New whales envoy must take firm stance

"It's encouraging that Sandy Holloway has already had discussions with key Japanese officials, and intends to visit Japan again before the whaling fleet departs," said Steve Shallhorn, Greenpeace Australia Pacific CEO.

Greenpeace urges Mr Hollway to do all he can to halt the departure of the whaling fleet, and to register concerns about the Japanese government's plans to build a new whaling factory ship to replace the aging and fire-damaged Nisshin Maru.

"Mr Hollway can have confidence that he has the backing of the vast majority of Australians who want to see an end to whaling in Antarctic waters," said Steve Shallhorn. "Especially since the latest Lowy Institute Poll revealed that nearly 60% of Australians want our government to do more to pressure Japan to stop all whaling, even at the risk of losing valuable trade deals."

Mr Hollway can also stress to Japanese officials that public awareness in Japan of the whaling issue has grown considerably in the past two years. During the whale hunting season in January this year, the Greenpeace Japan website received 1000 hits an hour, with concerned Japanese citizens speaking out against their government's whaling practices in the Southern Ocean: 

         "There is no national consensus on wasting taxpayer's money to make    whales a source of protein,"
         "Whaling is not a Japanese tradition. There is no need to conduct whaling under the name of research when there is an oversupply of whale and the demand is unlikely to increase. It makes me angry that Japan goes against global convention (...). We should stop whaling immediately."
http://www.greenpeace.org/international/news/fake-science-exposed180108/Whaling-receives-criticism200108

Although it's now 10 months since the ALP government announced it intended to appoint a special whales envoy, Sandy Hollway is a good choice for the job.

As  (CEO) of the Sydney Organising Committee for the Olympic Games (SOCOG), Mr Hollway was supportive of environmental intitiatives to achieve the first ever Green Games. He met with Greenpeace a number of times to achieve positive outcomes including: Sydney's Olympics were the first games to ensure all spectators took public transport; the first green powered Olympics, and used cutting edge sustainable design of the Athletes Village.
http://www.greenpeace.org/australia/solutions/green-olympics/wins-and-losses