Nationals keep fighting Labor’s forestry shutdown
Federal Member for Lyne Alison Penfold says The Nationals will continue fighting for forestry workers, businesses and regional communities by opposing Labor’s flawed Improved Native Forest Management (INFM) carbon credit method.
The Coalition has confirmed it will move to disallow the INFM method and is seeking the support of crossbench senators ahead of a vote expected on Tuesday September 15.
Ms Penfold said the fight was about protecting both Australia’s sustainable native forestry industry and the integrity of the Australian Carbon Credit Unit scheme.
She said Labor’s INFM method created a financial incentive for State governments to shut down productive native forestry and then claim carbon credits for doing it.
“That means taxpayers could effectively be paying governments to close forests, destroy regional jobs and reduce Australia’s supply of sustainably produced timber,” Ms Penfold said.
“That is wrong environmentally, economically, and for regional Australia.
“Forestry workers and their families have every right to ask why their livelihoods should be sacrificed so governments can generate carbon credits of questionable integrity.”
Ms Penfold said concerns about the method were particularly serious in NSW, where the Minns Labor Government had already committed to establishing the Great Koala National Park before the INFM method was developed.
“The fundamental principle of a carbon credit is additionality – the carbon abatement being credited must be something that would not otherwise have happened,” she said.
“The NSW Labor Government had already made an election commitment to create the Great Koala National Park; the policy decision came first and the carbon methodology came later.
“Governments should not be able to make a political decision to close an industry and then retrospectively turn that decision into a taxpayer-funded carbon credit.”
Ms Penfold introduced the Carbon Credits (Carbon Farming Initiative) Amendment Bill 2026 into Federal Parliament on June 22 to strengthen the additionality requirements applying to carbon credits. The Bill remains before the House of Representatives.
“My Bill continues to sit on the Notice Paper waiting for the Parliament to deal with it,” she said.
“It would protect the integrity of the carbon credit scheme by making it clear that credits should only be issued for genuine and additional carbon abatement – not decisions governments had already made.
“I introduced that Bill because I could see exactly where this was heading.
“On the NSW North Coast alone, forestry directly supports more than 5500 jobs and contributes around $2.9 billion to the economy, with another $1 billion in value-added activity.
“These are not numbers on a spreadsheet. They are forestry workers, mill workers, truck drivers, contractors, small businesses and families living in our regional communities.”
Ms Penfold said shutting Australian native forestry would not eliminate demand for timber.
“We are in the middle of a housing crisis. Australia needs more timber, not less,” she said.
“If we stop sustainably harvesting our own forests, we don't stop using timber; we simply import more of it – potentially from countries with environmental and forestry standards nowhere near as strong as Australia's.
“That exports jobs, exports economic activity and potentially exports environmental impacts as well.
“The Nationals understand regional communities because we represent them. We will keep standing up for forestry workers, timber businesses and the towns that depend on them.
“We will fight Labor’s INFM method in the Senate, and I will continue fighting in the House to have my Carbon Credits Bill debated and passed.
“Our forestry workers deserve certainty, our regional communities deserve a future, and Australians deserve confidence that a carbon credit actually represents genuine carbon abatement – not another mechanism for governments to fund political decisions.”
ENDS