News Service from House Harris

Fed: 'Uninformed greens' to blame for fires: forestry industry

CANBERRA, Feb 16 AAP - The war of words has escalated over whether green policies are to blame for Victoria's bushfire disaster.

The forestry industry says uninformed conservationists who insisted on locking up forests have been proven "fatally wrong".

But the Greens have asked the industry to keep the confrontation for another time.

There has been debate about whether the fires were exacerbated by a lack of pre-emptive burn-offs around homes and in forest reserves.

National Association of Forest Industries (NAFI) chief executive Allan Hansard laid the blame at conservationists' feet.

"The current process of locking forests up in conservation reserves and national parks with no ongoing fire management regime has proven to be fatally wrong," Mr Hansard said.

"Bushfire management policy must be based on the best scientific knowledge, not the whims of uninformed green ideologists.

"These current green policies are clearly not working and, ironically, have contributed to the destruction of the very areas they were supposed to protect."

Mr Hansard said forests should be managed to stop fuel building up, and forestry roads should be maintained for access.

He offered to brief Greens leader Bob Brown on "how the current policy isn't working".

Senator Brown said it was unacceptable to seek a political debate while the fire tragedy was still unfolding.

"There ought to be healing and division, not confrontation and nastiness," he told AAP.

"NAFI's refused repeatedly to enter into a public debate at a time when there was no tragedy, and now they're wanting to set up confrontation in these horrible circumstances."

Senator Brown reiterated that the Greens' policy was for pre-emptive burn-offs in forests.