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. …
So what difference can we expect to see from the spanking new Premier Napthine? So far we don’t quite know. We do know he has done away with the position of Parliamentary Secretary for Forests which the logging industry man Gary Blackwood held. We also know that in his electorate, people want wind farms and …
WA’s endangered Quokka is as precarious as our own Long-footed Potoroo. ‘Find and destroy’ is also the WA govt’s plan. These friendly little characters are known to survive on Rottnest and Bald Islands off the coast of WA (both cat and fox free), but there are also a number of small populations on the mainland …
If VicForests was a private company it’d be financially (as well as morally) bankrupt. VicForests’ 2012-13 Annual Report is out. A small ‘profit’ was made this year – as a result of not having to pay big legal bills they said, but still no dividend paid to the public (government) for their use of, or …
The long battle to stop a huge monstrosity planned for Mallacoota’s favourite beach, Bastion Point, was given the go-ahead by the Baillieu government in January. After three weeks of panel hearings in 2007, after 87% of submissions opposed the plan, after the then Planning Minister Justin Madden opposed the project, the Coalition government’s environment minister, …
Minister Walsh last year blind-signed a law that made it illegal for the public to enjoy or use 340,000 ha of public land where logging was occuring. This is about half of all our public land available for logging in eastern Victoria! Yet we are told VicForests logs less than 1% of public forests every …
Victoria’s backlog of almost 500 listed species that currently have no legal protection, have finally seen a plan* to plan for their protection. Environment East Gippsland legally challenged the government’s neglect to write protection measures for most of the state’s rare species last June. It was settled in October 2013, but we’re still concerned that …
After the Gillard Government was leant on by the Business Council of Australia to hand environmental powers to the states, combined enviro groups commissioned the Australian Network of Environment Defenders Office to write a report assessing the adequacy of threatened species and planning laws in Australian jurisdictions. The report outlines the legal framework for managing …
THE federal government will tell business leaders that it is putting on hold plans to devolve to the states power to deal with environmental approvals for major projects. The decision is a major blow to business – which has claimed ”green tape” is jeopardising projects worth many billions of dollars – and a victory for …
