Eric Abetz (Tasmania, Liberal Party, Minister for Fisheries, Forestry and Conservation) Share this | Hansard source

something that you never hear the incessantly interjecting Senator Brown ever talk about. That is 10,000 jobs which federal Labor does not care about either. While the Howard government has moved swiftly to address the uncertainty created by the recent decision, there has been a deafening silence from those opposite. The reason is that Mr Garrett, Labor’s environment spokesman, is opposed to forestry in Tasmania, and he is most definitely opposed to the Regional Forest Agreement in Tasmania. This is what Mr Garrett had to say about RFAs in 1999—and listen carefully, those opposite: ‘RFAs are a completely flawed and discredited process.’ The simple fact is that Labor’s Mr Garrett, just like Senator Brown, is opposed to regional forest agreements and is opposed to forestry in Tasmania.

While Mr Latham may well have gone, his extreme green antijobs agenda survives in the form of Mr Garrett, who has been deliberately placed in this vital policy role by Mr Rudd. Let there be no mistake: if Mr Rudd and Labor were to win government, it would be the extreme green, antijobs views of Mr Garrett which would prevail. Their record and the views of Mr Garrett make this very, very clear. Only the Howard government can be trusted to conserve both jobs and the environment, getting the sensible balance that Australians so desperately want.