Forests and Politicians
News form the North Coast of NSW
Yuraygir Kid goes Feral
12 November 1998
To: NPA of NSW < npansw@bigpond.com
>
Yeah, g'day
Picked up the press releases from Harry Woods' office today -
they were coming off the fax machine.
It seems to me that the govt is treating the conservation
movement with a fair degree of contempt. The approach seems to be
that "we know that the greenies are not going to be happy
with this, so we will put in a few fact sheets with quotes from
them saying how good and open the negotiation process is - then
they won't be able to complain about the outcome. Or, if they do,
we will be able to show how two-faced they are." [If anyone
takes this missive as being critical of the involvement of the
conservationists in the negotiaition process, I'll get pretty
cranky.]
This might be clever politics, but the logic is pretty appalling.
Being supportive of a process does not require, and nor should
it, that you are stuck with support of the outcome. If the govt
really thinks that it should be able to play this little game,
then I seriously question whether we should participate in this
sort of process in the future. Certainly, entry into such process
should be clearly on the basis that this specious approach is not
used again.
Today, I have been in touch with Carr's office, Knowles' and
Allen's. I also rang back to Woods' office. The general purpose
was to express my real anger with the decision and also to object
to the weakening of the environmental controls on logging
operations as part of the decision. It seems to me that with this
sort of dedcision which favours the industry so strongly, that it
should have been accompanied with even stricter controls, even
mandatory requirements to prosecute breaches; community watchdog
roles created; and the ability (mandatory?) to take away the
licence to operate within forests where breaches occurred.
Instead, not only do we have a 20 year guarantee of resource, but
a weakening of controls to go with it, and the promise of greater
access to the national parks and reserves that will be created in
the 380,000ha! The 4WD and horse-riding lobby will be laughing.
So, where are the conservation outcomes in all this? The ORV
people have already been making huge gains at the expense of the
proper role of national parks and nature reserves, and now they
have virtually been given the new parks as well. How many of the
new access tracks and facilities will be retained, created,
enhanced, according to conservation, protection of the
environment and preservation of biodiversity principles?
When I looked thru the press releases, I did not see any
attention to conservation principles within the new reserves.
Yeadon There is to be a Timber Industry
Employment Taskforce to oversee job protection, timber
supplementation and new industry development. Why? The industry
has been given millions of dollars already and is to get more.
What is their contribution? Why should the government put more
time and resources into what should be the job of the industry
and
union?
There has been unprecedented private investment by the timber
industry. Ok, so how much has the public contributed to this?
Spiro Notaras has said he was given $900 000 (SMH) to restructure
even tho he was prepared to close 2 years ago. He told me at the
timber rally on Monday that he had wanted redundancies but the
govt wouldn't give them to him coz they
did not want to be seen to allow a sawmill close down in the
Grafton area. So, now we see twice the amount of building from
the highway as you go past, probably paid for by the public purse
to someone who wanted to get out. Now, they have a huge
investment of public money which will add to the price when they
sell out, and a further enhanced asset when they are allocated
the 20 year resource guarantee.
The other thing about this is the open expectation that the
govt should have come to the party with redundancies. Is there
any real risk or requirement for the so-called private timber
industry to pay its way? When we talked about plantations in the
early 80's during the Washpool campaign, we were pooh-poohed for
talking rubbish. Now, not only are plantations being demanded,
but the industry expects that the public will again carry much of
the cost. It would not be unreasonable if every farmer of any
crop went to the govt and asked it to carry out all the
operations and pay all the costs, except for the harvesting and
collection of the profits.
Carr $18 million over 5years for private land
acquisition. For the timber industry? If so, what about a few
quid for acquisition of lands for rationalisation and addition to
reserves over and above the piddly amount now available?
$5 million over 5 years for log haulage assistance. That's nice.
Can we expect that milkmen and sugar cane hauliers will be given
the same assistance?
$50 million over 5 years for development of hardwood plantations.
No doubt cane growers, wheat cotton and banana growers will also
be given similar amounts to expand their crops.
.................................................
During my rounds today. I was told that no-one was going to be
totally happy with the outcome - the suggestion being that, in
some way , that made it OK. I regard that simplistic argument as
bordering on insulting. The fact that no-one is torally happy
does not equate with it being a sound decision. I might have felt
somewhat happier if the govt had made some effort to demonstrate
that the conservation objectives had been achieved. That they did
not simply indicates that they had no case and felt that they had
no case. Hence, the talk about "balance", the focus on
retaining jobs, the appeasement of the community by promise of
gretaer access to the reserves that are created. This was not a
conservation driven outcome.
The preparation of "fact sheets" to demonstrate that
the process had been supported, and that conservationists had
been participants thus (in Knowles' words) making it
"difficult for anyone to sustain an argument that the
Government had not met conservation targets" indicates to me
that the govt has decided to give away even a token attempt at
explanation that conservation aims have been met.
How do we justify this decision as meeting the CAR criteria? We
can't and we don't even try. We tell everone how good and
transparent the process was, and we throw a lot of goodies to the
mill owners; and we give away the reserves to the users and
abusers, and hope that the votes will come to us. We throw in
some figures to show how much we have "taken off" the
industry and those who do not have a real understanding of what
is happening will agree that the "greenies" are simply
greedy and insatiable.
What is going to be the effect on the NPWS as a result of this?
Yvonne ???? of Knowles office has undertaken to send me the
media package, most of which I have, but the black and white maps
are pretty well useless as they are. She will also send a copy of
any substantial material (I don't regard the press releases as
substantial in any way) as it comes to hand. She seems to think
that I will be able to pick things up from the internet, but will
send a copy of the bill that was presented to the parliament
tonight when it becomes available, along with transcripts of the
debates.
My contacts with the various minister's offices was to let them
know that I was pretty unhappy with the outcome and also to
express my objection to what I understand the bill tonight to
contain,
I will be urging others to also ring up and object like billyo.
- Premier: (02) 9230 2310 - Knowles: (02) 9230 2312 - Yeadon:
(02) 9230 2341 - Allan: (02) 9230 2115 -
Peter Morgan