Tony Burke’s speaking notes

Who writes the speeches in the Forestry Department? There are some absolute gems.

There are so many little titbits that come from Senate Estimates (on right now in Canberra) that don’t make it into the paper.

This is my favourite one so far.

In estimates on Monday night Greens Senator Christine Milne cornered the Department of Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry (DAFF) Secretary Conall O’Connell over a speech made by Forestry Minister Tony Burke in June.

In that speech to Parliament Burke expressed his support for the controversial Gunns pulp mill, the subject of much campaigning from people and both the right and left of politics.

Shortly after the speech some groups, including lefty yoof pressure group GetUp!, claimed there were some striking similarities between what Burke said and Gunns promotional material.

Such as (which admittedly Greenlines has lifted straight from the GetUp! website in an act of horrible hypocrisy):

“Construction of the mill and flow-on investment would create some 8,000 direct and indirect jobs spread across the trades and other areas. Another 1,500 jobs would be created during operation.” – Ministerial Statement by The Hon. Tony Burke MP, 2009.

As compared too:

“Construction of the Pulp Mill and flow-on investment will create some 8000 direct and indirect jobs spread across the trades and other areas. A further 1500 to 1600 additional direct and indirect jobs will be created during the Pulp Mill’s operation.” – Gunns statement, 2008.

On Monday something very interesting happened. Dr O’Connell apologised for DAFF staff directly lifting lines off the Gunns website for Burke’s speech.

‘‘The department did draw on the Gunns’ site for text and that was an error in terms of just drawing directly like that,’’ Dr O’Connell said.

‘‘When that became clear, after the event we did explain that to the minister and I personally apologised to the minister for that poor handling.’’

Dr O’Connell insisted numbers in the speech on projected job creation and contribution to Tasmanian GDP were not taken from the Gunns website, but from economic work done for the Tasmanian Government by Monash University and Allens Consulting.

But under question he had to come back to the the issue.

‘‘Obviously I have made the assurances to the minister that the processes that allowed that to happen no longer exist. We have different processes as a result,’’ Dr O’Connell said.

Read more here
The Age