This morning 15 Greenpeace activists faced court in Mackay in relation to last year’s occupation of the Abbot and Hay Point coal terminals.
We spoke with some of the activists before their court appearance about why they took action, and what it was like standing up for the climate. You can hear what they had to say and see footage of their amazing actions here:
All fifteen activists were convicted mostly on a charge of Unregulated High Risk Activity. The majority had no conviction recorded, and fines ranged from $300 to $750.
Our lawyer made a general submission to the court about climate change and why the activists felt compelled to take the action that they did. In their individual submissions the activists restated the urgency and importance of the issue. One of the activist’s submissions spoke about the long tradition of non-violent direct action espoused by Gandhi and Mandela. The judge didn’t seem particularly impressed by this and spoke at length about the need to stay within the law at all times.
The judge acknowledged that the activists’ views were genuinely held, but said he was ‘miffed’ that the activists tried to highlight the issue, because ‘the public is already well aware of the issue’ and that our views are ‘held by the majority of the community’.
We agree that many people are worried about climate change. We don’t, however, think the government has translated that concern into the strong leadership on climate change that our activists were calling for.
During a short media conference outside the court, Greenpeace Australia Pacific’s CEO Linda Selvey expressed her frustration that the future of Queensland is being sacrificed for the short term profits of the coal industry. She vowed that Greenpeace will continue to campaign alongside the millions of people around the world who are demanding real action on climate change.
We are relieved that this has finally been dealt with and that the penalties are relatively low. But as one of the activists, Kristen McDonald said afterwards, ‘it’s a tragedy that the people who are responsible for the climate catastrophe get rewarded, while the people standing up for the common good get punished.’
