The Hon. I. COHEN [10.50]: In 1992 the then State and Federal governments signed the national forest policy statement and undertook to establish a comprehensive, adequate and representative reserve system - a CAR national park system - and ecologically sustainable management. Only after those two goals had been achieved and an accurate appraisal of the remaining resources had been completed would they consider granting resource security to the timber industry. This sensible approach was similarly adopted by the Carr Labor Government as its policy prior to the last election. Now the Carr Labor Government intends to ignore the procedures established by the national forest policy and the ALP's forest policy by granting resource security before the final national parks are decided, before ecologically sustainable logging practices are adopted and before a credible appraisal of existing timber resources has been undertaken.

There can be no doubt that this is being done deliberately to stop a truly comprehensive, adequate and representative national park system from being declared and to stop forests from being managed on an ecologically sustainable basis. The Government is knowingly committing resources to industry at such a level that no future government in the next 10 years will be able to protect the forests without paying massive compensation to industry. No-one will want to do that. The Carr Labor Government will be remembered in history as the Government that sacrificed a CAR reserve system to short-sighted political expediency, abandoned the concept of ecologically sustainable forest management and signed the death warrant for many of our endangered species. It could have resolved the forest conflict but it decided to entrench it instead.

This Government must be condemned for guaranteeing native forests to industry at levels that can be maintained only if those forests placed under moratorium are logged, together with vast tracts of old growth forests. The basis for granting resource security to industry is the shonky wood resources study of State Forests. State Forests district foresters advised head office in July that the wood resources study had got it terribly wrong. For example, in the Coffs Harbour management area the wood resources study gave a total loggable volume of 300,000 cubic metres of quota sawlogs outside the conservation criteria outcome, yet the district advised head office that the study estimates were well above the district estimate and that only 20,000 cubic metres of sawlogs were outside the conservation criteria outcome. That represents 7 per cent of what the wood resources study showed.

Did State Forests panic when district after district told it that the wood resources study was merely wishful thinking and that there was a major supply crisis? Of course not! State Forests told the Government that its resource estimates were right and that it should go ahead and give resource security. One conservation representative on the Resource and Conservation Assessment Council, who got tired of council's continued refusal to undertake an audit to assess the reliability of the wood resources study, conducted the audit himself. Even he was shocked by the overwhelming evidence of how badly State Forests had stuffed it up. The evidence showed that less than half the volumes given in the wood resources study were actually there. The National Parks and Wildlife Service did an assessment and also found that the timber claimed was simply not there. It concluded:

Wood supply agreements would promote levels of harvesting in excess of sustained yield, and would increase the pressure on forest ecosystems. Furthermore, such agreements would jeopardise the development of a Comprehensive, Adequate and Representative reserve system, encourage further depletion of the timber resource, and compromise the long term viability of the timber industry in northern New South Wales.

Undeterred, State Forests still advised Treasury that its wood resources study was right. State Forests said that there was minimal risk associated with these wood supply agreements because there was sufficient timber outside the moratorium areas to maintain supplies for 10 years. State Forests lied. The area in which I live accommodates the first Harvesting Advisory Board to oversee the operations of State Forests. State Forests advised the board that there is no timber left to log outside the moratorium forests in the Murwillumbah management area. By February next year there will be nothing left to log outside the moratorium forests in the Urbenville management area, and by the middle of next year only moratorium areas will be left to log in the Casino management area.

What happened to the moratorium? What happened to the guarantee of supplies for 10 years? I am informed that Bulahdelah and Tenterfield management areas are in similar straits, and that by
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the end of next year the Coffs Harbour and Dorrigo management areas will be in the same position. In the next few weeks the Carr Government intends to sign agreements to enable those moratorium areas to continue to be logged for 10 more years. The Government intends to sign agreements to guarantee logging in most of those forests currently under moratorium because they are likely to be needed for an adequate system of national parks. All the moratorium areas surrounding the area in which I live will have to be logged to maintain these timber commitments.

My neighbours, the people of New South Wales and I will not be getting the promised CAR reserve system. I am privileged to live in one of the principal centres of biodiversity in the world. I am unlucky because an inadequate reserve system means that past clearing and logging has left those forests with the most species threatened with extinction anywhere in Australia. I am devastated that the Carr Government intends to rule out protection for those forests and their inhabitants. I am told that forests in the Murwillumbah management area - which include Whian Whian, Goonengerry, Nullum, Mebbin, Wollumbin and Mooball State forests - have been so heavily overcut and mismanaged that even if all available resources were taken no sawlogs would be left within five years. This includes logging in forests with some of the highest conservation values in Australia.

Local communities will not allow this to occur. I and members of the community will ensure that these most priceless and unique forests are protected. I will not sit back and allow the Government to destroy the homes of marbled frogmouths, Prince Albert's lyrebirds, Coxen's fig parrots, black-breasted button quails or any of the other species unique to the northern rivers region and already seriously threatened with extinction. I am told that current logging prescriptions will have to be watered down further to supply the volumes of timber promised, and that even after sacrificing a CAR reserve system and any semblance of ecologically - [Time expired.]