The Government must strengthen protection for Western Australian reefs and reinstate marine parks to help combat worsening coral bleaching, Australian Greens Senator Rachel Siewert said today.

Chair of the Senate Select Committee into the Scrutiny of Government Budget Measures and Greens Senator for Tasmania, Senator Peter Whish-Wilson, provides the following comments on the release of the Senate Inquiry Report into the CSIRO budget cuts.

Greens spokesperson for Whaling, Senator Peter Whish-Wilson, says that the Turnbull Government is doing more to protect the Japanese whalers from public scrutiny than it is doing to protect minke whales from being slaughtered in Australia’s whale sanctuary. The Government has refused a FOI request from Sea Shepherd Australia and the NSW EDO.

The Senate has supported a Greens motion calling on the Government to address coral bleaching and reinstate our world leading system of marine parks.

The Environment and Communications Reference Committee will be holding a hearing in Adelaide TOMORROW as part of its inquiry, established by Greens Senator for South Australia Robert Simms, into oil or gas production in the Great Australian Bight.

Greens Senator for Tasmania and Chair of the Senate Select Committee into the Scrutiny of Government Budget Measures, Senator Peter Whish-Wilson, will use tomorrow’s hearing into CSIRO cuts to get to the bottom of the supposed final job loss numbers announced today.

With increasing evidence that coral bleaching is occurring off the coast of the Kimberley Australian Greens Senator Rachel Siewert is calling on the Government to urgently reinstate marine parks.

Greens Senator for South Australia Robert Simms says shareholders should raise concerns with BP over its environmentally risky plan to drill for oil in the Great Australian Bight.

BP is holding its Annual General Meeting today in London. A Climate Analytics report also released today stated an oil spill would be "devastating for South Australia's $442 million fishing industry and its tourism industries in coastal regions, worth more than $1 billion and decimate the rich and many endangered creatures of this ocean".

The Australian Greens welcome news the co-founder and project manager for ‘Shark Spotters’, a successful non-lethal shark mitigation program from Cape Town, has been crowdfunded to visit Australia in early March.