VicForests must go
Tax-payer sponsored environmental demolition must end and VicForests must be relegated to history, is the message Environment East Gippsland is sending to the Victorian Government after the exposé that $5.5 million “Community Service Obligation” is funding public forest destruction annually in the region.
“Environment groups are feeling vindicated across the state after decades of highlighting this fact and denial by VicForests”, said Jill Redwood of EEG. “We have to thank the whistle-blower within VicForests for helping uncover the scandal”.
“It is shocking to see this entity now plan to cut down forests to fuel furnaces that power our toasters and TVs. A more Monty Python-esque scenario would be hard to concoct”.
“The public would be shocked to know that powering their homes would be by destroying the homes of millions of native wildlife. If any power company went within cooee of this electricity source they could expect a major consumer campaign against them”.
“The cynical symbiosis between the Abbott Government’s new RET regulation to allow burning forests to be claimed as ‘renewable’ and VicForests positioning to keep itself relevant is a scandalous spectacle”, said Ms Redwood. “We need to reduce CO2 in the atmosphere, and forests are the most effective carbon capture and storage mechanisms we have. Burning them would be counter-productive to climate mitigation.”
“If the government is happy give a handful of East Gippsland workers $55,000 a year in benefits, they should be employed in projects that assist the wider community, not just maintains the VicForests Empire”.