That’s the rumour Hag heard last night.
Worth asking the Premier isn’t it, girls and boys in the meedja?
A payout figure of around $200,000 was being bandied around last night by Hag’s insider. Not a lot when you consider the furore created by the decision to log Recherche’s north-eastern peninsula — until the combination of Bob Brown, Dick Smith and the Tasmanian Land Conservancy group stepped in to fund the $2 million purchase from landowners, the Vernon brothers.
Belatedly realising he was rapidly being left behind and looking like a goose with only his political enemy Rene as unwanted ally, Premier Paul has tried manfully to play catch-up in the past two days.
But Sue Neales in The Mercury picked it nicely yesterday: A heralded Sate Government initiative to buy historic Recherche Bay has been revealed as little more than political grandstanding. … instead of funding the $2 million purchase of the land in the state’s far South, it was believed the Government intended to just waive $100,000 of property tax that would be owed.
Oh, such statesmanship.
But that little tax offer still left the question: what about the contract with Gunns? Heavens, with a shrinking Share Price and a billion-dollar pulp mill planned, they can’t be left out of pocket. There is a contract after all.
And this, Hag is told, is where that very special relationship between State Labor and Gunns comes in handy …
Mind you, Hag reckons the sudden greening of Rough Red is only because Red is desperate for traction with an election looming. Internal polling must be pretty dreadful and every greenish tinge vote must be courted. You could tell by the body language on telly that this was not a happy little vegemite overjoyed at saving priceless heritage. At heart he wanted to see the chainsaws go in and archaeology-by-bulldozer unleashed.
But political pragmatism (desperation) won the day … and the spruiking of a visionary State Government began.
Meanwhile … My bid saved Recherche
Latest, today: Politicians contradict each other over Recherche Bay protection
Cameron
February 8, 2006 at 13:48
Good work, Hag.
Some very pertinent questions indeed.
The whole pulp mill thing is, I suspect, about to get interesting again–I attended a press conference this morning at which TRAC coordinator Les Rochester announced that the government will have to cease the current development process for the Mill, as no environmental guidelines exist (according to Les) for the pulping of pine woodchips, which Gunns Ltd has announced it wants to use. The ‘World’s Best Practice’ guidelines that have apparently underpinned the planning of this mill are based solely on eucalyptus stock.
The RPDC will then have to go right back to the beginning and review the development of this project from the beginning; I won’t pretend to be an expert in such matters but I would think that this might potentially delay the development process by some months, at least. I seem to recall hearing somewhere that Gunns was keen to start building this thing by the end of the year; if what Les reported this morning holds water (and there is no reason to suspect it doesn’t) then that plan will have to be shelved, if only temporarily.
This in itself is interesting, but I will be at the newsagent quick-smart in the morning to see how the Examiner, that beloved bastion of entirely impartial and objective reporting on all matters pulp, presents this issue to the general public. Gripping stuff; stay tuned!
Tess
February 8, 2006 at 15:46
Cameron,
If only Les took the time to read the guidelines (or tried to understand them). They make numerous references to softwood. Does Les not understand that softwood is pine? This would not surprise me – although it is more likely he has run out of angles to attack the mill.
Tess
David Mohr
February 8, 2006 at 17:08
Tess,
The RPDC based their guidelines for the Gunns IIS on the “Tasmanian Environmental emission limit guidelines for any new bleached eucalypt kraft pulp mill in Tasmania, 2004”.
The use of pine in the pulp mills produces a whole new range of chemical effluents including sterols, resin acids, monoterpenes and diterpenes which are not featured in the 2004 guidelines.
According to the RPDC the guidelines “been amended to include a footnote specifying that levels of sterols, softwood-related resin acids, monoterpenes and diterpenes be measured.”
What levels are acceptable? There are no guidelines passed by the Tasmanian parliament to deal the use of pine in the pulp making process.
Frank
February 8, 2006 at 20:53
GUNNS, survivors or winners and grinners?
Bungle inflated cost of heritage site
Australian, Australia – 1 hour ago
… A further $80,000 is to cover stamp duty, and The Australian understands timber company Gunns will receive about $200,000 from the sale price for cancelling … http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/common/story_page/0,5744,18088626%5E30417,00.html
…cost hugely inflated by government bungling???
*$300,000 of the funding will go towards rehabilitating a logging road bulldozed through a neighbouring conservation area,…
* Gunns will receive about $200,000 from the sale price for cancelling its timber contract?
Compare the financial trend on the ASX with the above news!
http://www.asx.com.au/asx/research/CompanyInfoSearchResults.jsp?searchBy=asxCode&allinfo=on&asxCode=GNS
Just watching!
Dave Groves
February 8, 2006 at 22:32
http://www.themercury.news.com.au/common/story_page/0,5936,18088437%255E921,00.html
The story from today’s Mercury raises a couple of interesting points for me.
The first is $300, 000 will be needed to fix the damage caused by the access road through the adjoining conservation reserve.
Second is FIAT’s Chief’s claim that the owners were hard done by as the timber on the property was worth between $400, 000 and $700, 000.
Given these figures of money out to money in, it seems hardly worth the trouble.
Lastly, there is a bit of a gap between $400k and $700k.
And these figures are from “experts�
How can anyone run a business with wild figures like these?
“Yes madam, your new lounge will be delivered Tuesday and cost between $4,000 and $7,000, plus of course the additional $3,000 to fix the damage we do delivering itâ€.
Life under the big top as the show goes on!
phill Parsons
February 9, 2006 at 01:05
Do I remember that other red, red Robin of the neck, making similar noises about greeness in the dying days of his government.
Will the voters be fooled when the government should have conserved Recherche Bay without question and given its location and pristine nature prior to the archeological findings because of its potential as a tourist attraction.
Now it will have one lets see if that can be degraded further with the wrong developments in the wrong locations.
les rochester
February 9, 2006 at 01:51
Tess obviously hasn’t read the 2004 Tasmanian environmental guidelines for a kraft eucalypt pulp mill. Vol 2 on page 27 lists the type of pollutants, and the maximum allowed to be emitted.
They all refer to eucalypt chips- 100%. There are no pollutants in the charts or in those guidelines, held up by so many as “The worlds most stringent” for the derivitives of pine or their pollution streams.Where are the maximum levels for Pine sterols, resin acids, monoterpenes and diterpenes???
Please find them in the document for me Tess!!!
These are flawed guidelines, and for people to espouse the spin of the government in order to confuse, baffle and distort, without reading them or understanding them, is quite ignorant.
Cameron
February 9, 2006 at 02:28
A fair point, Tess.
Of course, the Brains Trust at Gunns Ltd have changed their minds over this pulp mill so many times that it’s hard to keep up. The concerns that Les expressed yesterday–which are not his alone, by any means–simply reflect that the use of pine as pulp stock (about which Gunns has also changed its story) may be something of an unknown quantity in pulp mills, particularly one proposed for an area where air quality is already a serious concern.
Transparency is obviously too much to ask of the Pulp Mill Task Force. But all is not lost: if Lennon can play Knights in Shining Armour over Recherche Bay…
super Annoyed
February 9, 2006 at 03:03
Is this a case of “damned if you do, damned if you dont”? Political motivations aside, it would be nice to hear one of our regular Greens contributors (or even the Tas Greens politicians) say “well, this is a good outcome”. They wont, because they have always been less interested in the conservation values underling the proposition, more in the using the issue to leverage votes and an increased constituency. Let’s give it 48 hours or so to see what the official response is…. In addition, the response to the funds set aside for rehabilitating Southport Lagoon requires some sort of response from the Greens and their supporters?
It must be acknowledged that it is politically brave of the Premier to make this move given his demonstrated lack of sympathy for the conservationist cause. There must have been a lot of work internally in the state ALP to come up with this result.
Dave Groves
February 9, 2006 at 05:41
There is much confusion in the community regarding “the guidelines†for the proposed pulp mill and the use of pine as a “feedstockâ€.
Understandable really when you consider how many times the marbles have been shifted from under the coconut shells.
Bob Gordon and company can keep shifting shells and marbles as much as they like, let’s face it for the titanic amount of money they are paid it is expected, but in black and white, the RPDC’s own documentation, “Development of new environmental emission limit guidelines for any new bleached eucalypt Kraft pulp mill in Tasmania volume 1 or 2â€, there is clearly no reference to the quantified emissions that come from using pine.
These guidelines were exclusively set for eucalypt consumption.
Car tyres, plastics, old computers and mobile phones aren’t covered any more than pine, so stop the bunkum, scrap these guidelines and let’s do in properly for a change.
By definition, pine as a feedstock is not good for Tasmanians:
“It should be noted that mills processing softwood pulp have higher levels of AOX in the treated effluent than mills processing hardwood pulpâ€
(page 80 vol 1)
“Since only hardwoods will be processed in Tasmania, the AOX limit can be set correspondingly lower†(page 81 vol 1)â€.
Does this mean that the limits for AOX emissions will be raised if they use pine?
Who would know as there are no guidelines?
As the show goes on, its back to you Mr Ringmaster…..