Mood:  sad

The good doctor said "Where is your money from?" I was a little gobsmacked having worked 3 years on the successful NSW wilderness protection campaign on a shoestring up to the March 1995 election of the ALP. No greeting with 'how are you going', or 'what's new'. No 'what campaigns are you working on', or 'where is your office' or the like. Messer we soon understood was a power player at intimate levels of NSW politics and that meant for her knowing the money trail. A member of the Sydney Water Board as govt appointee for 10 years on a bursary of some kind.

(It was an experience similar to the one conversation with Opposition Attorney General Smith former Crown prosecutor some 10 years later. In a similar power dynamic his first question - "where is your money from?" he wanted to know. It's a fair enough question to ensure bonefides but it is also so very NSW. No trust, grasping milieu.)

Last evening 9 October 2009 we saw director of Total Environment Centre on (now also web cast) NSW Stateline on the debacle that is waste policy here (available in due course from ABC here) but not Angel's likely role in that outcome. It jogged our memory. We don't trust Angel but compere Dempster gives him credit. So why the reservations here - well the list is substantial but sticking to the waste policy area for now it involves Messer and waste and now dead Frank Miller and Angel coming in over the top of the real campaigners - as usual.

But first we need to introduce yet another policy wonk - John Denlay, guru on waste issues. He was our mentor for this writer's time 1995 to 1997 in closing the dioxin spewing Waterloo Incinerator: Opposed by Greenpeace, South Sydney Council, Eastern Suburbs Greens (including this writer then Bondi councillor) and Friends of the Earth Sydney (Denlay's group). But not opposed by Total Environment Centre advisedly according to John Denlay and my own experience as Bondi Ward councillor elected to close the old monster. They wanted an upgrade and an effective escape hatch for waste burnt into the atmosphere and toxic ash. A very bad idea. They called it "waste to energy".

This TEC record is instructive for what follows at Woodlawn too given Angel's pre-eminent role in the green group interface with the NSW ALP ministry from 1997 onwards.

Above is a NCC conference resolution from 1995 from our file from JD to me to present over two pages from our file about how to really address land fill. During this time Angel was a nobody on waste policy. It was all John Denlay's leadership.

By 2000 Denlay had married and left NSW. Despite high hopes of the Carr Govt wrestling waste volumes down with innovative 'extended producer responsibility' and industry plans and metropolitan waste boards, including closure of notorious waste escape hatches (Waterloo incinerator simply gasifying the refuse), by 2000 the wheels were falling off.

The NCC had an expert working group called Waste Crisis Network. Frank Miller was on WCN. FM was a rural land holder at Braidwood, esteemed member of local Green Party, and FoE Sydney rep on WCN following the Denlay pioneering work on policy. The other members are mentioned below in this explosive letter to the NSW Independent Commission Against Corruption. Notice the date 6 June 2000. The folks on WCN were the cream of the green movement on waste and probably had 100 years of experience amongst them hands on. They weren't light weights by any measure. The handwriting at bottom left is the SAM editor's writing in a telephone file note confirming who authorised the letter for WCN (old lawyer habit):

Independent MP Richard Jones pushes this controversial development here 2 days later in NSW Parliament and apologies for the faded image off old fax paper:

Now notice the date of this letter by Messer countermanding the reference to ICAC dated 14 June 2000 duly signed:

There is no doubting Messer wanted to destroy the credibility of the ICAC referral by the cream of the waste campaign of the NSW green movement, indeed the NSW Environment Minister quotes the letter in parliament 29th August 2000 in making their excuses:

The so called "junior officer" Frank Miller in the Minister's reply was at leat 70 years of age and backed by his whole committee.

Notice this line item in the NCC budget papers of that year up to June 2000 - $37,500 for "water reform process", that is main business of the Sydney Catchment Authority, and Messer's own Sydney Water Board, in papers prepared by Geof Lambert as treasurer (a very credible professional scientist/psephologist), with this writer an elected NCC executive member who resigned that year in disgust at anti environmental decisions being forced through the executive.

The policy back story is here: Having failed after 5 full years to wrestle down waste volumes as promised the Carr govt wanted an escape hatch - Woodlawn mine site near Goulburn according to out of sight, out of mind tradition that has got western civilisation where we are today. The more greenwashing by the operator the better as here regarding methane harvesting April 2007:

Back in 2000 via minister Refshauge a friendly was appointed to an inquiry to locate and assess Woodlawn mega tip. This is waving the white flag, creating the notorious escape hatch not so different conceptually to the Waterloo Incinerator issue mid 90ies, this time a hole in the ground and water table problems, previously toxic ash and dioxin air pollution:

NCC then issues a friendly, green tinted, grotesquely naive press release.

Unduly friendly once you read the context: Veteran campaigner Miller can see the work of the WCN being dismantled and shafted:

Angel writes to Miller later that year cutting him down even further with something to do with a media spot by Angel on an REP - regional environmental plan - for the catchment (?):

Angel has a reputation for speaking over the top of the real campaigners on the coal face on diverse policy areas from forests (just ask ChipStop convenor Harriet Swift), to waste (here), to Snowy River (Carl Drury) to Lake Cowal (Ruth Rosenhek) and on and on it goes. SAM here was puzzled what this REP for this waste matter is all about.

But today we googled and found this explanation in Hansard regarding  the issue of conflict of interest within the model for the Sydney Catchment Authority for regulator/operator model. The very issue that came up with the msyterious submission to the Woodlawn Commission of Inquiry from the SCA against Woodlawn and then changed by SCA midstride to grudging acceptance.

Presciently Ian Cohen MP refers to the relevant REP in his speech in parliament in 1998 here, and notice all the players are mentioned in his speech on the SYDNEY WATER CATCHMENT MANAGEMENT BILL Second Reading, 1 December 1998 and see bold:

The amendments have been drafted with the assistance of longstanding water campaigners such as Dr Judy Messer, a board member of Sydney Water; John Connor from the Nature Conservation Council, a peak body in the environment movement; Keith Muir from the Colong Foundation; Graham Douglas and Noel Plumb from the National Parks Association; and Michael Mobbs, the only person in Sydney who can credibly argue for a more sustainable existence in that he lives in Sydney’s only sustainable house. Many people should follow Mr Mobbs’ example. I have not yet visited his house but I have heard a great deal about it. His home reflects the attempts being made in non-urban areas to achieve sustainability and no run-off of pollutants from living areas. Michael Mobbs has certainly achieved that.

I also commend Kathryn Ridge from the Greens’ office, who has worked long and hard on preparing the necessary material. She has done an excellent job. Both the ministerial representatives and the Opposition acknowledge that this bill was the product of extreme deadlines. I have received copies of correspondence from Dr Judy Messer, who has been a director of Sydney Water for almost 10 years. She indicated her concerns about this bill directly to the Premier. She stated:

I wish to express my strong concern that, in terms of its powers, functions and scope as outlined in the Bill the Sydney Catchment Authority will not achieve the admirable outcomes that you wish to see eventuate.

The Greens share the deep concerns expressed by those who have had a long history of involvement with this issue. For example, John Connor from the Nature Conservation Council sent a letter to the Premier expressing similar concerns to those of Judy Messer. Mr McClellan spoke on a number of occasions about the need for any legislation to establish a completion date for a regional environmental plan [REP], which is a prescriptive instrument that controls the actions and decisions of State agencies and local government authorities; the incorporation of water quality objectives set by the Environment Protection Authority or the Healthy Rivers Commission; consent authorities not approving a development application unless it has a neutral or positive impact on water quality; and the development of amelioration or action plans to address existing developments which are causing pollution.

An REP which incorporates these elements will be groundbreaking, but there is no confidence that this vision will take shape if it is not clearly outlined in the bill. Such articulation is crucial to ensure that the Sydney Catchment Authority [SCA] has no role in setting the catchment water quality and environmental flow objectives for its operations. Such a conflict is untenable and must be addressed in the bill. Later I will give my recommendations for addressing the regulator-operator conflict that is inherent in the SCA. That conflict relates to the setting of objectives, the financial framework, the role of the board and the contract of engagement for the chief executive officer.

In relation to ending the ad hoc political decision making in relation to Sydney’s catchments - and certainly that is an issue of ministerial discretion - the Minister for the Environment should be the Minister responsible for Sydney Water, because the SCA is to have primary responsibility for protecting the catchment and catchment water quality. As Dr Judy Messer so aptly put it, there is not only considerable conflict of interest but also an inordinate amount of ministerial authority. She said, "This allows virtually unfettered powers to the Minister without imposing adequately defined duties and responsibilities". The ministerial discretion powers must be subject to the operating licence, which needs to be mandated and created following a period of public exhibition within a specified time frame.

at http://www.parliament.nsw.gov.au/Prod/parlment/hansart.nsf/V3Key/LC19981201043

 

Frank Miller died broken hearted a few years ago, and this is just another inadequate apology to him from this writer: For failing to run sufficient political protection for his sound and idealistic work in the snakepit that is Sydney politics, green and otherwise. We were as beaten as he was.

These are his words, as if from the grave but actually from October 2000, and worth a read despite the prose style, and very wise:

The serious allegation is that both Messer then and presumably Angel were out of their depth when they betrayed in 2000 the trust of the real waste campaigners at the coal face in 2000 to sustain their relationship with the Carr Govt, and stay on that drip.

Posted by editor at 11:59 AM NZT

Updated: Sunday, 11 October 2009 10:35 AM NZT

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Mood:  sharp

Mediocre laissez faire economic analysis has grown up around the alleged desirability of the defunct 1997 '$35 billion' (or is that only $25 billion?) NSW power sell off plan, rejected by the union movement and ALP conference. But not just those groups. Civil society groups were also very concerned as per this article in the UK The Guardian in 1997 which was provided to NSW MPs with the package below:

The following documentation has never been web published before sitting in a plastic folder in the SAM archive for 12 years now. But we always knew it was quality information that should be kept for posterity, whether one agrees or disagrees with the weight of the arguments.

As stated elsewhere, this writer slotted a copy of this briefing note under every NSW MP's door. A practice we learned from an earlier parliamentary officer job with cross bencher Clover Moore MP in late 1992, when Moore McDonald and Hatton's influence and power was in their halycon days. The unofficial circular under doorways was banned soon after and we may well have caused that. Certainly the anger in the ALP Right must surely have been white hot after their power sale plan fell over.

As stated in the penultimate post regarding plans for the sale income in 1997:

(b) we know of another $450M via John Connor (now of ALP aligned Climate Institute) which Carr planned to insert into a NSW version of Howard's $1B Natural Heritage Trust package in the sell off of Telstra. Indeed the 1997 energy sale plan was quite a monkey see, monkey do version of Carr copying Howard in 1996 federal election win. In NSW substitute power assets for telco, but it was all about smashing unions and getting the money. And people wonder why Carr jumped directly to Macquarie Bank from the premiership?

The briefing paper from 1997 follows and main credit goes to freelance writer and academic Claire Gerson in Third Opinion magazine edited by Stevie Bee/Broadbent (now out of publication) who often worked overnight because back then internet speeds on landlines were so slow it was the only way to access his international sources. Also to then climate change campaigner Dietrich Willing of Friends of the Earth Sydney:

................................................................................

Lastly here is a poster from nascent  NSW Green party from that time in 1997: 

Posted by editor at 2:19 PM NZT

Updated: Tuesday, 6 October 2009 4:00 PM NZT

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Mood:  rushed

While agreeing with the overall thrust of the show last night there are some omissions and clarifications of significance:

1. Obeid MP, hardly objective, quotes $35 B valuation of 1997 energy sale proposal. This figure is also quoted by Keating in (complete with banker consultancy conflict) the SMH in recent years putting the sale at $35B but conflating the 1997 and 2007 sale plans which are radically different. Keating here 6 May 2008 and note his disclosure eventually of financial conflict to Lazard Carnegie Wylie bankers, in

http://www.smh.com.au/news/opinion/iemma-deserved-better-than-naked-obstructionism/2008/05/05/1209839545859.html

However other literature we have seen from that 1997 controversy puts the 1997 sale figure at $25B not $35B. So we remain agnostic on the true figure. To be sure it's a big number but so is a $10B discrepancy.

 2. In fact the Iemma plan excluded various infrastructure reducing the sale down to some $10-15B. It took John Kaye MP (Greens) to expose Keating's in effect false advertising of the sale on the opinion pages of the SMH. Keating wanted people to think it was the 10 year delay that caused the price reduction from $35B to $15B and '$20B in lost income', when really it was apples with oranges. Tsk tsk. Perhaps this deception related to this:

NSW power sale fees to tip $150m | Business | News.com.au 11 Dec 2007

3. The unfettered market axiom assumed in the 4 Corners view of history behind the 1997 proposal is shallow and potentially very dangerous. SAM will publish material from that 1997 campaign from UK experience which is damning, by academic Claire Gerson, and circulated to all NSW MPs via FoE Sydney green group at the time by this writer by hand under their parliamentary office door. A practice that is now banned.

4. Further to point 3, Argentina privatisations were a disaster. The gigantic Enron bankruptcy in the USA another disaster for social fabric and subject of withering doco on google video - Smartest Guys In The Room. And Lehman Bros collapse more recently in the GFC. In this sense public ownership of essential services has been vindicated big time. These are huge democratic issues beyond a once off sale of the family silver.

5. As per the second episode of the long running West Wing tv show "Post Hoc, Ergo Propter Hoc" because a rail project stalled doesn't mean it was the failure of the 1997 sell off that caused it. A whole list of broken promises for rail was mentioned.

The rail extension to Bondi Beach we know alot about (and published source materials here ages ago) as then ward councillor at Bondi, and chair of the council environment committee. Bondi Rail was private public partnership with Macquarie Bank with Lend Lease involvement. So it was off Govt budget not part of the energy sale income. Second it was opposed for high priced ticket, failure of design over lack of mid way station, destruction of public park, cost of excavation in soft terrain for beach front station, and fear of high rise on air space rights (just like Bondi Junction/Gold Coast is today).

6. An irony of point 5 is that 4 Corners last night showed Lee Rhiannon MP (Greens) who back in 1997 was a private Bondi citizen and a strong local voice against the Bondi rail/private capital. Rhiannon and her protege now Mayor of Balmain Jamie Parker, are shown promoting north west rail against the Metro in 2009. Horses for courses: 1997 against Bondi rail, 2009 for NW rail showing just how political the Sydney snakepit really is.

7. Perhaps one of the biggest omissions is the political-economic reality of the disastrous thankfully stalled plan for a $5B secretive truck tunnel from Rozelle to Port Botany with cancer smog stacks in marginal Marrickville (held by Carmel Tebbutt on the Rees team replacing Iemma).  

8. Another big ommission is that not all income of the 1997 energy sale was likely to end up in transport. More likely it was intended for a raft of political fixes and boondoggles. The green movement in NSW are as implicated in this as much as anyone:

(a) We know of possibly an extra $billion spent on the Chatwood-Epping rail build (supposed to go Parramatta) due to complaints over a postage stamp of Lane Cove NP, in particular via Dr Judy Messer then chair of Nature Conservation Council and north shore egomaniac. The redesign involved was rejected by leading greens in FoE Sydney, Karen Morrison and others. This wasted $1B possibly more than anything probably cruelled the extension to Parramatta. (But it did boost the need for a democratic Green Party beyond such as Dr Messer, or Jeff Angel, who also championed the deal with Carr to entrench logging in public forests for 20 years 1/4 saved, 3/4 trashed).

(b) we know of another $450M via John Connor (now of ALP aligned Climate Institute) which Carr planned to insert into a NSW version of Howard's $1B Natural Heritage Trust package in the sell off of Telstra. Indeed the 1997 energy sale plan was quite a monkey see, monkey do version of Carr copying Howard in 1996 federal election win. In NSW substitute power assets for telco, but it was all about smashing unions and getting the money. And people wonder why Carr jumped directly to Macquarie Bank from the premiership?

9. We could swear we heard the presenter Wendy Carlisle suggest to ex RTA supremo, now Metro supremo Les Wielinga, that the 'NSW public more in sorrow than anger will see an extended metro when they believe it'. That is transposing the old saying. Just a small slip up but still confusing. Yes, a double check shows the journo fluffed her line, but we knew what she meant and so did big Les Wielinga.

11. In terms of real politik, voters ditching the NSW ALP as per the vox pop at the end of the show won't mean much in safe Liberal Party seats in the north west sector (where this writer is based 6 months now). That's the cruel real politik of the situation for voters. And perhaps even their own fault since they voted in the M2 tollroad way back in 1994-5 and 1999 when the NGO sector - including arrest of this writer as a protester - called for rail not tollway road  vision for Sydney. In that respect both Labor and Liberal are indistinguishable.

Posted by editor at 12:06 PM NZT

Updated: Tuesday, 6 October 2009 2:26 PM NZT

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Mood:  sharp

SAM editor has finally taught ourselves how to upload DVD (VOB file) to YouTube. It involves video conversion programme Super, downloaded for free from Majorgeeks.com,  including working out preferred settings for YouTube upload easily found via google (eg say WMV file, which is also handy in the process for reduction in file size, 30 frames per second etc etc). Finally one must split any file longer than 10 minutes or longer than 100MB in size, via another free download programme Yamb found via google and a nervous download in terms of security integrity. Through all of this a 700MB file 14 minute file has become some 9 and 5 minute files of 78 and 44 MB file size respectively.

Here is our submission in the last 24 hours:

                  

Secret smog stacks threat to Sydney residents - Part 1

This video from February 2007 shows background to plans of the NSW Government, Australia, to install a $5 billion truck tunnel via marginal seat of Marrickville to a vastly expanded Port Botany for gigantic new container ships. The film is about what is driving the tunnel/smog stacks project rather than the tunnel itself covered in more detail here:

1st March 2007

$5b secret road under Sydney

http://www.dailytelegraph.com.au/news/nsw-act/b-secret-road-under-sydney/story-e6freuzi-1111113075104

A tunnel must have smog stacks which will pollute and kill Sydney citizens from air pollution well before their time. More detail here:

28 August 2009

"M5 East pollution harming asthmatics"
"POLLUTION levels in Sydney's M5 East tunnel are so high that healthy motorists who use it daily could develop respiratory problems within two years"

http://www.smh.com.au/national/m5-east-pollution-harming-asthmatics-20090827-f183.html

Botany Bay & Catchment Alliance (33 community groups) and local Green Party have been exposing this agenda for several years now, including BB&CA being a party to an official Commission of Inquiry. The CoI report urged minimising Port expansion but was kept secret prior to a sensitive Sept 2005 by-election in Marrickville by then Minister Frank Sartor via (then) Deputy Director of Planning Sam Haddad. The CoI report was released 3 weeks after that vote and ignored with maximalist project announced the same day.

This film reveals many of the arguments put to Commissioner Cleland who retired soon after his work was done. This secretive agenda for massively expensive truck tunnel/smog stacks is still affecting govt leadership dynamics in 2009 with local MP and Deputy Premier Carmel Tebbutt newly appointed health minister and tipped to take the top job before March 2011 general election. Will she sell out local voters, particularly the young, sick, elderly and democracy itself?

More at http://www.botanybay.info/

and

http://www.sydneyalternativemedia.com/blog

See part 2 also on Youtube at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LXbT9dl94Zg

Thanks for watching.

[and]

                  

Secret smog stacks threat to Sydney residents - Part 2

Added: October 02, 2009, 02:50 AM

Time: 5:04

 

And here is the letter we refer to in the background signed by then Deputy Director of Planning Sam Haddad who also appeared last night in footage on ABC TV Stateline. We say this letter shows a very political agency on the part of Haddad for then Minister Frank Sartor and the NSW ALP given the sensitive timing of the Marrickville by election Sept 2005.

Posted by editor at 10:37 AM NZT

Updated: Sunday, 4 October 2009 10:27 AM NZT

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Mood:  sharp

We have been following the Redgum conservation campaign for some months now: Here are images from our story:

Wednesday, 31 December 2008

Redgum forest decision in Victoria: Time for complementary NSW protection by Minister Ian Macdonald
Topic: nsw govt

Now we look at the record of past forest decisions to get a grasp of what we can expect from the brown ALP in NSW

Picture explanation: What's in a map? This is a secret map the Carr Govt didn't mean to release back in 1999, quite tatttered now after various relocations by the SAM editor. It was obtained from a friendly NSW Resource and Conservation Assessment Council (RACAC) staffer in early 1999 who quickly sought it back but we refused. Viewed with an informed eye it reveals just how hyperbolic Carr's oft boasted 'big national park decisions' actually is.

The final maps publicly released for the Upper, Lower and Eden forest regions don't have this colour detail as above. In the public version they merge the new reserves with the old park reservations to make them look bigger (see for example Upper NE map immediately below). 

Note in the map above carefully the purple/maroon area which shows the actual new national parks by Bob Carr in 1998-9. They are minimal compared to the light green logging areas effectively privatised for 20 years out of public land.

Don't be misled by the dark green areas above. These were parks created by other governments - decades and decades earlier in recognition of the 80 million hectare area of NSW majority cleared and degraded. 

The question has to be asked "Did Carr release more forest for destruction (private logging areas out of public forest) than he saved (new national park)?" The answer must be yes. Current premier Nathan Rees has a very low standard to improve on the record of  Bob Carr in his recent exhortations to save the redgum forests of the Murray Darling River.

Significantly Rees' current chief of staff GraemeWedderburn was also in that role for Bob Carr in 1998-99 and presumably in on the political deceit on the public interest back then.

Simon Santow ran some stories in the ABC radio news yesterday and on flagship World Today as here:

The World Today - Push to save river red gum forests 24/07/2009

The story was spinning off the article about, and opinion piece by, ex NSW premier Bob "akimbo" Carr in the Sydney Morning Herald both front page and opinion piece column:

http://www.smh.com.au/opinion/logging-river-red-gums-is-environmental-vandalism-not-job-creation-20090723-duum.html

 and front page here:

A word of advice: Carr tells Rees to save Riverina red gums

And the story is evolving already suggesting an ALP set piece choreography with advance notice to the ALP Govt of the SMH profile pieces:

Rees bows to pressure to stop logging 24 Jul 2009

It's sound politics for the NSW ALP no doubt given Verity Firth MP (ALP) is looking very shaky in her inner west seat of Balmain from so called 'blue' Green Mayor Jamie Parker: A description of Parker by News Corp's Imre Salusinszky, not understanding that Parker (marketing student and promoter of Horny Goatweed in your local ColesWorth supermarket) has always been an adoptee or at the least close ally of 'red Green' Lee Rhiannon MP since his Macquarie University student politician days.

(We well remember meeting Jamie in Rhiannon's parliamentary office foyer years ago and noting a precocious, impertinent, brash and talented individual. We decided to quit the party soon after.)

But News Corp know how to kick the ALP. As the Chinese say, everyone likes to push a falling wall.

 

Being such an accomplished spruiker Carr's Herald foray almost had this writer forgetting the ex premier's real record on forests in 1998 and 1999. How Carr protected:

'only 1/4 of the scientifically assessed areas deserving protection and under threat' according to Dailan Pugh of North East Forest Alliance (see Pugh's report of his below in late 1998).

Here is a sample of green NGO reactions we collected at the time knowing the historical accuracy and significance in the face of a tax payer funded PR machine:

Pugh was also recently quoted in the Australian Weekend colour magazine profile of current federal Climate Change Minister Penny Wong, then a policy adviser on forests to Carr Govt in NSW. He repeated the lowly 1/4  protection figure of true area demanded by the science in NSW. Wong then bailed out to become a South Australian senator, perhaps also knowing the truth would eventually come out in NSW about the forest fraud?

Indeed Carr has always been a dodgy and unreliable voice on the so callled 'programmatic specificity' of government policy. Not just integrity of forest conservation decisions. Famously he banned web archiving of his government press releases.

With a web archive people soon realise how maps of forests conflate publicly owned native forests into "Native forest and hardwood plantation" as per Upper North East publicly released RFA map (above): In other words conversion of public estate to agri industry corporate profit. All in a days work for the now Macquarie Bank consultant ex premier Bob Carr: He may well be a keen bushwalker but at some point like his political recruit Peter Garrett now minister at federal level he not only sold out the green agenda but started to believe his own bullsh*t too.

This is the first time these secretly obtained maps from the government's own RACAC have been (web) published. Also note RACAC itself is a rip off of the earlier Coaliton/Fahey Govt NRAC - Natural Resource Audit Council  of 1993-4. This gives you the clue of the brown ALP agenda from the beginning.

The secret maps show, particularly via the maroon colour new conservation areas versus light green logging areas, Carr simply foreclosed on any future protections with 20 year logging guarantees. And he has the chutzpah to call that being green. Certainly his strategy harvested green votes via cunning tax payer funded advertising but it wasn't a real green policy outcome, and the maps and credible commentary prove it.

Let the reader judge just how hyperbolic those '300 new national parks I created ... no one could have done more' claims by Bob Carr on radio yesterday 24 July 2009 actually amount to. Such statistical games are only really of any sense taken in context of nationally and statewide only 20% forest landcover in 1788, down to 10% land cover now, with barely 1/10 of that which actually remains intact mature forest critical to wildlife. The highly mechanised logging and agricultural industries have been taken their toll. 

Tragically Carr only manages to parade his 300 national parks by airbrushing from history the far greater area of forest he effectively privatised. That's just another reason why he was embraced by Macquarie Bank as a consultant within months of being forced from office under pressure of devastating polls in 2005.

Ironically now the caravan has moved to west of the Great Divide Carr's and the Sydney Morning Herald's postures on saving redgum forests are indeed valid and important. The two main NGO groups associated - The Wilderness Society and NSW National Parks Association - are quite justified in leveraging the exhortations of Carr as a loyal ALP public figure.

But those of us with longer experience and more probing analysis of green and national politics well understand Carr's posture has more to do with:

• Carr papering over his own dodgy environmental record, and perhaps desire for redemption at various times;
• the flurry of attacks this last week on federal brand ALP minister Peter Garrett and his shredded green credentials - recruited by Bob Carr in the first place after green group scathing repudiations of Carr in 1998-99;
• the electoral bleeding of inner west ALP MP's like Verity Firth, and also to some degree Carmel Tebbutt.

Now this writer has the web publishing capacity much of this pre google material can now by made accessible.

Here is the remainder of the maps available at that time, indicating the relatively minor additions by Carr in maroon colour, the much more extensive dedicated logging areas in light green with repeal of iconic environmental legislation, and below that the scathing reportage of Dailan Pugh in 1998-9, important as Pugh was embraced by the Carr Govt and a green NGO appointee on RACAC itself. Groups with far more democratic base like The Wilderness Society were simply frozen out. Note too how a scathing statement of Carr as "sell out" reference by Pugh below becomes a lesser rhetorical question in lobbying document to the NSW Teachers Federation.

Picture (above): Notably absent from the line up at this icon event was one Peter Garrett because it would involve criticising ALP premier Bob Carr

In conclusion, one can safely assume that the rate of native forest destruction in NSW, including high conservation value forest has not reduced at all since Bob Carr's 'big national parks decision of 1998-99. And the additions to his national parks since - for example 65,000 ha in the 2003 election campaign - do not alter the general position. Increased intensity of logging in State Forests, and on private land, has resulted in the destruction of millions of individual rare and endangered wildlife.  When you deconstruct the spin current premier Nathan Rees could hardly do worse than Premier Bob Carr when it comes to ecologically sustainable logging policies or conservation as in the case of the redgum forests and may God have mercy on them now.

Famously politicians like Bob Carr in 1994 find it easy to be green in Opposition but can't be trusted. Notice similarly with these ALP politicians pre 2007 federal election namely Garrett and Albanese, later in lock step to support a Gunns plan for a massive pulp mill of Old Growth forests in Tasmania.

Nathan Rees though premier of NSW is in effect an ALP politician in Opposition posturing on green policy too, but the implementation will need extreme levels of scrutiny.

Posted by editor at 12:51 PM NZT

Updated: Sunday, 26 July 2009 12:08 PM NZT

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One of many contacts on the central coast confirms early this February that Dick Person, formerly NSW Government administrator at the sacked Port Macquarie Hastings Council, has completed his report into Gosford Council.

This is the council that willingly gave away control of the old Pacific Highway at Piles Creek after the devastating untimely death of a family of 2 adults and 3 children in a washed out section of road.

NSW Govt to take back Old Pacific Hwy ABC Sat Dec 6, 2008 9:01am AEDT

The Sydney based coroner was scathing of lack of local government rigour:

Culvert tragedy: coroner blames council - National - smh.com.au 18 Sep 2008

Similarly this quote from the SMH:

"An "incompetent and ineffective" NSW council is entirely to blame for a highway collapse that killed five family members, including three children, a coroner has ruled.

In damning findings, deputy NSW coroner Paul MacMahon said Gosford City Council had failed to provide the most basic road maintenance, and that neglect had cost five lives.

Adam Holt, his partner Roslyn Bragg, 29, their young daughters Jasmine, 3, and Madison, 2, and Ms Bragg's nephew Travis, 9, died when a culvert collapsed and swallowed part of the Old Pacific Highway at Somersby, north of Sydney, in June last year."

And then we have this follow up:

Council risks second road collapse - National - smh.com.au 22 Sept 2008

and this

Pipes corroded before road collapse: inquest ABC Tue Jul 1, 2008 12:45pm AEST An inquest into the deaths of five people in a road collapse on the New South Wales central coast has heard Gosford Council failed to keep adequate records of repairs needed to the roads.

and this

Documents reveal collapsed highway section needed repairs ABC Mon Oct 15, 2007 8:04pm AEST

There are a legion of hostile residents and ratepayers in Gosford LGA or so it seems:

Mayor defends 'most complained about' council ABC Thu Oct 30, 2008 1:37pm AEDT

Yet the Person Inquiry was haphazard at best. Many did not know how to make public submissions. Indeed there wasn't any public advertisement calling for these. Did Dick Person access this torrent of information?

Another contact says there has been a report of alleged corruption sent to ICAC regarding deliberately deleting the content of resident complaints from the council's own information database. Of cooking the information flow. Who would have thunk it?

Picture: The inquest heard the Gosford City Council were 'aware of structural problems'. (ABC TV)

Another contact says there are two (not one) KPMG reports one of which allegedly calls for directors at Gosford to be sacked. Did Dick Person see this particular KPMG report? Does it exist?

Yet another contact says there are two reports by a state government and Gosford council retained consultancy called Internal Audit Bureau into alleged incapacity of Gosford to properly do land use planning and assessment in relation to water licensing. Are these the kind of skills also involved in landscape engineering, say for road safety? Did Dick Person access that as yet IAB confidential report?

Suffice to say our submission to Dick Person was sent direct via his email address at Port Macquarie Hastings not via Gosford Council.

We look forward to Dick Person's findings and the State Government response not least for the memory of those 3 dead children and their hapless parents. Will they get justice?

Posted by editor at 7:32 AM EADT

Updated: Monday, 2 March 2009 8:05 PM EADT

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Mood:  quizzical

Vote grab sinks Sydney road plan | The Daily Telegraph24 Feb 2009 ... A $9 BILLION roads plan to solve Sydney's transport and congestion

might take a look at this story above from their own sister newspaper via The Australian, in the Wall Street Journal.

Call me a stupid greenie, commercial lawyer, evolutionary ecology graduate, and otherwise grovelling gardner, delivery van driver, bottle shop attendant, and reader analyst, but the synchronised global recession looks alot like there is no economic case any more for super containers to Port Botany (or Port Phillip in Melbourne for that matter).

No doubt the army of sub-contractors and tradies out there need a $9 billion meal ticket. Trouble is, a glorified truck tunnel to Port Botany as a cover for every mega road project wet dream of the Roads  Minister is probably a white elephant.

And how did we get all this congestion in the first place? More mega roads rather than sophisticated public transport? Do you think? We can't even get an integrated ticket organised. 

Far better if that army of job hungry workers were set to work on real sustainability projects - like wave power energy for instance. Geo thermal. Solar photo voltaic and water heater power on every northerly facing roof.

Or urban friendly bike paths. Or water tanks. Or ..... the list is endless really.

Posted by editor at 1:49 PM EADT

Updated: Monday, 2 March 2009 12:00 PM EADT

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John Dowd, former NSW Attorney General sounds miffed. He reckons just now on ABC local radio "What would new Minister John Robertson know about corrective services?"

Well the last time we went into Justice Action office to talk to Brett Collins and crew to take the picture of a mural below - good mates with Lee Rhiannon MP they are too - we happened to bump into ... John Robertson in the lift well.

We talked briefly about Enron: Smartest Guys in the Room and how you can watch it on Google Video for free. He said he had just bought a copy and was about to watch it.

That was mid to late 2008 or so. That's right, Robbo at Unions NSW was a close neighbour of Justice Action a few years. Brett Collins at JA is another shortish tough fit nuggety looking bloke who has beaten the system particularly as a Kiwi avoiding deportation through the application of Rolls Royce administrative law in the 80ies. That's when we met Brett first, intrigued as a law student about this ex prisoner, he giving a talk at the Australian National University to an audience of 5 or so at ... the Student Union. Later we saw his name in the Administrative Law class cases taught by the respected John McMillan, later Commonwealth Ombudsman.

Collins, a reformed bank robber with 10 years in prison under his belt, is now a Big Media go to expert on the receiving end of the justice system. He's also a pretty friendly bloke, doting father with a fast paced conversational style and an effective advocate. He's no angel but he's no thug either, and arguably an ornament to our democracy in a curious way. He's a living example of rehabilitation perhaps more by individual struggle than anything else.

We think Robbo knows a fair bit more about Corrective Services and maybe even 'Rotten Ron' than big Liberal progressive, former Attorney General John Dowd quite realises. Indeed Justice Action have even been known to quote John Dowd approvingly here in another context. Another close friend of Justice Action would be former senator Kerry Nettle who has been on the same civil right platform as VIP Dowd.

Take the hint Mr Dowd!

Posted by editor at 9:32 AM EADT

Updated: Monday, 2 February 2009 10:22 AM EADT

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Is that the best News Corp ninnies can do yesterday page 4 of the Sydney Daily Telegraph?:

Will former union boss John Robertson run NSW one day? | The Daily Telegraph ...By Joe Hildebrand. January 31, 2009

If you are going to attack now minister in NSW John Robertson MP on ideological grounds at least get your facts and history right.

Regarding the protest pictured above, the NSW budget was under pressure early this century from escalating workers compensation insurance payouts and litigation costs. So the then premier Carr tried to 'reform' the sector. Then union secretary Michael Costa led a strong campaign against weakening workers legal rights only to trade his political capital for a cosy parliamentary pension, and implement the 'reform' as a Cabinet minister and more so later as Treasurer.

Trouble is since then we have seen the HIH collapse with huge social disruption and various convictions for fraud in the insurance/finance sector. Also academics and judges have now spoken out about insurance premiums for workers comp going up while payouts to actual injured workers have gone down while company profits have gone up - alot.

Big Govt and Big Business - quite possibly the same thing - are happy. But is it right?

...............................

Picture: Screen print of a death: Workers are killed and injured in this state every year in the course of earning a living, guaranteed. People who only work in offices tend to forget this reality.

.............................................

This 'reform' has been our own mini Enron, our own whiff of the Madoff and Walls St meltdown. courtesy of Carr, treasury hacks like John Pierce and treacherous Michael Costa. It was a bogus 'reform' deal at the expense of the little people and simply fed the big end of town's insatiable greed.

Fact is the 'reform' was a big business crock of financial and legislative shite.

Robertson as NSW union heavy blockading the gates of NSW Parliament over protection of labour rights has been vindicated on this topic. So this is just more Big Press nonsense. Like the whining over failed energy privatisation in a dead market, which would have destroyed jobs, asset value, state income. Thank heavens it didn't proceed. We are no friend of the ALP but this ideological irrationality and anti ALP tribalism is frankly quite tedious.

See the real financial story below - from the same conservative press 2 years back - with some juicy bits in bold (added except for the first paragraph which is the newspaper's intro). Read this and ask yourself one question - how big were the donations by the insurance industry in NSW and Australia generally to both sides of politics over this period? A good second question: Who in the big parties in parliament got sweet sinecures later on?

Background:

Liability of flawed law reform | The Australian

| April 14, 2007

FIVE years ago, David Ipp proved he was no ambulance chaser. At the height of the insurance crisis, the NSW Court of Appeal judge drew up an instruction manual for state governments on how to end the litigation explosion.

It became the bible of tort reform and led to restrictions on personal injury claims that have slashed the amount of litigation around the nation. Plaintiff lawyers, who lost millions of dollars in potential income, still seethe.

Ipp's credentials on this issue are impeccable. And that is why this judge has just become the worst nightmare for state governments.

Ipp has aligned himself with those who have been arguing all along that tort reform had gone too far.

To lawyers, this is the equivalent of St Peter denouncing the Catholic Church for excessive zeal. If the architect of these changes says they went too far, it gives credence to those who have questioned whether Australia gave away too much in order to solve an insurance crisis of the time.

Ipp's intervention has highlighted the fact that the price of solving that crisis goes beyond the realignment of the civil justice system. It has also handed governments the power to strike out a category of litigation that could expose their incompetence.

One of the reasons public liability insurance was unavailable or unaffordable in 2001 was the withdrawal of many insurance companies from the Australian market. They were struggling under an avalanche of litigation, were losing money and, understandably, had no desire to lose more.

Ipp's 2002 report provided the intellectual framework for the legal changes that enticed them back. But he did not have the last word. The insurance industry had a seat at the table and helped state and federal governments design the new civil justice system. A revolution that began in NSW has spread in varying degrees to the other states.

So while it should come as no surprise that lawyers criticise the system that has cost them a fortune, it is entirely predictable that insurers defend it vehemently. It has put them in clover.

The general insurance industry's return on net assets in the year to last December was a healthy 19.4 per cent. And that was no fluke. The year before it was 21.4 per cent, according to figures compiled by the Australian Prudential Regulation Authority.

Net incurred claims for the year to December were down 5.1 per cent, following a 0.5 per cent rise in 2005.

The Insurance Council of Australia says the changes are "carefully designed and principled". "The reform brought together the fundamental issues of people in the community taking greater personal responsibility for their lives while providing for the needs of the seriously injured," ICA spokesman Paul Giles says.

Even though insurers still pay for most awards of damages, they have greater certainty over their exposure. They are insulated from thousands of small claims that once would have cost them money. And even when injured people win in court, insurers have the comfort of statutory caps on the amount of compensation.

Tort reform has undoubtedly eased the pressure on public liability insurance premiums, which have fallen by 20 per cent. It has also made it possible for the insurance industry to write 610,000 new public liability insurance policies between 2003 and 2005.

The number of civil claims lodged in the nation's courts has been slashed by 75,376 since 2000-01. More than half of that reduction was in NSW, where Productivity Commission figures show civil claims have fallen by 39,959 cases.

But the new system is far from perfect. Rushed and inconsistent law-making has left so many anomalies and loopholes that Ipp and some other judges are clearly exasperated.

The legislators have left a gap in the compensation arrangements of NSW that is big enough for an injured policeman to fall through.

This system also hands blanket immunity to some government authorities, a change that goes beyond the approach recommended by Ipp.

The judge started criticising NSW compensation arrangements in 2005 when he handed down a judgement that said: "The statutes in this state relating to workers compensation and common law damages claims by workers against their employers and others can be described as a hodge-podge. No consistent thread of principle can be detected."

He removed all doubts about his position last month when he addressed a legal convention after crossing paths with former policeman Gordon "Bennie" Ball, who is seeking compensation for psychological injury.

The judge had been obliged by NSW law to strike out crucial parts of Ball's compensation claim, undermining his chances of winning a payout and lumbering him with a legal bill expected to be between $25,000 and $30,000.

This is not the outcome envisaged by former NSW premier Bob Carr when he introduced the first stage of the Civil Liability Act, which is the centrepiece of that state's tort reforms. "There are fundamental rights involved in what we are drafting and no one wants to deprive the genuinely deserving of compensation," Carr told parliament.

Two days after ruling against Ball, Ipp made it clear he did not like what he had been obliged to do. He told a stunned gathering of lawyers in the NSW Hunter Valley that the legislative inconsistency at play in the Ball case had led to "anomalies and unfairness".

He was referring to the fact that Ball, like other long-serving police, is not covered by the statutory workers compensation system, which only gives benefits to injured officers who were employed after 1988.

Ball is receiving a proportion of his final income. But if he wanted compensation for his injury, he would have had little option but to go to court. That would have put him up against the legal immunity the Carr government gave government agencies in the Civil Liability Act.

Ipp told his audience that tort reform had gone too far and those seeking changes had "really good points".

While adhering to what he said in his 2002 report, Ipp said he believed the legislation put in place had gone further "and sometimes much further" than what he had recommended.

He also revealed that two weeks earlier he had criticised the NSW Government for placing government agencies in a privileged position.

"Public authorities are given a host of novel and powerful defences that are in conflict with the notion that the Crown and government authorities should be treated before the law in the same way as an ordinary citizen," Ipp told a conference marking the anniversary of the Australian Law Journal.

"It is difficult to accept that public sentiment will allow all these changes to remain long-term features of the law."

In 2002, when introducing changes to the Civil Liability Act, Carr said he believed that courts should not have the power to determine how a public authority should spend its money. As a result, public authorities were given immunity from all actions concerning the general allocation of resources.

That might sound reasonable. But in practice, the immunity has allowed the NSW Government to dodge the sensational accusations of mismanagement contained in Ball's statement of claim.

Until he retired, Ball had been crime co-ordinator in the state child protection enforcement agency: the pedophile police.

His statement of claim accuses the Government of almost halving the number of police pursuing the state's pedophiles and child molesters in the late 1990s.

In the five years to 2001, the strength of his unit fell from 50 to just 30 officers, Ball's claim says.

Under-resourcing meant his unit had insufficient resources "to adequately carry out its investigations or prosecute pedophiles", it says.

He also claims staff shortages led directly to many investigations being suspended when he believed they should have been pursued. As a result, he claims he had to prioritise every investigation until he retired on medical grounds suffering from guilt, depression and post-traumatic stress syndrome.

The case has outraged the NSW Police Association.

Association secretary Peter Remfrey accuses the state Government of "hypocrisy" over its handling of the matter.

Instead of testing Ball's claims in court, the Government assembled a high-powered legal team and took him to the Court of Appeal.

The Government's legal team included Crown Solicitor Ian Knight, Paul Menzies QC and barrister Elpi Chrysostomou. They did not challenge the substance of Ball's claim that government negligence had directly caused an injury that forced him to leave the force.

They urged Ipp and the other judges to apply the immunity that rules out claims based on a government authority's general allocation of resources.

The judges found themselves duty-bound to rule against Ball.

By relying on the immunity, the NSW Government might have beaten Ball. His case will need to be re-pleaded on narrower grounds that do not accuse the government of causing his injury by under-resourcing his unit. That will weaken his ability to prove the government was at fault. It could also reduce the amount of any damages.

By invoking the immunity, the NSW Government has pushed the police association into the arms of those who want the immunity abolished.

Remfrey says the government had effectively "legislated themselves out of being liable for their own actions".

He says the police association agrees with Ipp.

"This tort reform has gone too far," Remfrey says. "Why should the NSW Government be able to pass laws making itself immune from the obligations placed on every other employer?

"Police officers are particularly vulnerable under these changes because they are charged with dealing with the implications of shortfalls in spending by all government agencies."

The Law Council of Australia and the NSW Bar Association believe it is time to review the impact of tort reform.

Law Council president Tim Bugg said the fact that the author of the last round of changes believes they have gone too far is a strong reason for calling a second review. "Our starting point is that no wrongdoer should be protected from his or her negligent actions, regardless of whether it is a government instrumentality or someone out in the street," Bugg says.

NSW Bar Association president Michael Slattery QC said any law that gave governments privileges above those of the rest of the community was not sustainable.

"Even worse, why should the community tolerate the suppression of litigation that would have revealed government incompetence and mismanagement?" Slattery says.

"This legislation suppresses criticism of government operations. The Ipp report did not authorise that."

A spokesman for NSW Police Minister David Campbell said details were not available on staffing levels when Ball was still in the force.

As well as appointing 40 extra police to prevent and investigate crimes against children, the Government had increased police powers and introduced new laws to protect children, he said.

Newly appointed Attorney-General John Hatzistergos adheres to Carr's argument in favour of the immunity.

"It is not the courts' function to be determining budgets. That is obviously a matter for the executive government," he said. "We need to ensure that duties of care are observed but that the courts, at the end, are not entrusted with a role of resource allocation in the general sense," Hatzistergos says.

..................................

More from the labour lobby here quoting former Compensation Court judge and former Attorney General Frank Walker:

Workers Online : Legal : 2001 - Issue 95 : View from the Bench

15 Nov 2005

Posted by editor at 10:34 AM EADT

Updated: Sunday, 1 February 2009 1:18 PM EADT

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Thank heavens for local NSW politics. With Gaza such a horror being shot to pieces by IDF gangsters on behalf of sinister illegal squatter movement, one embraces the light relief.

"I won't tackle premier" blares the lower circulation Sydney SunHerald today. Derr Frank.

You don't have a faction, or history in the ALP until poached from Sydney City Council independent politics by then Premier Bob Carr. You won't tackle him because your's is the last man standing desperation platform. There's a clue here Frank: You've got a face only a mother or wife could really love Frank as per the press image here:

I won't tackle Premier Sydney SunHerald 18 Jan 09 Exclusive: Frank Sartor breaks his silence on the plot to unseat NSW Premier, Nathan Rees.

And even further back in the mid 1990ies when you couldn't even get a gig with the successful bid team for the Olympics under the Fahey Coalition Govt? You were the Johnny On His Own even as the independent mayor of the CBD.

You're a bolt on Frank (as well as having a head like one?). Just like Peter Garrett. You will never be given the levers to the machine. Control of the treasury decisions. You might have laid down on the railway tracks for 5 years doing developer dirty work for the Tribe but they see that as their genius leveraging your previous strong cred as an independent to their own sleazy benefit. But truly Frank - it wouldn't matter if you had given your whole body to be burnt. You are not congenitally ALP which is why you ran as a successful independent mayor for Sydney all those years ago. And not for the ALP.

It's an old cliche but when you've been f*cked for your body and not your mind, they don't respect you in the morning Frank. It's been the morning after ever since Carr bailed out mid 2005. Why do you think Deputy Premier Andrew Refshauge announced his retirement after Carr's resignation pronto making way for Carmel Tebbutt in his own seat of Marrickville. So you could be premier? Dear fellow, in the words of Daryl Kerrigan, you're dreamin'.

(Just as this writer was too of Starship Troopers pseudo fascists in the form of the IDF last night but that was from watching Al Jazeera coverage of Gaza last evening.)

And there is another reason Frank you won't "tackle the premier". He's younger, brighter, and far more adept at diplomacy than you when he tries, and he's got truck loads of courage to take on his own machine at the pre- selections. You never had to do that as an insert to the ex Premier Carr food chain.

You Frank, are like a whiny dog with his tail between his legs asking for more. In that respect you are doomed to a certain fate like Peter Garrett 'with limited power' serving the beast we all know as the ALP. It's a gilded cage for you Franky, and Peter. That's the price you pay for the strut upon the stage.

Even today's front pager is exploitative by Fairfax to balance last Friday's front pager in the Daily Telegraph. You might think your voters in Rockdale, a large proportion of Mediteranean background, might be just a little distracted with the Middle East at the moment than interested to gird their loins in favour of their local MP?

As for Lisa Carty she is the proverbial 'bony arse bitch' of a journalist in the sense of the movie Working Girl character Signourney Weaver.

She can't help you, but she can use you. And she just did with your front pager and 2 page spread signifying just about nothing. Rees will be chuckling in his weeties at the din of empty vessels.

Posted by editor at 7:15 AM EADT

Updated: Sunday, 18 January 2009 7:58 AM EADT

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