newy.com.au – NSW Police have withdrawn charges against 125 climate activists arrested during Rising Tide’s 2024 blockade of Newcastle Harbour, although three cases from the protest remain awaiting judgment.
The charges were formally withdrawn in Newcastle Local Court on Friday, prompting celebrations among defendants and supporters gathered outside the courthouse.
Each of the 125 defendants had faced two charges, including an allegation of seriously disrupting or obstructing a major facility under section 214A of the Crimes Act. The offence carries a maximum penalty of two years in prison, a $22,000 fine or both.
They were also charged under the Marine Safety Act with operating a vessel in a way that interfered with other people’s use of the water. That offence carries a maximum $5500 fine.
Rising Tide described the group as the majority of 173 people arrested during its November 2024 “People’s Blockade”. NSW Police reported at the time that 170 people, 156 adults and 14 children, had been arrested.
Rising Tide spokeswoman and defendant Naomi Hodgson said the campaign would continue to push governments to phase out coal and support affected workers.
“People are taking these actions because governments continue to approve and consider new coal projects while the climate crisis worsens,” she said.
“As long as governments fail to deliver a credible plan to phase out coal and support workers through the transition, communities will continue to step in and demand action.”
The prosecutions suffered a major setback in October 2025, when the serious Crimes Act charges against test defendants Noah Bruce-Allen, Roisin McSweeney, Andrew George and Joanna Gardner were dismissed.
The court found there was insufficient reliable evidence about the four defendants’ movements in the harbour to establish the offence. They had pleaded guilty to the less serious Marine Safety Act charge.
Police were subsequently ordered to pay $73,000 in legal costs arising from the test cases.
Further cases ended in June when police withdrew serious charges shortly before another test hearing, abandoned all charges against two defendants and had the remaining Marine Safety Act case dismissed.
Rising Tide said all but three of the other matters arising from the 2024 protest had now been resolved. The defendants in those three cases are awaiting judgment after a June hearing, with the matters due back in court in September.
NSW Police had not published a separate explanation for Friday’s mass withdrawal.
Climate Defenders Australia, which represents 110 of the 125 defendants, said police should have ended the cases earlier.
“Police should have withdrawn these charges long ago, once it was clear they could not make out the cases against them,” executive director Julia Grix said.
University of Newcastle neuroscientist Dr Elizabeth Manning, whose charges were among those withdrawn, said: “I think it’s clear from this that the government’s attempts to squash the right to protest are undemocratic and not in line with the law.”
The arrests occurred after protesters entered Newcastle Harbour in kayaks and other small craft on November 24, 2024. Police said participants entered the shipping channel and interfered with vessel movements, while the Port Authority suspended shipping for several hours because of safety concerns.
Police said 34 people had to be pulled from the water and another 10 needed help returning to shore. Rising Tide said the blockade forced a coal ship to turn around.
The group organises the annual harbour action to disrupt coal shipping and is calling for an end to new fossil-fuel projects, a 78 per cent tax on fossil-fuel export profits and the cessation of coal exports through Newcastle by 2030.
Friday’s withdrawals apply only to the 2024 blockade. Climate Defenders Australia says more than 100 prosecutions arising from Rising Tide’s separate 2025 Newcastle Harbour protest remain before the courts.
