerk reaction, said Forest & Wood Communities Australia Managing Director, Justin Law. Last month, Bunnings bowed to activist pressure by refusing stock timber from native hardwood harvested in Victoria following the Federal Court’s findings in a case brought against VicForests by activist donation collection group, Friends of Leadbeater’s Possum.