How’s this little gem from the state budget – “The Government will provide $7 million over two years to remove trees destroyed by previous bushfires and help improve the safety for people who access public land. This program will focus on the Alpine and Mountain Ash forest areas in eastern Victoria.” This has never …
Another creatively written Annual Report for VicForests (2012-13) was presented to parliament in mid-October and it verges more towards fantasy than a serious commercial look at their performance. Steve Meacher from Healesville Environment Watch has done an analysis of the report and also compared it with their stated Corporate Plan in 2011, with the actual …
The same weeks as Kevin Rudd was returned as PM, Victoria’s Napthine government passed two anti-environment bills through parliament. The amendment to the logging Act (SFTA) gives a free-for-all to the logging mafia; everything it wants for as long as it wants with bugger-all scrutiny. All underwritten by us taxpayers for hundreds of millions if …
f passed the Bill will formalise a new ‘cut-out-and-get-out’ style of forest management in the short term as well as pay millions to the logging industry in the long term. The proposed Amendments to this law governing native forest logging will hand full powers to VicForests (the profit-driven semi government entity in charge of logging …
So Julia Gillard has declared that she wants the parties who started the so-called Tasmanian forest peace process “to do everything they can to use their abilities to silence those who haven’t gone with the mainstream consensus”. To silence. I lived with the silence of Tasmania for too many years. And now the leaders of …
THERE are no plans to save most Victorian animals and plants that are at risk of becoming extinct. This is despite new data revealing more animals are becoming threatened. The latest list of threatened animals, released by the Department of Sustainability and Environment, found one animal had become extinct in the wild in the past …
The draft Action Statement (protection plan) for the Long-nosed Potoroo is now out for public comment. This was one of our 4 species used to legally challenge the government recently over its inaction on threatened species protection. The draft plan’s recommended actions are very thick with motherhood statements and very thin on detail, funding commitments …
The Climate Change Authority recently recommended changing the rules so burning forests for electricity could be termed ‘renewable” (with all the associated financial help!), but the Gillard Government has just said no! Huge thanks to The Greens again. This has stymied the industry’s plans to have burning forests take place of woodchipping to keep the …
The recently released report from the Auditor General on the State’s finances again raises questions about why VicForests was not required to pay a dividend again this year. The report shows how the State Government demanded most Government businesses like Melbourne Water and other water authorities were all squeezed for additional dividend payments to help …
The Baillieu Government directed the Victorian Environmental Assessment Council (VEAC) to determine which areas of eastern Victoria’s National Parks prospectors and fossickers will be allowed into. VEAC isn’t to look at IF prospecting should be allowed but where. Fossicking includes metal detecting, digging holes and panning for gold, all detrimental activities especially to stream sides. …
