Greens MP Ian Cohen is calling for a halt to clearing of 360 hectares of critically endangered bushlandon a former ADI site in the Cumberland Plain.  The imminent clearing by bulldozers of this bushland - adjacent to sensitive wetlands - flies in the face of the NSW Government’s own advice on the Cumberland Plain.The environmental approval that allows Delfin Lend Lease to clear the area and build homes for 6500 people was granted under now superseded Federal conservation laws. The site should be reconsidered using current Federal law and NSW State guidelines.

“This clearing should be halted immediately. Both Federal scientists and NSW Department of Environment Water and Climate Change (DECCW)
scientists have listed this area, the Cumberland Plain Woodland in the Sydney Basin Bioregion, as a Critically Endangered Ecological Community
and yet it is about to be bulldozed,” says Greens MP Ian Cohen.

“Environment Minister Sartor must talk to his Federal counterpart, Mr Garrett, and act to save the Cumberland Plain from desecration. (more…)

Conservation groups today appealed the Premier to intervene in the battle over the future of the last koala colony in the South East Forests in a remote area near Bega.

“Our people inspected the remote area on Monday and found that contrary to statements from the Minister for the Environment, State Forest bulldozers were already at work on the road network that will be needed to allow access for the Eden woodchip mill’s huge log trucks,” said spokespersons for the groups.

“State Forests is deliberately pushing the community closer to direct confrontation in the forests even while protracted negotiations on the fate of the koalas are under way with the Department of the Environment.” (more…)

(letter to Braidwood Times, published March 3, 2010)

With deliberations on the new Palerang LEP working draft just begun, it is clear that environmental issues will not receive the support that some may have expected. At last Thursday’s meeting, Clause 26D, Ecologically Sustainable Development (local), was the first to go. It stated: Before granting consent for development, the consent authority must have regard to the principles of ecologically sustainable development as they relate to the proposed development. Not long after that, the fifth objective of the section RU1 Primary Production was debated - to ensure that the development and management of the land has proper regard for the environmental constraints of the land and has a neutral or beneficial impact on environmental assets including waterways, riparian land, wetlands and other surface and groundwater resources, soil fertility, remnant native vegetation, and existing and potential fauna movement corridors. With Cr Turley safely out of the room after it was suggested in no uncertain terms that she had an unexempted pecuniary interest, this clause was successfully deleted also, with the casting vote of the mayor. (more…)

(printed in March 2 edition of the Canberra Times)

Since your January 26 story “Koalas face big logging threat”, nothing much has changed except that, despite numerous representations to Ministers and further attempts to highlight the issue in the media and elsewhere, logging may begin as soon as Monday March 1. The support given by current and past governments to the ongoing, taxpayer-subsidised woodchipping of native forests and these governments’ blatant disregard for the protection of forests for biodiversity, water quality, habitat, climate change mitigation and tourist attraction reasons is hard to comprehend. How does continued logging of native forests in this way, without even value-adding in Australia, contribute to the nation’s financial or environmental well-being? (more…)

Minister for Forestry Resources, Ian Macdonald, today refuted the findings of the Natural Resources Commission (NRC), which reported that Forests NSW, under his stewardship, had logged red gums in the Riverina region 70% beyond sustainable levels. The NRC report was commissioned by
former Premier Nathan Rees to ascertain the true state of the red gum forests.

Mr Macdonald was responding to a question in Parliament by Greens MLC Ian Cohen: on what basis does the Minister argue that logging forests
70% beyond sustainable levels equates with world’s best practice?

“In 2007 the Minister described Forests NSW management of Riverina Red Gums to the House as achieving the ‘highest international environmental order’,” said Ian Cohen.

“I asked the Minister whether he stood by the assertion that Forests NSW has engaged in environmental management of the “highest international environmental order” in light of the Natural Resources Commission’s findings. Mr Macdonald was dogged in his response. (more…)

Greens MLC Mark Parnell has called for the standard release of all public submissions online when the Government asks for public input into decision making.

The call comes as the public submissions to Seeking a Balance, the review into mining in the Arkaroola ranges, remain unpublished despite the consultation period closing last month.

“It’s pretty simple really - all submissions to any Government public consultation process should automatically be published online,” said Greens MLC Mark Parnell.

“At the moment, the public spends hours and hours giving their feedback where it effectively ends up in a great big black hole.  They never get a response to the issues they’ve raised, or any sense of whether what they have said has had any impact,” he said. (more…)

It is beholden on us at the local government level to ensure that activities like mining do not make it impossible for our residents to live in their own homes. It is appalling that a mining company’s activities override the rights of people to live simply and comfortably and have adequate sleep. The general situation with mining in this country, which has a long record of destroying farmland, damaging ecosystems, polluting waterways, destroying Aboriginal sites of significance, sucking out huge amounts of underground and riverine water and generally impacting negatively on communities, is unacceptable to anyone who puts social justice and quality of life before gold and the dollar and I hope that we will do everything we can to lessen the impact of this particular goldmine on our residents.

Catherine Moore, Questions and Statements, February 4 Council meeting

Greens MP Ian Cohen is referring Forestry Minister Ian Macdonald and Forests NSW to the Auditor General for their unsustainable management of the Riverina Red Gums.

“The Natural Resources Commission (NRC) report on the River Red Gums has provided the necessary research for the NSW Auditor General to seriously question the assertions of Minister Macdonald and Forests NSW,” says Mr Cohen.
 
“Minister Macdonald has previously claimed Forests NSW’s management of River Red Gums is consistent with world class environmental practice. I would question whether logging 70% beyond sustainable levels in an internationally significant wetland meets such a standard. 
 
“The report is a resounding indictment on Forests NSW’s management. The report clearly states, ‘forest growth rates have been in long-term decline but quotas have not been revised down’. In other words Forests NSW, with the blessing of Minister Macdonald, has continued to log at a ‘business as usual’ rate in the face of an increasingly stressed system. (more…)

Australia Day. What does it mean?

For the First Australians, it represents the take-over of their land with the arrival of the first governor and the subsequent events which led to dispossession, disease, genocide and prejudice, not to mention mismanagement and destruction of the land and water systems that had provided for them for so long.

It re-emphasises the failure to acknowledge that Indigenous people were here for tens of thousands of years before the British flag was planted on the soil of what was conveniently called “Terra Nullius” - land belonging to no-one.

This in turn is further emphasised by the flying, draping, parading and wearing of the Australian flag, featuring the colonisers’ Union Jack in the left hand corner. And if that wasn’t enough, the notion of Terra Nullius is rammed home even more by the singing of the National Anthem with its first lines - “Australians all let us rejoice, for we are young and free.”

What’s to celebrate? (more…)

(letter to the editor, published in the CT January 28)

Let’s be honest. Every day more light is shed on why there is no hope for humanity and all those species whose survival depends on our making the right decisions, and your report “Koalas face big logging threat” (January 26) is yet another example. We ought to be doing everything we can to protect biodiversity by retaining habitat, in this case for the last known koala colony on the far south coast. Forest protection has many benefits. As well as providing habitat, forests help to soak up the massive amounts of CO2 we are pumping out, improve catchment and regulate the water table. But no, we prefer to turn our forests into woodchips to meet the demands of insatiable overseas markets, not just in Japan but also China, whose demand for woodchips currently and frighteningly outweighs the huge amounts we already are producing. As with climate change, it is easier to pretend the problem does not exist, or at least, that humans have nothing to do with it, because recognising that our voracious consumption is jeopardising our very existence would mean that we had to do something about it. Australians all let us rejoice? I don’t think so.

Catherine Moore, Charleys Forest