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RUBY:

From Schwartz Media I’m Ruby Jones, this is 7am.

Some of the world’s most treasured art works have been under attack in the last few weeks by climate activists trying to draw attention to the urgent climate crisis.

So is this plea for action working? And why are activists turning to this kind of protest instead of targeting the world's biggest polluters directly?

Today, national correspondent for The Saturday Paper, Mike Seccombe on the divide within the environmentalist movement and what’s driving protestors towards desperate action.

It’s Thursday, October 27.

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RUBY:

Mike over the last few months, we've seen a series of stunts by climate activists targeting, in particular, famous works of art. So to begin with, can we talk about what those protest actions look like and what their purpose is?

MIKE:

Well, yeah, it really seems to be the sort of protest action of the moment. So this week we saw some climate protesters in Germany throw mashed potato at a Monet.

Archival tape - [German protestors shouting]

MIKE:

There've been a whole bunch of others, a whole slew of other food themed protests in the past couple of weeks. The Just Stop Oil protest group threw tomato soup at Van Gogh's Sunflowers.

Archival tape - [Protest soup sounds]

MIKE:

Another Monet was drenched in potato in London before the protesters stuck their hands to the wall with superglue.

Archival tape -- Protestors:

“Let's move to the time for action. Ladies and gentlemen.”

MIKE:

And a few months ago here in Australia, a couple of protesters super glued their hands to a Picasso at the NGV in Melbourne. And it's not just food, I might add. Around the world, we're seeing protest groups gluing themselves to busy motorways to block traffic and public transport to make a statement about, you know, their respective governments climate action or inaction.

Archival tape - [Protest sounds]

MIKE:

And here in Australia we see the same thing. Groups like Extinction Rebellion, Blockade Australia are perhaps the best known for these sort of radical approaches to trying to force change on climate in particular.

Archival tape -- Mali Cooper:

"Hi, my name is Mali. I'm 22. I'm currently locked on to a car at the start of the Sydney Harbour Tunnel.”

MIKE:

We saw a very pertinent example recently when a young activist, Mali Cooper, blocked Sydney Harbour Tunnel with a car and then attached a bike lock around their neck and the steering wheel and held up traffic for a while.

Archival tape -- Mali Cooper:

“And some really angry people who were screaming and threatening me and banging on doors. The police are on their way.”

MIKE:

And although Cooper was a traumatised victim of the Lismore floods and live streamed a very eloquent plea I thought for greater action on climate. Most of the media focus of course was on the angry response of other motorists.

Cooper eventually was charged, but the charges were dismissed on mental health grounds because Cooper was deemed to have suffered trauma of the Lismore floods. But there are other protesters who are facing some huge fines and even jail time as a result of criminal charges.

RUBY:

Hmm. Let's talk about that, Mike, because you and I have spoken before about how anti-protest laws are being legislated in various states across the country. But when you take a step back and you survey the landscape across Australia right now, what is it actually like for protesters or would be protesters when they attempt these types of actions?

MIKE:

It's increasingly risky for them to do so. So, yeah, these laws are becoming progressively more draconian over the past few years. You know, they've gone from maybe a fine of a few hundred dollars to several thousands of dollars and potential jail time of maybe a couple of years. As of a couple of months ago, for example, an individual protesting against the destruction of old growth forests in Tasmania faces up to two years in prison and substantial fines. And a community member in Tasmania who obstructs access to a workplace as part of a protest.

You know, something as simple as blocking traffic could face 12 months in prison. And an organisation that supports them may be fined $45,000. So that's the most recent laws in Tasmania.

If we go back a couple of years in 2019, the Palaszczuk Labor Government in Queensland criminalised the use of lock-on devices that protesters had used to, you know, hamper environmentally destructive developments. You know, notably at the Adani coal mine and the new offence there carried a penalty of up to two years jail. And perhaps the most repressive, because of its wide ranging nature was the Roads and Crimes Legislation Amendment Bill of 2022, passed by the New South Wales Parliament about six months ago, which provides for penalties of up to two years in jail and or a $22,000 fine for any disruption to roads, train stations, ports and public and private infrastructure.

So, you know, a very, very broad scope of things that are covered there, which cuts off an awful lot of essentially any protest that inconveniences anyone anywhere, any time. So, you know, there's definitely a big move on, as we can see by authorities to try and shut this kind of protest down.

RUBY:

And as you've been listing off these changes to legislation like, it struck me that all of this has happened in the last couple of years. And, of course, the other thing that's happened in the last few years is that the effects of climate change have become increasingly concrete and it's become more of a mainstream issue, something that people are aware of and are calling for action on. So what should we make of that confluence?

MIKE:

Well, I spoke to Bob Brown about this, you know, the former Greens leader who also 40 odd years ago led the Franklin blockade in Tasmania and has been involved in environmental activism all that time. And his take on it is that governments and the commercial interests that they support are on the defensive about their failure to take necessary action. And they consider that the best defence is attack. So as he said.

Archival tape -- Bob Brown:

“They can't win the argument on the environment, so they have to take out the environmental spokespeople.”

MIKE:

And he says it's not just an Australian thing, it's worldwide.

Archival tape -- Bob Brown:

“And it is tearing at the heartstrings, if not the foundations of environmental groups. As to whether or not we toe the line or we stay out there defending the environment and suffer the consequences.”

MIKE:

I might add that Brown is in no doubt at all that the laws in Tasmania that that provide for $45,000 fine for any organisation that supports a protester is specifically directed at his group, the Bob Brown Foundation, because it is one of the few environmental groups that still actively encourages non-violent civil disobedience.

Archival tape -- Bob Brown:

“I could see that peaceful direct action was an absolute imperative if we're going to protect the environment. And I didn't want to go into an organisation which had already discounted that.”

MIKE:

But you know, its slogan is Action for Earth and its ethos holds that direct action is amongst the most democratic forms of political expression. So these fines directed at organisations would of course, not only directly, you know, impact them by the $45,000 or so in the fine. But what can happen then, of course, is that once they've been involved in a criminal offence that can affect their charitable status and ultimately lead to them being deregistered as an organisation. So there's big, big risks there organisationally for these incorporated environmental groups. So, you know, in Browne's understanding of things, you know, what the proponents of these laws really want is for them to, quote, stand uselessly on the footpath by the side of the road, waving their placards.

You know, while the bulldozers and the log trucks drive past. So, you know, they're doing their very best to chill the whole idea of direct action protest.

RUBY:

We'll be back after this.

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RUBY:

Mike, it seems like what's happening is that there are environmental groups that have been around for a long time. Groups like Greenpeace or the Bob Brown Foundation who have this long standing institutional knowledge of how to run successful campaigns. But these big organisations are increasingly feeling that they can't operate in an activist space that's being so heavily policed, at least in any sort of direct way. So how do these experienced kinds of campaigners view the activists who are now trying to take direct action, who are doing things like throwing mashed potato at a Monet painting?

MIKE:

Well, it's a complex relationship, I think. I mean, I spoke to one senior person at Greenpeace. You know, he said he admired the commitment of these people and their bravery, that they were prepared to run the risk. But his take is that you have to be smart about it. There's no point incurring all these potential penalties if there is no benefit in terms of persuading more people to your cause. And so his assessment is that, you know, this is essentially dumb action that you can take and smart action perhaps gluing your hands to a Picasso is a reasonably smart action because it doesn't put people offside, but it does draw attention to your cause. But he cited, for example, one landmark protest in London several years ago by Extinction Rebellion, in which activists shut down the London Underground by climbing on top of trains.

Archival tape -- BBC Reporter:

“All together three trains were halted by rooftop protests. With other Extinction Rebellion members glueing themselves to trains, commuters couldn’t understand why public transport had become the latest target.”

MIKE:

And it wound up splitting the organisation because some of the people involved were of the view that why would you stop the trains when they actually want more people to take public transport?

Archival tape -- Disgruntled commuter one:

“They’re doing it the wrong way, they’re doing it for the right reasons but they’re doing it the wrong way.”

Archival tape -- Disgruntled commuter two:

“No one should do that regardless of what it is. That’s just out of order and it's not right.”

Archival tape -- Disgruntled commuter Three:

“I think they’ve really shot themselves in the foot to be fair, a lot of people are getting public transport as opposed to getting their own transport.”

MIKE:

And furthermore, why would you disrupt working people on their way to their jobs when the bankers and the people who support the fossil fuel industry probably don't take public transport? So that split the organisation in Britain and wound up with several of the senior people leaving.

So I think there are distinctions to be made between what's smart action and what's not smart, and also between that which directly targets the polluters, i.e. locking yourself onto a piece of logging equipment or a coal facility and those that just target the public. And the latter in the Greenpeace guys view, and I might say in mine is that, you know, you're more likely to irritate people and get negative media if you do those kinds of stunts.

RUBY:

I suppose, Mike, that the issue for this generation of protesters is that they feel that there isn't any time left. The climate crisis is now and they simply don't have the time to organise the infrastructure to take down multinational corporations. And so their actions are instead more about a last ditch plea to avert disaster. And they'll do anything to get that message out to a world that they think just isn't seeing what's right in front of all of us.

MIKE:

Yeah, and I have some sympathy for that position because clearly governments are not acting fast enough. We know what the science tells us, and I think most people are broadly on board with the message that we have to act pretty quickly so I can understand their position. As I mentioned, you know, earlier, we've seen a number of direct actions from Blockade Australia protesters in particular. And I spoke to one of these people, a young man called Max Curmi, who back in March scaled a 60 metre crane at Sydney's Port Botany and suspended himself from it.

Archival tape -- Max Curmi:

“I was over in a protest at Port Botany where I climbed a crane and stopped operations in the port, I guess the maximum penalty for that for being in a waterside area or trespassing in a waterside area or climbing a crane was six months jail.”

MIKE:

And he was prepared to take the consequences. He subsequently pleaded guilty to five charges and was sentenced by a magistrate, Ross Hudson, to four months in jail, plus a 1500 dollars fine. Now, what's interesting is that those penalties were not imposed under the new anti-protest laws.

He ended up being charged with trespass on a railway line which carries a three year jail sentence. And the reason it carries such a serious sentence, obviously, is you don't want people trying to derail trains. But that wasn't what he was doing at all. He just crossed the line to get to the crane that he was going to protest on. But the authorities deliberately went for the more serious and quite incidental charge because it carried the biggest jail sentence. So anyway, he appealed or his lawyers appealed to the district court and the penalty was reduced to a nine month community corrections order. And as he says, you know, the court essentially said that he shouldn't have done jail time, that he was stitched up a bit.

And so, you know, you can see why Curmi sees this chain of events, you know, this selective use of an incidental offence in his initial prosecution. You can see why this has only strengthened his cynicism about the political and legal regime in Australia.

Archival tape -- Max Curmi:

“The way that parliamentary politics works on this continent that there is no meaningful pathway to taking the sort of serious action that we need to say now because it's so deeply corrupt.”

MIKE:

And he just sees no way to effect change other than taking provocative action, peaceful, provocative action, but nonetheless, you know, very disruptive, provocative action.

RUBY:

Mike but do you think that if this continues, that the criminalisation of meeting and organising protest continues, do you think that we're going to end up seeing the end of direct action, at least in any kind of organised way?

MIKE:

I suspect the key words there are organised way. I think that, you know, the big incorporated environment groups will definitely be backing away. But the interesting thing about Blockade Australia is it's not incorporated, it has no hierarchical leadership structure, it's more by way of a movement. So I suspect we will continue to see them take, you know, quite radical forms of protest action. So we'll probably see less of it. But more radical I think is the way I'm reading it at the moment.

So I think we are seeing a big change in the way that protest action is undertaken as to how the current spate of protests involving artworks should be viewed. Well, in one way, maybe it's smart because it gets big publicity for the cause, draws a lot of media to the issue of carbon pollution and climate change, but does no real damage, doesn't inconvenience the public. So at that level, maybe it's smart, but really it's also a bit sad, isn't it, that it doesn't directly impact the polluters, you know, that they reduced to such symbolic acts sort of as a measure of how stymied they are.

On the other hand, I would suggest there is something positive to take from Bob Brown's line that polluters can't win the argument on the environment, so they're going after the environmental spokespeople. The mere fact that we're seeing these draconian laws, I think, is a response to the realisation that they are losing the battle and that in the future I think environment groups will exploit that essentially by going after the money to lead a purposeful life. You don't have to go and be in a tripod in a forest. You can be working within an organisation and saying, hey, we should be divesting ourselves from that fossil fuel company. And we're seeing more and more of that. We're seeing it being taken to the courts, taken to the boardrooms, taken to the markets, and I think that ultimately that will be the more effective way to go.

RUBY:

Mike, thank you so much for talking to me today.

MIKE:

Thank you for having me.

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RUBY:

Also in the news today,

Medibank has confirmed that the data of all 3.9 million customers was exposed in a recent cyber attack.

The health insurer has also admitted it did not have insurance that covers cyber attacks, which means the company will foot a bill between 25 and 35 million dollars, as it responds to the fallout for customers.

And the Australian inflation rate has reached its highest level since 1990, with the latest data showing the consumer prices index has risen 7.3% over the past year.

The Australian Bureau of Statistics said new housing, gas and furniture prices were the biggest contributors to the 1.8 per cent jump in prices during the September quarter.

I’m Ruby Jones, this is 7am. See you tomorrow.

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