G'day Anthony James here for The RegenNarration, your ad-free, freely available, listener-supported podcast exploring how people are regenerating the systems and stories we live by.

I've come to Walyalup, Fremantle, this morning, at the mouth of Derbal Yerrigan Swan River in WA, because Tim Winton's in town to launch his new book.

Tim's awards would fill a book themselves now.

He's regarded by many as the pre-eminent Australian writer of his generation and he's come to town today to launch his first picture book in more than 20 years and the first non-fiction picture book for children about Ningaloo Reef, the world heritage treasure, a thousand kilometres and some north of us.

Here it's called Ningaloo: Australia's wild wonder, spectacularly illustrated by award-winning Perth local Cindy Lane, and as it happens, it launches at the best and worst of times up at the reef.

Let's head into the legendary local independent publisher Fremantle Press for a chat about it all.

I don't know if you've ever met.

Did you meet him?

Oh, I think we've met before G'day Tim.

How are you, mate?

Nice to see you.

Yeah, I think we met at another book launch actually, and then our chats have been.

You were in Sydney for your for Breath the first time you were in a fan club somewhere, that's right.

Yeah, in bloody by Sun Drive Riverbed heading up your way, and then the next time was just online.

But yeah, great to see you, mate.

So, um, back doing your favorite thing media and events.

How's it feel?

familiar new book.

Yeah, I always appreciate talking to you, mate, so I think it's not at all.

It's terrific to have the time taking the interest.

All right, mate.

So we're here because you're launching your new book, ningaloo, australia's wild wonder.

Well done, I'm really happy to see it looks awesome.

It's different, though.

All right, mate.

So we're here because you're launching your new book, ningaloo, australia's Wild Wonder.

Well done, I'm really happy to see it.

It looks awesome.

It's different, though.

Huh, you haven't done a kid's picture book, the publisher tells me, for over 20 years, and nor has there been a non-fiction kid's picture book from Ningaloo ever, from what I understand.

So how did this come about?

I'm just trying to figure that out myself.

How did it come to this?

I don't know.

I think we've been.

You know, I've been studying Ningaloo and visiting Ningaloo and advocating for it, for, you know, 25 years, 30 years, and I've done a lot of stuff in different spaces.

You know whether that's public advocacy.

I've written speeches.

I've done a lot of stuff in different spaces you know whether that's public advocacy.

I've written speeches, I've written essays, I've written fiction, you know, with Juice, which is essentially a very bleak nightmare vision of what Ningaloo could look like if we lose the battle and abrogate our responsibilities.

And I've, you know, I've written lose the battle and abrogate our responsibilities, and I've written three parts of a television series on the natural history for the ABC.

So I guess this is a new space in the sense that it's for young people specifically, and so I guess we've amassed a lot of knowledge and a lot of information and a lot of experience about Ningaloo and it seemed that the best place to take that stuff was to the young, given that they're going to be the custodians of the place.

And also I have spent a lot of time trying to convince old people in power to change their thinking.

And, you know, not without some success, but you are up against the educations that they've had and the mindset that they've grown up with and their attitudes, which are essentially, you know, exploitative and extractive.

And so in the end I just thought, well, essentially you know exploitative and extractive.

And so in in the end I just thought, well, you know, it's probably smart to take this information to young people and be a part of their education and their and their formation, and to arm them with the natural history, the data and the social history of the place, so to show them the wonders of Ningaloo and its three ecosystems, but also to show them that this stuff doesn't stand in isolation, that the fact that it's intact now is no accident, that this is the result of ordinary people's efforts to change government policy, to change the culture and to essentially save the place, which is what happened.

And I think in some publishing settings you'd be under pressure to just stick to the quote-unquote facts.

But the facts about what animals are there and how the animals relate to the ecosystem and how the ecosystems relate to one another, that's not all the facts I mean.

The facts include how this thing came to be in a geological sense, but also how it came.

You know it comes to still exist, and that's a social reality that is too easily overlooked or somehow erased from the picture.

So I think it it's about acknowledging the wonder and the miraculous nature of what's there and to inspire young people with a sense of awe and excitement, but for them to also get enough sense of empowerment where they can do something similar in their world and in their future.

Ningaloo is the one place where we got things right by and large, compared to, for instance, in the northwest of Western Australia.

It's the exception to the rule.

The rule is complete exploitation, development and landscapes that are completely unrecognisable.

You know, and we're seeing that being played out.

You know now at Murrajuga.

You know, where you have some of the social and natural wonders of the world having to coexist, you know, with really destructive industrial activities.

So we should celebrate Ningaloo for its exceptionality and show kids that this is what can happen when people get together and defend a place and and have a different ethic about custodianship and a shared sense of responsibility to a place.

I'd love to come back to a few of those threads, tim, though immediately I'm filled with curiosity.

Even just the documentary project that you alluded to a couple of years ago when we last spoke.

That, when we spoke, had almost killed you Out of your comfort zone.

Various things happen, you end up with multiple roles and you pull off an extraordinary thing, but it took a toll, it's fair to say.

I'm wondering a project like this, does it have the opposite effect, or is it still a production thing that takes its toll, or was this a bit of a different beast?

Look, it's a shorter project, so the toll is different and it's all work.

It's all labour, but it's probably a kinder process.

You'd like to think so?

It's probably a kind of process, um, you'd like to think so yeah, and, and it's um, I think it's uh a way of the way of getting our revs in.

Yeah, that's right, donuts in freo.

That's why we're inside um, no, I think.

I think it's a.

It's a, it's a fresh look at the at the same issue, and I think it's when you can put beauty back in the frame and that's where Cindy's artwork comes in.

So I'm trying to arm the book and the reader with the facts, with natural history and social history, but really it has to be beautiful and I think that's.

You know Cindy was the right person and you know her practice is really interesting.

She's a watercolourist.

She makes sure that.

You know, when she's painting mangroves she uses mangrove water in the mix and when she's doing the stuff on the reef, she's using seawater.

No way.

Yeah, so that's just part of her practice and it brings a kind of an organic element of connectedness and respect.

So beauty is important.

I think we overlook that at our peril.

And so we're both artists.

And you know even though I've been, you know, like a long-term activist there's no point in hectoring people, whether they're young or they're old, because they switch off, and if you can't put something beautiful in front of people to inspire them, you've already lost half the battle, you know.

So I guess my position, you know, as a grandfather of six, is that you know, the world is a miracle and we need to be reminding ourselves and making that knowledge, that miraculousness, available to young people, to show them how exceptional not just Ningaloo is, but our existence as a species.

You know, this is really important and I think we overlook that and that makes us poorer, and I think you know we are, you know, subject to our own anguish and our own anxiety, particularly around climate and biodiversity loss and there are many things to mourn.

But I think we become poorer and weaker and are less armed for the struggle if we forget about wonder and the miraculousness of existence, you know.

I note tonight at the launch that Fiona Stanley will be helping to launch it.

How did that come about?

I asked if she might be interested.

I know that you know Fiona as a senior, not just a public person but a medical practitioner.

She's in the space of children's health.

She's vitally concerned about the future of the planet and the future of young people and the health of young people, particularly the climate.

She's also been a long-time supporter of Protect Ningaloo, the campaign that we've been inventing and then running and supporting for all these years.

So it seemed like a good fit.

It's Perth.

She's an establishment figure, but not your usual Perth establishment figure in the sense of she's not.

Fiona doesn't see herself in the role of perpetually defending the status quo, and in Perth, you know, in the media and in politics, most people are invested in defending the status quo, which usually means vested, political and, you know, corporate interests, and Fiona's a standout in that sense, which is probably what makes her a little bit spiky and unpopular in certain parts of, you know, perth culture.

Yeah, it occurs to me that her front row seat to kids and their worsening health since she founded the Kids Institute in 1990, and still ongoing, and you know mental, emotional as much as physical, and how they all tie in her front row seat to that.

I mean you mentioned being a granddad before.

When I see her and when I listen to her speak, that's what I feel.

I feel that she's charged by that and in a sense representing that.

And to see her at the launch, it made perfect sense, yeah, I mean, it's skin in the game, isn't it?

You know, and I think if you've lived long enough and you've seen things at work long enough and you can see the trends and the impoverishment of our young people in terms of health and mental health in the midst of our really unbelievable prosperity and just the mix of those you know.

So, look, I think you know I'm really grateful that Fiona's going to launch the book and I think it's a good mix.

Yeah, I think so too.

I'm looking forward to it.

All right, I want to tie back in some threads to where we started, and as much because when I was coming down, I'm thinking about Juice being your previous book and this and how distinct they are.

And then and then coming back from overseas only recently and keeping tabs and and hearing the news about the declaration of the marine park in Ningaloo, but then also the mass bleaching, this best and worst of times thing I sort of see placed on everything.

But I'm wondering, from your point of view, can you tell us a bit about, as you've been up there and working at all this, what the state is with that new marine park?

What does it mean?

And then, on the flip side, yeah, how the reef is looking.

Yeah.

So I mean, obviously it's terrific news that the West Australian government has committed formally to giving Exmouth Gulf, the entirety of Exmouth Gulf, marine park status, because that was our position and that was what we'd been advocating for for 10 years, and that 30% of the Gulf would be, you know, given over to sanctuary status, which is, you know, really important.

So for those of us who've been fighting that fight and trying to convince decision makers to make this step, it's, it's, it's been terrific, it really is progress, because we're essentially trying to, you know, complete unfinished business from the middle of the last decade.

Exmouth Gulf should have been part of the Ningaloo World Heritage Area.

It was initially listed inside the boundary, but vested interests made sure that it was carved out, and so this is a little bit of justice, this is a little bit of catch-up.

It's infuriating that it should have to take so much extra, you know, a decade of extra energy and effort and funding from the community to produce this outcome.

But it's a good thing and I think it's encouraging that at least in this space, the West Australian government has, you know, seen itself free to make the right decision, you know when, so often they can look as if they're constrained by obligations to other interests.

Well you mentioned Murujuga before.

Yeah, just declared world heritage.

Yeah, and extension of gas plant to 2070.

Yeah, so you know, so we're making, we're still making progress at Ningaloo in terms of spatial protection, and that's something to celebrate.

Because you have to celebrate the winds, because they're not always that frequent, you know 100%.

You have to celebrate the wins, because they're not always that frequent, you know A hundred percent.

And just for context, for those who aren't aware, listeners who aren't aware there was well deluge is that overstating it?

But just a lot of industrial pushes, various kinds that have had to be fended off and worked through to come to this outcome.

It is a huge outcome.

Yeah, no, it was huge.

2005, we knocked off the Straits salt, the Annery salt proposal.

2017, we had to knock off the subsea seven oil and gas pipeline launching facility.

Then we, you know, last year knocked off the K plus S the world's, you know, biggest salt producer.

They had another massive salt facility plant.

You know, last year knocked off the K plus S the world's, you know, biggest salt producer.

They had another massive um salt facility plant.

You know the size of the of Sydney Um and uh.

So to knock those out of the way and then to get the park has been great.

You know, what most people won't still realise is that we're still facing the threat of the deepwater port, smack dab in the middle of the marine park which they're still hoping to get up at Quailing Pool, which is now going to be a Class A reserve.

So, you know, obviously they still have ambitions to get a little carve out and we're obviously going to make sure that that doesn't happen.

But you know, if ever there was a company that couldn't read the room, it would be them.

So it's not to say that we've won the battle there, but we, we just have to make sure that, you know, we get proper protection and that that there's no um, somehow sweetheart deal.

You know it's not as if that doesn't ever happen in western australia.

Well, that's been a.

You know, that's been a a great bunch of results.

But in the face of all of that, yeah, as you say, we've had to go through the worst bleaching event in Ningaloo's history and that was very painful.

You know, last year, the beginning of summer, I was part of an expedition to go to Scott Reef, which was a big adventure for us and I thought it might be fun, but it turned out to be a very bittersweet experience.

We travelled 400km north of Broome.

We were closer to the island of Roti in East Timor than we were to the Kimberley by the time we got right out there and this huge underwater skyscraper comes to the surface at Scott Reef.

It's amazing.

And we, just from the moment we jumped in the water, I just knew everything was wrong.

It was 36 degrees, oh, wow and uh.

And so I knew that.

You know we were getting in the water at the top end of a marine heat wave.

You know, we knew that all the you know all that water is going to come south because that's part of the, the luan current and sure enough, um you enough, as I drove south from that experience.

Once we got back to Beagle Bay and drove back down the highway, I felt like I was being chased by a bushfire and that's really what it was.

It was an underwater bushfire that came all the way down the coast and a few weeks later, the Kimberley Corals started bleaching, the Rowley Shoals started bleaching.

The Rowley shoals, you know, were 90-something percent bleached.

30,000 fish died in one fish kill in the Pilbara.

And then, you know, ningaloo just had, you know, its most catastrophic bleaching event a few weeks after that, which is still continuing because the water is cooled.

But, um, the problem we have now is that, um, uh, at the end of winter and the beginning of summer, we normally expect water temperatures to be at their absolute coolest.

Um, but we will start next summer with, um, warm to hot water.

So that's, we're already going summer with warm to hot water.

So that's, we're already going to start from too hot.

And you know so, the bleaching was really an enormous shock to people studying and living there and people who love the place.

You know, it's quite devastating to see it.

We don't yet know the extent to which, how much we'll recover, you know, and it's not, it's mostly the northern part of the reef.

Coral Bay South was luckier, but it's still a huge.

If ever we needed a wake up call.

Luckier, but it's still a huge.

If ever we needed a wake-up call and there's been this sense of immunity a false sense of immunity on on the west coast about marina heat waves and coral bleaching, because it's.

You know, what happens at the great barrier reef seems to be oh, that's over there and poor old great barrier reef, lucky for us.

But it's not going to happen because we do have a cold current, but even the cold Ningaloo current, which comes upward from the south, wasn't enough to cool this huge underwater bushfire that was just devastating the environment.

So it's something that we have to use as a pivot.

Do we want this to be the future?

Because if we don't take urgent and serious and substantial action now, these kind of marine heat waves will be, if not an annual event at every few years, to the point where no reef can recover.

At the moment we're on track to three degrees, just short of three degrees heating, which is catastrophic.

You know the world is trying to keep global heating to 1.5 degrees and we're kind of on track to overshoot that by a long way, and that just means you, you know, the death of world's corals.

And if we're okay with that, that's fine.

But you know it's not just about the coral reefs of the world.

You know, I think australians don't understand that at two degrees, 2.7, 2.9, three degrees the whole north of australia will out.

You will have climate refugees from within our borders, let alone from outside our borders, and all those people in the north.

You won't be able to live.

You know, if it's 55 degrees every day, I know what 50 degrees feels like.

It's terrifying and the idea that it could be like that for weeks at a time.

People can't live that way, let alone produce food.

No, that's right.

And so people will just have to come south.

You know, and it's all very well to say you can stop the boats, how are you going to stop the utes?

So you know it's just going to be people, and the most consequential part of that tragedy will be the dispossession, probably permanent dispossession, of First Peoples from country.

And you know that would be worse than colonisation.

If you can't, if your obligations are to country, and you can't physically be there because it doesn't support human life anymore, what species of grief are we looking at that's?

exactly where I wanted to go next, in fact, knowing that there'd been joint management declared at the reef and wonderful process and genuine process with First Nations and your documentary project of course featured some profound interactions and finds in the digs, in the caves, that were so emotional and portrayed in the documentary, so it's well worth seeing.

For those who haven't seen it, I'm wondering in a sense, how have the relationships continued to form over the last couple of years and also how they might be feeling and seeing this from their perspective.

Always hard to talk for them, of course, but given you're here with me and I haven't been back for a couple of years, what's your sense of it?

yeah, I think.

I think, in terms of a conservation alliance, um, a mutual effort, this is, you know, quite a special case now.

I mean, you know, the Ningaloo custodians only got native title determination in 2019.

So we've been able to, you know, watch this in real time as people came back to country.

So, you know, the Ningaloo Coast now has joint management.

The Duralia Station has been returned to First Peoples for joint management as a conservation park, which is, you know, quite a big addition to the conservation estate, and the declaration of the marine park in Exmouth Gulf as a jointly managed asset is a part of that.

I think if it hadn't been for the alliance of conservation interests and science interests and custodians, first peoples, then it would have been a different process and, I think, a less successful process.

So that's been a great thing to see.

That's not something that we saw 25 years ago when we were fighting the original Save Ningaloo campaign.

So I see that as a really important evolution and a sign of progress.

I think Ningaloo's First Peoples are feeling empowered, but embattled, if I can put it that way.

I think there are young people coming onto country, there are older, senior people who are ailing and getting older, and some are leaving us, and so there's a sense of urgency, um, about things.

But I think, I think, you know, ningaloo's custodians have always known that the place is fragile and their investment in the life of the place is is ancient, you know, and ongoing and you know they'll, they'll, they'll keep honoring country come what may and um, and but I think I think it's a, you know, I think it's a really interesting time to to see people coming back on country.

There are more digs subsequent.

There have been a number of digs subsequent to our tv show and I've, you know, been had the privilege of um being there for some of that and that's been a great thing.

And you see new, young, traditional owners involved in that each time and that's been, and that's been a terrific thing.

So, you know, yeah, I think it's part of a, it's part of a good story.

So, yeah, we face challenges, but we need to.

I think we need to remember that in order to face the future in terms of climate and biodiversity loss, we need alliances, we need solidarity, we need a sense of possibility, and that's what I was aiming to foster, you know, with this, with this children's book this sense of look at the miracle of the world.

Look how beautiful and holy it is, look what we can do together to keep it alive.

And I mean that just in terms.

I don't just mean that in terms of saving these ecosystems and looking about this place, but it's about the broader challenge of keeping the climate to the point where it's, you know, making it habitable places over as much of the globe as possible.

Life isn't going to be for my grandchildren's children.

It's not going to be what it was for you and me.

There's nothing we can do about that.

I mean, we've left it very late.

We've, you know, we've fudged it and kicked the can down the road.

There's a, you know, there's a certain level of change for the worse baked in, and we just have to be honest about that.

But every, every action that we take, every every percentage of a degree that we take off, the sum total means more people get to live better, more species get to survive, more landscapes and landforms get to persist, and that's worth fighting for.

Because, um, the idea that, okay, it's all too late, there's nothing we can do, uh, that's just reckless.

And you know, if you, if you've got too little time left, does that mean you don't want any time.

If you can fight for more time, you take that time and you use it.

And I think, if I saw something written today if you think that your contribution doesn't make a difference or that your country's contribution doesn't make a difference, why are we still paying tax?

Every time you pay tax, you add to the common wealth.

Every time you avoid tax, like some of our great corporate friends, particularly in the fossil space, you're robbing the rest of the people.

If you're okay with robbing people, put your hand up as a thief, that's fine.

But if you're pretending that you're contributing, when you're okay with robbing people, put your hand up as a thief, that's fine.

But if you, if you're pretending that you're contributing when you're actually robbing people, you're a liar and we'll call you out?

you know you said before about first nations folk they'll honor country whatever comes.

I had in mind what that meant for you even and, but you proceeded to tell it.

Just what else are you going to do?

yeah, I mean, and if you've I mean all of us have got skin in the game.

If you have children or you don't have children, everyone's got friends, everyone's got family, everyone's got neighbours, we're in it together and we go down together or we pull up together.

And every good thing that's happened in this country and there are lots of good things that we've achieved in this country they only came from people pulling together for the common good, and if the common good isn't a good enough excuse, I don't know what is.

And to hear some of those stories.

I mean even the great news out of Ningaloo right now and Muraduga, and there's news coming out of the Kimberley too, as well as the bad stuff.

But yeah, it's not like we're starting from scratch with that stuff, with coming together.

No, and I think we have to learn and we have to remember the victories that we've had.

You know, in order to keep fighting the fight, you need to remember what we've achieved, and that stuff arms you, and you know, I'm an old guy who's been around and we've, you know, been part of a bunch of battles and I need to remind myself.

So it's even more important that we need to introduce young people to the fact that good things have been done and good things can happen.

They'll only happen if we provide good information, we keep our minds open and we form alliances across boundaries and we get stuff done together.

This is a, this is a common effort.

It's not, um, it's not the work of individuals, because no one person can save us, no one person is ever going to save us.

Good time for a book that you co-produce with an illustrator.

In that sense, yeah, no, and, and honestly it's kind of an antidote to to juice my previous book.

You know it juices the nightmare of where we don't do anything and we and we abrogate our responsibilities and consign, you know, our descendants to a nightmare world.

And this is a book that puts in front of ourselves, uh, all the grandparents and the parents who are going to have their children on their knee or they're going to buy this book for their kids or their grandkids, as an instance of what there is to celebrate and what there is to defend.

Cheers, mate.

Well, you might remember we don't go out before talking about music.

What did you listen to coming down or sort of what's in the ears generally these days?

It's funny.

There was a great American kind of roots singer-songwriter called Chris Whitley who I was seriously into years ago and in fact we featured him on the album that we made for Dirt Music when Lucky Oceans and I were producing that album.

That came out after my novel in 2001.

And I hadn't heard it and Chris Whitley's since died.

Sadly, he died in his mid-forties and I was listening to his first great album, living With the Law, as I prepared to come down, and it's a great record.

Got a lot of terrific songs on it, so galore as I prepared to come down, and it's a great, great record.

Got a lot of terrific songs on it.

So, yeah, I recommend having a look at Chris Whitley.

Somebody told me there's a documentary about him called Dirt Floor on YouTube, so it might be worth a look.

I can always rely on you for a tip I haven't had before.

Thanks, tim, on you mate.

Pleasure that was adored Aussie writer Tim Winton.

With great thanks to you generous supporting listeners for making it possible.

Special thanks this week to Andrew Carter and Jennifer Lowe for becoming new subscribers and for subscribers notching up their third anniversary.

Thanks so much to Gillian Sanbrook, martin VanderWalt, anne Goodall and Terry and pam McCosker.

A nd Fiona Brook, thanks so much for your four years of support.

Just incredible, one and all.

If you'd like to join us, be part of a great community, get some exclusive stuff and help keep the show going, we'd love you to Just head to the website or the show notes and follow the prompts.

Ningaloo: Australia's Wild Wonder, will be launched in Perth tonight.

The book can be pre-ordered now and will be in stores from the first week of October.

And if you happen to feel like hearing more of Tim and I in conversation, head to episode 162 on the extraordinary documentary about Ningaloo that Tim spearheaded a couple of years ago, and even episode 17 way back in the beginning, just after the launch of the feature film adapted from his book Breath.

And quick tip last week's stack of events here in WA, delivered in spades.

I'll have more for you on all that soon.

For now, the music you're hearing is Regeneration by Amelia Barden.

My name's Anthony James.

Thanks for listening.

Thank you you.