Tuesday, 7 February 2023

 Samantha RATNAM (Northern Metropolitan) (14:25): As we begin the work of the 60th Parliament I hope that the issues that impact our community the most are given the space and time to be aired and hopefully solved in this place. We owe it to all those who chose us to be their representatives, and we owe it most importantly to the generations to come that are counting on us to ensure they can survive and thrive. There is no bigger issue before us than climate change and the survival of our environment.

In less than three years Victoria has experienced the beginnings of what will become more frequent and fierce climate disasters. The bushfires of 2020 had barely been recovered from when the floods came. Across the seas our friends in New Zealand have endured intense flooding over the past few weeks. We are being warned about more fires to come. Arctic ice shelves are melting and the oceans are warming. We are close to reaching five tipping points that will consign the earth to irreversible and catastrophic climate change.

The 59th Parliament did some groundbreaking work in its inquiry into Victoria’s extinction crisis. It found that climate change was one of the biggest threats to our biodiversity, with habitat loss and invasive species also greatly threatening our plant and animal life – yet Victoria still allows our native forests to be logged. That Parliament also investigated how Victoria can move to 100 per cent renewable energy by 2030 and keep coal and gas in the ground and found that it is possible. There is so much that we can do in this place. Let us not miss this chance.