typingisnotactivism
… revelations in the past month reveal a state-level democracy that is surely gone to hell — with all Gunns blazing. The battle over a “proposed” $2 billion pulp mill that will eat over three million tonnes of native forest annually while daily pumping 64 million litres of dioxin-laced effluent into Bass Strait is certainly taking on epic dimensions, at any rate.
“We control political forces, we control moral forces, we control economic forces. Therefore we are a full-blown Corporative state. We stand for a new principle in the world, we stand for sheer, categorical, definitive antithesis to the world of democracy…” from The Doctrine of Fascism, Giovanni Gentile & Benito Mussolini, 1932
An anagram of ‘Tasmania’ is ‘I am Satan’. Although I personally would put money on George Bush being Beelzebub’s errand-boy, southern revelations in the past month reveal a state-level democracy that is surely gone to hell — with all Gunns blazing. The battle over a “proposed” $2 billion pulp mill that will eat over three million tonnes of native forest annually while daily pumping 64 million litres of dioxin-laced effluent into Bass Strait is certainly taking on epic dimensions, at any rate.
With blood pressure-red face and follicles, his support for logging what remains of Eden, and reputed love of Bacchian delights, Premier Paul Lennon has been cast as Lucifer. While it may mean mixed metaphors, that would see Gunns’ CEO John Gay framed as The Emperor from Star Wars. Not for his famed ability to shoot lightning from his fingers, but his barely disputed role as the power behind the throne.
Like all good sagas, other pivotal villains are emerging gradually — but distinctly. The latest is Linda Hornsey — Secretary to the Department of Premier and Cabinet. She is emerging as Hell’s handmaiden/Bobba Fett — part devoted servant/part mercenary-assassin.
Gunns’ proposal was under assessment by a panel of experts set up under the Resource Planning and Development Commission (RPDC). After half the panellists resigned citing political interference in late 2006, new independent experts were appointed — including panel head and retired judge, the Honourable Christopher Wright.
According to a statutory declaration by Wright, Hornsey convinced him not to resign on March 2 over pressure and interference from Lennon. It has recently emerged that she convinced him not to send a letter from the RPDC assessment panel to Gunns on March 9 informing them that their 10,000-page impact statement and supporting evidence were still thoroughly deficient or, in words used by Matthew Denholm of The Australian, “inconsistent, unreadable, unacceptable, and based on too many assumptions”.
It was more recently revealed by Lennon himself that Hornsey contacted Gunns on March 8 to inform the company of this as yet unannounced determination by the RPDC. Six days later, Gunns’ CEO John Gay announced Gunns’ withdrawal from the assessment process. The following day, Lennon announced Cabinet support for fast-track legislation to replace the rigorous RPDC panel and its associated burden of public participation. That legislation made its first run through the Tasmanian Lower(ed) House barely a week later. Although Lennon was aware at the time of the RPDC determination, he made no mention of it, insisting instead that the decision was about Tasmania’s jobs, future, and money.
The legislatively appointed “independent” consultant, Sweco Pic, has been given half-a-million dollars and less than three months to complete an assessment/approval process that still had a panel of independent experts armpit-deep in questions and deliberations after two years of heavy lifting. It just so happens that Hornsey has again risen to the surface — on the “independent” three-person panel to which Sweco must report. Indeed, the panel claims that Sweco already tabled its draft report in late May — after barely six weeks on the job.
The final outcome of assessment has not yet been determined, but is due to be made by August 31. It has recently been revealed, again by Denholm, that Gunns just happen to have pulp mill construction contracts in place that will cost the company $1.076m for every day of delay after the first week of September. This suggests optimism, stupidity, certainty of the assessment outcome, or some combination of the three.
Without meaning to bumpkinise Lennon, Gay or Hornsey, they now have to deal with federal courts and federal law which differ drastically from the Tasmanian Parliament and the Office of the Tasmanian Attorney-General. Even in preliminary documentation for two federal cases against Gunns and federal Minister for Embitterment and Slaughtered Resources, Malcolm Turnbull, there is strong support for the allegation that the federal Government was talking with Gunns about an alternative process even before they had withdrawn from the RPDC. The key admission actually seems to have come from a statement on Turnbull’s own website.
Evidence of collusion may yet create a collision for the Coalition, Lennon may yet find himself singing ‘O no’, Gay might think better of it all and go back to making closets, and, with any luck, ordinary citizens of Tasmanistan may wake one day soon to find their state is no longer part of the Axis of Evil. Still, when someone with a brain like Malcolm Turnbull can say that Australia is a world leader on climate change on national TV and keep a straight face doing it, the recommendation would be that nobody hold their breath just yet. Perhaps when the pulp mill’s mustard gas vapours start filling the Tamar Valley would be a better time to start.
