Kabay Tamu: Meet the councillor on the frontline of Australia’s fight against climate change
An emerging First Nations leader, whose community faces the threat of being lost to climate change, is pleading for more action to lower greenhouse gas emissions and save his island home.
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An emerging First Nations leader, whose community faces the threat of being lost to climate change, is pleading for more action to lower greenhouse gas emissions and save his island home.
Kabay Tamu was one of eight Torres Strait Islanders who filed a complaint with a United Nations committee in 2019, arguing that the Australian government had violated their human rights by failing to act on climate change.
In 2022, the UN’s Human Rights Committee found in their favour but Mr Tamu, who also serves as a councillor for the Torres Strait Island Regional Council, said the area’s low-lying islands were still under threat.
“We’re still enaged with the government, trying to build that relationship and address a lot of the issues that we have,” Mr Tamu said.
Building seawalls to protect the islands from rising sea levels was an urgent priority.
“We’ve got seawalls that haven’t been built on Warraber,” Mr Tamu said.
“There are other communities that are heavily impacted as well. Probably around the middle of next year, sea walls will start to be built near Warraber.
“It’s something that will protect our community in the short-term.”
TSIRC is currently seeking $250m over five years as part of a strategic plan to upgrade its roads, jetties, barge ramps, runways and dredging.
But further investment must be met with a commitment to fight climate change, Mr Tamu said.
“The case (with the UNHRC) was really about holding the government accountable to actually take real steps towards what they signed up for in the Paris Agreement,” he said.
“That’s reducing emissions, transitioning to renewables.
“It was a fight for the Torres Strait to have these defence measures like sea walls.
“But we’re fighting for the rest of the country as well and the whole planet.”
Works on a one-kilometre seawall for Poruma were completed earlier this year to mitigate flooding and coastal erosion.
The central island is one of five communities to benefit from a $40m seawall package co-funded by the state and federal government.
The Albanese government was committed to working on climate change, a federal government spokeswoman said.
“We’ve lifted our country’s 2030 emission reduction target by more than half, from 26 per cent to 43 per cent and have enshrined that target, together with net zero, in the law of the land,” the spokeswoman said.
“Australia’s emissions projections shows that material progress is being made to meet our emissions reduction target of 43 per cent below 2005 levels by 2030 and we are well on track to meet that target.”
Queensland Environment Minister Andrew Powell said he hoped to further protect remote islands facing coastal erosion and inland flooding from being lost.
“I am keen to listen to the local authorities and communities and work with them to deliver these projects,” said Mr Powell.
The Commonwealth funds a range of climate adaptation and mitigation initiatives in the region, including establishing the Torres Strait and Northern Peninsula Area Climate Resilience Centre — a $15.9m investment over six years.
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Originally published as Kabay Tamu: Meet the councillor on the frontline of Australia’s fight against climate change
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