The Australian Wooden Boat Festival board banned Sea Shepherd Australia from having a stall at this year's festival in Hobart (see link below for correspondence). The board has written to Sea Shepherd claiming it is 'political' and had the potential to 'harm the reputation' of the festival.

Nevertheless, the board accommodated stalls from the companies involved in the highly political and contentious fish farming industry as well as other non-government organisations.

Sea Shepherd Australia spokesperson Adam Burling said that "The festival board itself had made the accreditation of stall-holders a political issue. Sea Shepherd members are bewildered by the discrimination which follows a similar exclusion in 2015. One thing the festival board got right is that Sea Shepherd enjoys the broad support of many of the Australian Wooden Boat Festival members."

A great many local supporters of Sea Shepherd had enjoyed the festival, Burling said. "People were asking where our stall was. However, to avoid any contention during the festival, Sea Shepherd has not raised the issue until the festival was over and most visitors have departed. Now we feel the public has a right to know about the ban."

Read the actual correspondence

This is what one of our festival stalls looks like. Hardly political. Our volunteers staff these almost every weekend across the country. Sea Shepherd has never been banned from an event before.