VANGUARD - Expressing the viewpoint of the Communist Party of Australia (Marxist-Leninist)
For National Independence and Socialism • www.cpaml.org
(Above: Anti-logging protest in Hobart in 2024. Source: ABC News)
After years of public pressure, on November 28 the federal government passed new laws affecting the forest and woodland habitats of many threatened species. While some good will indeed come from this, the laws have already been widely criticized by environmental groups.
The main highlight of the legislation is that the Tasmanian logging industry will no longer be exempt from federal environmental regulations. Those who remember our article ‘Did capitalist corner-cutting kill the Thylacine’ will recall that habitat damage from clearing forests has been a serious crisis on the island for a long time, and as readers may have inferred from that article, Tasmania’s native forest logging is a very powerful and influential industry. With this in mind, it shouldn’t come as a surprise that the industry has been given a year and a half of breathing room before the exemption will officially come to an end on July 1, 2027. Those eighteen months of business-as-usual chainsaw privilege can still make a big difference. And there have already been warnings that even afterward, the industry may still find loopholes to exploit. It is worth briefly adding, for perspective, that 88% of Tasmanians oppose ongoing logging.
In addition to what has happened, it is useful context for us to explain what did not pass in the new laws. As environmentalist and former senator Bob Brown said: “Our appeals to get Takayna the World Heritage protection it deserves were rebuffed with a pitchfork by Albanese and Watt. Playing off the Greens with the Coalition is like playing off the Angels with Bluebeard. Nevertheless, the Greens were able to block some holes in Watt’s legislative sieve.”
Environmental organisations such as the Wilderness Society have correctly assessed that, while some good will come from this legislation, it is only a minor and limited victory. However, we must add that, while these organisations are good at identifying and targeting environmental matters, they usually lack class-consciousness. When asked about the deeper root causes of environmental issues, they still tend to dismiss such an approach with remarks like “it’s better to send a positive message than to sling mud” and “we can’t repair all of democracy”.
This comes partly because their long and often successful campaigns over decades faltered dramatically in recent years. Their real enemy, the logging, mining and gas industry, is one of the most aggressive sections of the ruling class. It has immense power. One of its most successful tools has been to win over the workers who are the front line of their attack against environmentalists. It's workers who they confront in blockades and in towns reliant on extractive industries.
At times like these it is important for us to occasionally take a step back to remind ourselves where and why these societies and organisations currently stand on big-picture thinking outside of specific environmental challenges.
Our task is to help them and their members develop the class consciousness necessary to take part in a broader mass movement on the path to Australian independence and socialism.