Senator COLBECK (Tasmania) (15:51): It's a great pleasure to rise to this urgency motion moved by Senator Duniam, and I can only concur with the comments listed in his motion. I think it demonstrates how committed the government is to forestry. I don't doubt the good senator's desire to see forestry in Tasmania continue, given his family history, and I will acknowledge that, but the fact that not one Labor senator from Victoria is prepared to come and stand here in this chamber and defend the actions of the Labor government in Victoria speaks volumes for this motion. Not one single Labor member is prepared to step foot into the chamber to defend what the Victorian Labor government is doing. I think that demonstrates, as I said, exactly what is going on. If you actually look, as Senator Duniam said in his contribution, at the science of forestry and the realities of forestry, you will clearly understand that this sector plays an important role in our broader communities. No lesser organisation than the FAO, the Food and Agricultural Organization of the United Nations, made this statement in their report The state of the world's forests 2012: … it must be clear that including forests at the core of a strategy for a sustainable future is not an option—it is mandatory. They go on to say: … the best way of saving a forest is to manage it sustainably and to benefit from its products and ecosystem services. If the principles of sustainable forest management are applied and forest products and ecosystem services play an increasing role, the global economy will become greener. The global economy will become greener. It's interesting that we just heard that the future is in plantations. We hear this quite a lot from the Greens. Mind you, you've got to grow those plantations somewhere and, every time someone looks to grow a plantation on a new piece of ground, the Greens are there to oppose it or to campaign against it. But the reality is that you won't get the high-quality timbers that go into making magnificent furniture such as we enjoy in this chamber here from plantation forestry. As a carpenter, I know that the best-quality timbers are slow grown. They're given time, on a sustainable forest rotation. That is where you'll get these timbers—and not only that. I acknowledge that the plantation sector is important, but a native forest based system of growing timber is actually better for carbon storage, it's better for biodiversity, it's better for water quality and it uses no chemicals. So, under almost every environmental value that you could consider, native forestry— Senator McKim: Except for destroying ecosystems. S enator COLBECK: Well, actually it's better for biodiversity. The forest science deniers that sit at the bottom of the garden—or, should I say, at the bottom of the chamber—aren't prepared to listen to the FAO of the UN or the IPCC when they recommend sustainable forestry. They talk to us about the IPCC when it comes to climate change, but they don't recognise that native forestry is better for carbon storage than plantation forestry, which they claim to promote. The forest science deniers in the chamber really don't want to listen to reality. They are the ones pushing the Victorians to this circumstance. We know the fires in Victoria have had an impact on the available timbers. It means an adjustment to the sector to make sure that the forest harvest can continue to be sustainable. I have to say that I am sick of the lies. I am sick of the lies that are made up by anti-forestry groups and that they continue to peddle in relation to this sector. It does, as Senator Chisholm said, make a valuable contribution to our community. It does make a valuable contribution to important sectors of our economy. It does provide us with the magnificent timbers that we see as we sit here in the chamber. It is a pity that from that nobody from the Labor Party from Victoria has come into the chamber to defend this motion.