Mill vote: Never forget

W McKell

But will people forget? Just in case you may loose track of who sold their souls to the devil in March 2007, I have provided two Ready Reckoners for both houses showing those who voted for the Mill Bill, their electorates and the next scheduled elections. Please feel free to print them out and stick them to your fridge door. Perhaps you would like to print an extra 50 and give them to friends, put them on noticeboards, leave them in the lunchroom at work or just pop a few in the neighbourhood letter boxes. You can even e-mail, fax or text them to a colleague. They make ideal gifts for the morally conscious and even double as wrapping paper.

It has been an appalling few weeks to see the sorry nadir to which our elected representative are prepared to degrade themselves for the greed of a few men.

However amongst the pile of merde has been a tiny glimmer of self-respect and decency in the form of the 9 brave Tasmanian parliamentarians who dared to evoke the rage of the corporate beast and vote with their heads and hearts (for the interests of their constituents).

Tasmania owes much to the 5 MLCs who voted against the abysmal Mill Bill — Terry Martin (Elwick), Norma Jamieson (Mersey), Jim Wilkinson (Nelson), Kerry Finch (Rosevears) and Sue Smith (Montgomery). Whilst Don Wing (Paterson) did not get to cast his deciding vote as the President of the Chamber, he too is to be congratulated for his diligent and ethical stance against the mill bullies.

Likewise the bravery of the 4 Greens MLAs is also to be recognised — Peg Putt (Denison), Nick McKim (Franklin), Kim Booth (Bass) and Tim Morris (Lyons).

Undoubtedly these 10 good people will now face an orchestrated campaign of punitive retribution. The fake letters campaign wielded by the pro-Mill forces shows the level to which some will sink. The widely reported delivery of 11,000 letters of Mill support, delivered by hand to Parliament House, was exposed last week by Kerry Finch.

Mr Finch cast doubt on both the number of letters and their authenticity when he revealed that of the 461 letters he received, 460 of them where “form letters” and unsigned — clearly a highly mechanised pro-Mill letter-writing campaign designed to influence parliamentary voting intentions.

It is also obvious that the 30 parliamentarians who voted like cattle for the Gunns Mill are more than aware of the public outrage associated with their disgusting actions. However with the next State Election 3 years away the strategy is now to keep a low profile and distract the great unwashed public with football matches and Mill construction-employment stories. Hopefully all will then be a distant blurry memory by 2010. In the Legislative Council, it is interesting to note the proportionally higher levels of Mill concern expressed by those whose electorates are scheduled for voting in the near future — particularly the upcoming 5 May election.

Windermere MLC and Mill supporter, Mayor Ivan Dean, must have had a near conniption on 1 April when Geoff Law mentioned the Mayors name at the Anti-Mill Rally in Albert Hall — greeted by a deafening 3000-strong Booo. With Mr. Dean only winning the Mayoral election by a whisker, now the desperate PR campaign must start with lots of fluffy-feel good stories — like protecting the people of Launceston by banning smoking in the Brisbane Street Mall. Unfortunately Ivan hasn’t yet grasped the irony that his Mill vote will help to poison every breath inhaled in the entire Valley.

But will people forget? Just in case you may lose track of who sold their souls to the devil in March 2007, I have provided two Ready Reckoners for both houses showing those who voted for the Mill Bill, their electorates and the next scheduled elections. Please feel free to print them out and stick them to your fridge door. Perhaps you would like to print an extra 50 and give them to friends, put them on noticeboards, leave them in the lunchroom at work or just pop a few in the neighbourhood letter boxes. You can even e-mail, fax or text them to a colleague. They make ideal gifts for the morally conscious and even double as wrapping paper.

And just in case you miss this opportunity, I will be happy to e-mail a revised list to the Editor of this fine journal a few weeks before each scheduled election for both houses.

Good luck Mayor [Smokey] Dean.

Tasmanian Legislative Council (Upper House) members who voted YES for the Gunns Pulp Mill, March 2007

Tasmanian Legislative Assembly (Lower House) members who voted YES for the Gunns Pulp Mill, March 2007