Police Minister in a Tither About Climate Activist Workshop, But Not Police Assaults on Civilians

NSW police minister Yasmin Catley is in an uproar after becoming aware that arch climate defence group Rising Tide actually have the gall to be holding a three day Action Camp on Gadigal land in the Sydney suburb of Marrickville commencing on Friday 15 July 2025 and, as the promotional image for the sinister workshop states, it will be all about “building skills and relationships for movement power”.

Rising Tide is a Newcastle-based climate group, which for the last two years has held formidable and successful climate action festivals on Awabakal land at the NSW regional town’s Nobby’s Beach, which have involved everyday concerned citizens taking to Newcastle Harbour on kayaks to block the passage of ships entering or leaving Newcastle Coal Port: the largest coal port on the planet.

“This group has shown to have a downright disregard for the lives of our police and harbour workers,” police minister Catley told the Daily Telegraph on Thursday, 3 July 2025. “It beggars belief that they are planning to coach others on this unlawful behaviour”.

But having attended the last two People’s Blockades of the World’s Largest Coal Port in Newcastle, Sydney Criminal Lawyers can attest to the fact that the nonviolent climate defenders appeared to be more concerned about raising the alarm around the ever-heating planet, than attempting to take the lives of any law enforcement officers, as Catley implies.

Indeed, whilst it would appear that Catley’s expression of outrage was likely prompted by the Murdoch rag raising the issue with her, it does seem like an inopportune time for the minister to be having tantrums about activists, when just last week, on 27 June, some NSW police officers she oversees assaulted multiple protesters at a peaceful rally, some of whom suffered grave injuries.

The truth is any mention of Rising Tide is enough to ruffle the Minns government, because last year, the NSW premier pulled out all the stops to prevent the event going ahead, yet in the end, the nonviolent, usually law-abiding civilians still managed to block a coal ship entering the port on a Sunday, as they breached the NSW antiprotest regime en masse, distinctly eroding its chilling effect.

Activists attempt to brainwash the innocent

Anyone who’s attended the Rising Tide People’s Blockades will confirm they’re squeaky-clean events, and even when participants break the law, they’re still particularly affable in manner, especially in dealing with police, and despite the minister’s assertion of their complete disregard for officer’s lives, in actuality, the protesters only have disregard for the laws that prevent raising the climate alarm.

As the Facebook event page sets out, the three day event is about building connections across social justice movements, as whether an activist’s “focus is in the First Nations, climate, antigenocide, queer, or union movements – or any other struggle for a better world – our needs for relationships of friendship and solidarity, and the skills required to run effective campaigns, are much the same”.

Rising Tide facilitators will be running the 15 to 17 August action camp, which will comprise of workshops and training to share frameworks, skills and strategies, as well as consensus decision-making, which are key to successfully undertaking nonviolent direct actions, such as blocking Newcastle Harbour, especially since the NSW authorities declared war on protesters in 2022.

Catley wasn’t the only NSW pollie to have suffered convulsions on hearing about the action camp, which, as the Murdoch press notes, will be held “right under Anthony Albanese’s nose in his electorate of Grayndler”, as NSW Coalition opposition police spokesperson Paul Toole made clear that the activist workshop is an obvious “brainwashing event” that needs to be “shut down”.

“It’s totally unacceptable that Addi Road is (helping) train groups to disrupt critical infrastructure like protests at the Port of Newcastle,” said Toole, who doesn’t mince words.

Hell on Earth

A decade ago, environmental groups were staging climate actions warning of the heating planet and the dangers of extreme weather to come. At that point in time, politicians, like then Australian PM Tony Abbott, could still get away with denying that the globe was getting kind of hot, but a series heightened climate disasters commencing half a decade ago have made the danger harder to deny.

These days, extreme weather is occurring somewhere around the planet 24/7 all year around. The 2019/20 Black Summer bushfires along the eastern seaboard of this continent brought this home locally, and multiple extreme flooding events across the region ever since has kept that understanding alive.

While in 2024, Earth passed the global heating threshold of 1.5°C above pre-industrial levels for the first time.

PM Albanese came to power in 2022, promising to end the “climate wars”, which obviously didn’t mean ending fossil fuel expansion, as his government has approved more than 30 new coal and gas projects since taking office, and new environment minister Murray Watt has just approved a 40 year extension of the North West Shelf gas project in WA, which is the nation’s largest fossil fuel bomb.

Since US president Donald Trump came to office in January, he has made concerted efforts to expand fossil fuel production and remove regulations to protect climate, and he in no way even tried to deny climate change, as it is implicit that his new measures do destroy the planet and his administration doesn’t give a damn, which is an attitude likely to be conveniently adopted by other nations soon.

The criminalisation of protest

The Perrottet Coalition government enacted the NSW antiprotest regime in April 2022, which outlawed unauthorised protests that obstruct major roads, tunnels and bridges, along with major facilities, via threat of up to 2 years imprisonment and/or fines of $22,000. And NSW Labor, then led by now NSW premier Chris Minns, enthusiastically waved through these draconian laws.

This was in response to rising climate protests in and around Sydney and Newcastle, and the laws did initially have the desired chilling effect. And the other noted effect the regime immediately had was it emboldened NSW police officers to let loose on nonviolent climate defenders, in the same manner that they do when they throw out the rule book in pursuing organised criminals.

But despite a series of overbearing attempts by the NSW premier to prevent the 2024 Rising Tide’s People’s Blockade, which were shown to be unlawful, the protest action went ahead, and it saw over 200 regular citizens block the waterway into Newcastle Coal Port, despite the fact that it is considered a major facility and they could be sent away for up to 2 years because of that.

So, the chilling effect that a two year maximum prison sentence has had on concerned citizens in respect of taking climate action is starting wane in face of the knowledge that the sky is really about to fall in.

The Minns government in February enacted further laws building upon the NSW antiprotest regime, which make it an offence to obstruct a place of worship, and provided NSW police with the power to issue move on orders to disperse an assembly or protest that’s simply near a place of worship, with what “near” means left undefined in law and open to the learned interpretation of police officers.

Further, last week’s NSW police response to a 27 June protest on Bidjigal land in Belmore, which involved nonviolent pro-Palestinian protesters demonstrating against SEC Plating, a company whose products are used in the production of F-35 fighter jets that are used in Gaza, set a new precedent that when police are confronted by protesters they’re now emboldened to beat and assault them.

So, while police minister Catley and shadow police minister Toole are getting flustered with the August Rising Tide Action Plan workshop, they needn’t bother, because this year the Minns government has a two-step foolproof strategy in attempting to foil the People’s Blockade.

Firstly, the NSW premier can order it not to go ahead because there are multiple churches in Newcastle that are basically near the waterway, and for those who do show up on the beach in breach of that order, the state government can then rely on the boys and girls in blue to beat the nonviolent protesters into submission and ensure that no kayaks take to the waterway that weekend.

If you are interested in attending the Rising Tide Action Camp to help save the planet, you can RSVP your attendance here