In this interview, Dr Peter Ridd appeared on ADH TV with David Flint to discuss the IPA’s research on the Great Barrier Reef.
All media appearances posted onto the IPA website are directly related to the promotion and dissemination of IPA research.
Below is a transcript of the interview.
David Flint:
My next guest is Peter Ridd, Chairman of the Australian Environmental Foundation, who previously was a professor at James Cook University. Welcome, Peter.
Peter Ridd:
Thanks very much.
David Flint:
Thank you for coming on. You had a piece in The Australian, Peter, which caught my eye. It came out on the 12th of August, and it was headlined, “The Great Barrier Reef is in rude health, but why let facts get in the way?” And then you went on to say the record coral coverage on the Great Barrier Reef across the past three years is not mentioned in the latest scientific consensus statement just released by the CSIRO. Well, that’s extraordinary. Could you tell us about that?
Peter Ridd:
Yeah. So, the Great Barrier Reef, for the last three years, on statistics from the Australian Institute of Marine Science, the last three years has had more coral on the Great Barrier Reef in every one of those three years than in every one of the previous 35 years. So this, despite supposedly all this coral that was killed by those catastrophic bleaching events in 2016, ’17, 2020 and 2022, and 2024 for that matter. And the incredible thing is that they want to bury this very inconvenient fact.
So this latest report, which is largely CSIRO, but in fact it goes right up to the Australian chief scientist was involved in this, all the big coral reef organisations, even in the 100-page summary, 100 pages of stuff about the reef, the condition of the reef, they somehow managed to forget that the reef has got record amounts of coral. And of course you know exactly why they don’t want to talk about that, because it basically disproves the whole hypothesis that we lost a whole lot of coral during those bleaching events.
David Flint:
You also mentioned that the record coral coverage wasn’t mentioned by the minister when she was talking about this.
Peter Ridd:
Yes, the Minister Plibersek. When she was negotiating with UNESCO, because they’re blackmailing us to list the Great Barrier Reef as endangered, she had to write a grovel letter to them, and she doesn’t even mention the fact that the reef is at record amounts of coral. So she was in this ridiculous position that she was saying, “Please don’t list it as endangered,” but she doesn’t use the most important fact, which is that we’ve got record amounts of coral. And of course all her scientific organisations are saying, “Well, it is endangered.” Now, it’s not. But her scientific organisations, like CSIRO, are saying it’s endangered. AIMS is saying it’s endangered. All the universities are saying it’s endangered. She’s now writing a letter to UNESCO to not list it as endangered, but she won’t use the most important fact to prove that. So it’s just a completely ridiculous situation.
David Flint:
You say that probably the most disappointing matter, and I can well-understand this, has been the media, apart from The Australian and a few outlets such as Sky, and of course this outlet too. But apart from these, you’ve had problems with the media. In fact, you made a tremendous offer, did you not, to the media to do something whereby they could find out the truth.
Peter Ridd:
Exactly. I mean, I’ve been frustrated now for five or six years. I know that I’m blacklisted by the ABC. They won’t talk to me about my views on the reef, despite having 35 years working on the reef. By the way, I know that I’ve been blacklisted, because I’ve been told by an ABC journalist that that’s the case. Now, he was fairly, well, it was she actually, was pretty disappointed by that, but that is just the case.
What we tried to do was say, okay, what we’ll do is, the Australian Environment Foundation, we will offer a few journalists a trip up to the Great Barrier Reef and we’ll say, “We’ll go to any reef you like in the Cairns region, even ones that are supposedly damaged by bleaching, and you can even bring along your pet scientist who reckons that the reef is in a catastrophic condition, and we’ll have a little bit of a debate on the boat.” And if I’m wrong, then presumably this other scientist will tear me to shreds and we’ll have a good think.
Well, of course, none of these journalists, these are journalists who’ve previously written pieces from the ABC, from the Saturday paper, Sydney Morning Herald, saying how the reef is in such a diabolical condition, but they won’t even come up to the reef and discuss the matter. And quite frankly, we know why, because they’re just doing an ideological thing. They don’t want to let facts get in the way of their story, so that’s why they rejected it. But it just shows you the corruption, that’s not just essentially in science, but the corruption that’s also in the mainstream media outlets.
David Flint:
That’s bad enough, isn’t it, in relation to the private media. They at least are not being paid for by the taxpayer, but I find it appalling that the ABC would be blacklisting you. Well, what’s your view of that? I thought the ABC should be a national broadcaster trying to broadcast the truth.
Peter Ridd:
And of course that’s exactly what it should be. And I think if you go back 30 or 40 years ago, that’s what it was. But I mean, my view on the ABC or the BBC, I was brought up at a time when we only watched the ABC on television when I was a young fella. We lived in Africa for a while, and my father, I was English, and we’d listen to the BBC on the shortwave radio. So the status of the ABC and the BBC, for me as a young fella, these were utterly trustworthy organisations which you had such a lot of respect for. But now, I just regard the ABC and the BBC, which is actually even worse, if that’s possible. I regard them with utter contempt. That’s really what they deserve now. They’re not doing their job and they’ve become ideological hard-left apologists for the left-wing.
David Flint:
You were shockingly treated by your former university. What is the foundation that you’re heading now? How does it differ from other organisations which also include the word environmental in their title?
Peter Ridd:
Yeah, it’s the Australian Environment Foundation, and we’re essentially a group that was set up about 20 years ago to look at environmental problems facing farmers. So, farmers are accused of all sorts of terrible things. So the farmers are accused of killing the Great Barrier Reef, for instance, destroying the Murray-Darling, and all these things are completely untrue. So it was set up essentially as a farmer-friendly conservation group. So we completely want to make sure that the rural environment is a good environment, but on the other hand, we want it based on actual science, not ideology dressed up as science.
So one of the things which we’re trying to do at the moment is get established within the systems of science through the government to get science checking done. So one of the problems we’ve got is that the science organisations, you saw what happened to me, was I stood up and said, “Hey, the reef is fine.” There was a whole coral reef nearby, and which they said there was no coral. And we went down and we said, “Well, we can photograph acres of coral. How did this go wrong?” And of course that got me into terrible trouble. I was being uncollegial, pointing out these mistakes, and I was disrespectful, pointing out they couldn’t even find a coral reef.
What’s happened with science is that dissenters can’t speak, and of course dissent is utterly essential, especially in science. So what we want in the Australian Environment Foundation, also with my work with the Institute of Public Affairs, is there needs to be a formalised systems of science, what we call red teams. So if a bit of science is going to be used for public policy, “We’re going to stop the cane farmers here applying nitrogen fertiliser in certain concentrations,” which is actually happening. We want to know, is that based on solid science? Now, I can tell you it’s not. But the problem is that they can just ignore somebody like me, but they couldn’t ignore a government-organised science red team. It might be set up within the Productivity Commission, or who knows what, that would actually investigate these things.
David Flint:
And before you go, can you tell us where people can read more about this and whether you think you are winning in trying to get the truth out?
Peter Ridd:
Look, I’m sure we are winning. I think we turned the corner just a few years ago.
David Flint:
Good.
Peter Ridd:
More and more people are a bit upset about some of the scientific things, and also the silencing of dissent, not just in science but in so many. So I’ve no doubt we are winning. Most of the stuff, if you want to look at what we do, is actually on a channel called the Reef Rebels channel, which I put out. So we do an awful lot of the stuff on where science is actually failing us.
David Flint:
That’s a YouTube channel, is it?
Peter Ridd:
Yeah, that’s a YouTube channel called Reef Rebels. Or you can go to the Australian Environment Foundation website where we’ve got some information.
David Flint:
Australian Environment Foundation website and Reef Rebels. If they Google in Reef Rebels YouTube, that will find the channel?
Peter Ridd:
It certainly will. And we’ve got a lot of stuff on there on where the scientific institutions are failing us on climate or the Great Barrier Reef, and many other things.
David Flint:
Peter Ridd, I’d like to thank you for the service that you’ve given to the Australian nation and to science generally, and the way in which you’ve been willing to sacrifice all sorts of things, including your university career, in the search for truth. You are really a great Australian. Thank you very much.
Peter Ridd:
It’s been my pleasure actually, and thanks for inviting me.
David Flint:
Good.
This transcript with Dr Peter Ridd talking on ADH TV Save The Nation from 15 August 2024 has been edited for clarity.
