The greater glider,a large gliding possum that lives on Australia’s east coast,was recently listed as endangered. Now a Victorian court has found the state-owned logging agency is failing to protect them.Credit:Josh Bowell
The matter was brought to the Supreme Court by two volunteer-run community environment groups,Kinglake Friends of the Forest and Environment East Gippsland.
Federal Environment Minister Tanya Plibersek recently upgraded the listing for greater gliders from vulnerable to endangered because habitat destruction from logging and land clearing for agriculture has turned the large gliding possum into a rarity.
In court,the environment groups argued VicForests had a legal obligation to identify and protect the two possum species in the forestry areas of the Central Highlands,near Kinglake,and in East Gippsland.
This would have required the agency to do comprehensive surveys of any logging coupe scheduled for harvesting and exclude their habitat from logging.
Activists from the groups Kinglake Friends of the Forest and Environmental East Gippsland celebrate their Supreme Court victory over VicForests with their legal representatives.
Justice Richards told the court the law should be followed when there was a threat of serious or irreversible damage to vulnerable species,but VicForests had argued this “precautionary principle” was not “engaged” or relevant,and the measures it took were adequate.
The judge found the actions VicForests had taken to conserve greater gliders and yellow-bellied gliders detected within a coupe scheduled for harvest were inadequate.