One Nation senators are holding a party meeting on the Great Barrier Reef on Friday afternoon to counteract claims that the reef is dead. But they are holding it more than 1000km from where the most severe coral bleaching crisis on record has had its greatest impact.
A spokesperson for senator Malcolm Roberts, a noted climate change skeptic, sent out an invitation for journalists to join the senators for a party meeting on the reef, after which One Nation leader Pauline Hanson will take her fellow senators for a swim.
"You can’t miss senator Hanson and her colleagues getting in a wet suit! This will be the most Aussie footage of the year," the invite states.
"We wish to highlight to the world that the Great Barrier Reef is alive and well. We have feedback from international bodies and local tourist operators that there has been a sharp down turn [sic] in tourism because various groups have lied and declared the GBR ‘dead’."
The party meeting will be held on Great Keppel Island, off the coast of Yeppoon in central Queensland, which is over 1000km from the epicentre of the bleaching crisis on Lizard Island, which sits 260km north of Cairns.
Coral bleaching occurs when abnormal water conditions, such as rising temperatures, expel tiny photosynthetic algae called zooxanthellae, turn the coral white.
The reef was hit by the worst bleaching crisis on record in early 2016 with 93% of coral surveyed affected. Follow up surveys have found that many of the affected corals are now completely dead.
Professor Lesley Hughes, a councillor with the Climate Council, an independent not-for-profit dedicated to fighting climate change, says that if One Nation is serious about the reef's health, it would show journalists the true extent of the bleaching crisis.
"Taking people to Great Keppel Island to show that the reef is ok is just extraordinarily misleading, and I don't see how anybody could possibly fall for that," Hughes told BuzzFeed News.
"I don't know what their motivation is other than to continue on their climate skepticism tack."
Hughes said the Climate Council's message has never been that the reef is "dead" or that tourists should stop visiting.
"We're not trying to stop people from coming, but we're making the point that [the bleaching crisis] is a window into the future. Simply by putting your head in the sand and pretending everything is ok will only hasten the reef's demise."
A spokesperson for senator Roberts declined to comment "until after inspecting the reef, talking to experts and meeting with tourists operators being decimated by Green lies."
BuzzFeed News will update this story if the senator responds to our questions.