Charles and Claire Gilmour
As a side issue we also mentioned that our member for Braddon, Bryan Green had said to us that ‘we will’, meaning he and Forestry Tasmania would, if put on the spot, deny saying they (FT) would silt up Hook Creek or that they didn’t know there were Giant Freshwater Lobsters in the area they had already, and wanted to continue to clearfell. The Government cannot now “deny” that they have no knowledge of people in their midst who will ‘deny’ the truth to protect themselves. At what height is the Bartlett Labor Government setting the benchmark for his ministers to be open, honest, and ethical in governing Tasmania? Will this benchmark protect and help prosper regional communities?
ON SUNDAY 13th July, we attended the State Labor Governments community forum in Smithton. It was an opportunity to talk with government ministers about issues of concern in our district, and we thank the members for their time.
Having an opportunity to talk one on one with members, albeit for only 15 minutes, it ensured our concerns were directly placed before the Minister rather than spun in to oblivion by minders, advisors and spin doctors.
The Premier was quick to get on his bike and start peddling. In his opening address he mentioned he wanted to draw a “line over the top”, if he’d mentioned doing this in concrete we may have felt more assured that our concerns weren’t likely to be washed away as quickly as lines in the sand naturally are. However with lots of cushy comfy words, we where lulled into – ‘sounds like all will be sweet, in cotton candy cloud nine land’, – for a blissful 10 minutes. Then it was back to reality and time to speak about the real world with a Minister.
Our concerns, presented to the Minister of Environment, Michelle O’Byrne, and delivered at auctioneer’s pace (considering time constraints and the Ministers own ability to speak rather quickly and thus obviously having an ability to understand such quick thinking), were mainly about water, the effects of clearfelling and plantations on water systems, (creeks, water catchments), the downstream effects on farming and endangered species. Most notably the effects on clearfelling the headwaters of catchments on the Giant Freshwater Crayfish.
The Minister listened to us and asked appropriate questions, such as did we think forestry practices should take into account demographics ie the type of vegetation, altitude etc, rather than the same brush being swept across the entire landscape. A resounding ‘absolutely’ was our response. This gave us a little hope that the message was slowly getting through. However it does make one wonder that if the Minister of Environment is aware that Forestry Prescriptions do not take into account ‘special values’ of different areas, WHY is Forestry Tasmania allowed to get away with pretending they do?
Surrounded by minders, secretaries, advisers, heads of dept etc, could have been somewhat offputting for anyone who was prone to feeling intimidated, but it gave us an opportunity to assess who advises and helps pull the strings.
One immediate concern we did have, when we mentioned climate change, was the response by the Ministers secretary, Scott Gadd. He said climate change has been happening since the world began. In essence he is correct, however, one could also say, a person is dying from the moment they are born, and this overall acceptance surely does not mean a human does not take precautions to protect their health, nor fails to go to a doctor when one is sick and follows prescriptions and advice to make one better, so that they can survive for longer. Surely the same should apply for climate change. We are deeply concerned that the Ministers Department for Environment, may not be taking climate change as seriously as it should be.
As a side issue we also mentioned that our member for Braddon, Bryan Green had said to us that ‘we will’, meaning he and Forestry Tasmania would, if put on the spot, deny saying they (FT) would silt up Hook Creek or that they didn’t know there were Giant Freshwater Lobsters in the area they had already, and wanted to continue to clearfell. The Government cannot now “deny” that they have no knowledge of people in their midst who will ‘deny’ the truth to protect themselves. At what height is the Bartlett Labor Government setting the benchmark for his ministers to be open, honest, and ethical in governing Tasmania? Will this benchmark protect and help prosper regional communities?
Did the message get through?
We hope that the Minister for Environment took our local concerns seriously, the effects of forestry operations on our and our community’s water supply’s, the downstream effects on food production and the detrimental effects of continuing to clearfell thousands of acres in a temperate rainforest inundated with rare, and endangered species.
We look forward to a response and the kind and clever action the Bartlett government surely must take in resolving issues of survival, biodiversity, food and water, now that they have personally connected with us.
We fully recommend people to attend these Government forums.
