"The individual has always had to struggle to keep from being overwhelmed by the tribe. If you try it, you will be lonely often, and sometimes frightened. No price is too high for the privilege of owning yourself." - Friedrich Nietzsche
Franklin’s vision: a blend of wood and wind
Bob Hawkins
08.03.14 6:00 am
SOMETHING very exciting is happening to Franklin, prettily strung along the western shore of the Huon, a few kilometres south of Huonville, administrative HQ of the stunning Huon Valley.
This mantra is seriously delusional ...
John Lawrence, Tasfintalk. Pic* First pub: Mar 7
08.03.14 5:30 am
Tripartite consensus at last? The most compelling thing about the Liberals’ fiscal strategy just released is that it may signify the dawn of a new era of consensus. The fiscal strategy is barely distinguishable from the government’s current strategy.
• Nick McKim: Liberals get it right on FT subsidies
• Jan Davis: The Campaign That Never Was ...
• Kevin Morgan: Palmer United Party to Decentralise Government Decision Making
Greens Energy Spokesperson Kim Booth
08.03.14 5:12 am
Second Basslink is an Alice in Wonderland election promise, that will drive power prices up
Editor
08.03.14 2:39 am
Tasmanian Times has been gifted a Cookbook by Kim McCosker, CDs by Nigel Connell and Daniel O’Donnell to give away. Four of each. Simply write to .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) with your choice of freebie and your name and snail-mail address. First in, best dressed!x
Spring Bay Mill chips in for innovative technology investment
Spring Bay Innovations MR. first pub: Mar 6
07.03.14 5:30 am
AUSTRALIA – 6 March 2014: Following the re-zoning of the former wood chip site by the Glamorgan Spring Bay Council, entrepreneur and founder of Wotif.com, Graeme Wood, will today unveil the next step in transforming the Triabunna site, Spring Bay Mill, with new innovative business opportunities. … First up on the slate is a novel and sophisticated technology that offers clean solid-wood bending without the use of steam, allowing plantation timber to be transformed into a range of products from high-value designer furniture to structural beams for architecture. “By taking cheap, abundant plantation timber we can apply a new technology to form and shape high end furniture for an international market,” said Graeme Wood. “This technology achieves what many thought was impossible. We can take abundant Eucalyptus nitens plantation timber and turn it into a high-end hardwood product.
• Mercury: Former forestry boss warns of heritage risk to international markets
Greens Senator To Tony Abbott: “We Want Our Country Back”
Steph Harmon, Junkee
07.03.14 5:15 am
We’re a few weeks out from the Western Australian Senate election on April 5, a do-over after 1370 votes were lost from the September 7 poll. Greens Senator Scott Ludlam was one of the likely losers of the initial botched attempt, narrowly missing out on a seat – and yesterday he stood in front of Parliament under the guise of inviting Prime Minister Tony Abbott to visit his state, and gave the Coalition one of the roundest shellackings you’re likely to be treated to.
Special timbers need to get real. The Honey Trap. Abbott rebuffed
Dr Gordon Bradbury, Tasmanian Blackwood Growers Cooperative. First pub: Mar 5
07.03.14 5:00 am
The Tasmanian Special Timbers Alliance just doesn’t get it do they! This recent article by Andrew Denham in The Sunday Tasmanian ( Special timbers need to be cut a break, here ) is a volatile mix of anger, resentment, conflict, hubris and unbridled entitlement. Sure the special timbers industry is facing extinction. Yes they got a bad deal from the TFA. But when the entire public native forest industry itself is on indefinite life support courtesy of the Tasmanian taxpayer to the tune of $1 million per fortnight, the special timbers industry is of little consequence. And as a forester and blackwood expert I say that with the deepest regret and sadness.
• Robin Davey, Saveyourleatherwoodhoney Association: Tasmanian beekeepers rely on the forest Beekeepers are alarmed that one half of the state forest which contains mature and near mature leatherwood on which all commercial beekeepers rely for viable honey production and the delivery of all pollination services, will again be under threat of destruction if the forest agreement is largely set aside and the new World Heritage status is reversed. … That threat was the timber harvesting methods of clearfell and burn. This method of harvesting is still favoured by Forestry Tasmania as it is claimed to produce the best seed bed and growing conditions for a monoculture of eucalypts. Such a monoculture produces an environment where there is little or no competing understorey, and this includes the leatherwood tree. … To allow the leatherwood resource to not only be threatened but suffer destruction as a result of timber harvesting methods, invites a situation where Forestry Tasmania either compromises its application for FSC accreditation or if it is accredited, loses that status.
• ABC: Tony Abbott says too much Tasmanian forest ‘locked up’, forms new council to support timber industry Speaking at a timber industry dinner in Canberra overnight, Mr Abbott said too much forest is currently locked up in Tasmania. He also recommitted to repealing part of the state’s Wilderness World Heritage Area made under the forest peace deal. Under the deal, 170,000 hectares of forest was added to the area, and the Government has formally asked the World Heritage Committee to delist 74,000 hectatares. “We don’t support as a Government and Coalition further lock-ups of our forests,” Mr Abbott told the dinner. “We have quite enough national parks, we have quite enough locked-up forests already. In an important respect we have too much locked-up forest.”
• Christine Milne: Too much forest? Get real Mr Abbott “Who in the 21st century would say the environment is meant for man and not just the other way around? Get real Mr Abbott. We have no future without environmental protection. “The Abbott government needs to keep its hands off the Tasmanian Wilderness World Heritage Area and abandon its backward attempt to remove 74,000 hectares from UN protection.
• Jenny Weber: Will Tasmania’s Forest Industry signatory rebuff Abbott over World Heritage delisting “Is FIAT going to rebuff Abbott on World Heritage delisting and proposed logging? What is its reaction to the Prime Minister’s commitment, and what action are they taking to rebuff Tony Abbott, if any, and if not why not?” Jenny Weber said. “Tasmania’s newly listed World Heritage forests and the abundant wildlife that depend on these forests for habitat have world class recognition now and their protection needs to be secured forever,” Jenny Weber said.
• Richard Colbeck: Job only half done in Tasmania
• Tony Abbott is wrong - Australia’s forest protection more important in age of climate change
• SBS: PM forestry speech provokes Tasmanian backlash
• Mercury: Former forestry boss warns of heritage risk to international markets
Abetz refuses to say if super trawler ban will be made law ...
The Advocate
07.03.14 4:45 am
LIBERAL Senator Eric Abetz yesterday refused to clarify whether banning super trawlers in Australian waters would be legislated.
• Peter Whish-Wilson: Three times denied. Government refuses to answer how Super Trawler “stays banned” Three times Senator Whish-Wilson asked how the government will ensure that Super Trawlers will “stay banned.” And three times the Minister representing the Prime Minister, Senator Eric Abetz refused to go beyond the Prime Minister’s original comments. Senator Whish-Wilson said, “Without legislation to permanently ban Super Trawlers, the Margiris could be back and fishing off Tasmania’s coast by October. “Talk is cheap. Tony Abbott has already left a trail of broken environmental promises. “This is clearly another one.
• Call for clear and consistent approaches to coastal planning and management
Greens pledge funding for north-west coastal pathway
Greens Member Paul ‘Basil’ O’Halloran
07.03.14 4:40 am
The Greens today committed $5.416 million to develop a multi-stage shared scenic pathway connecting Devonport and Smithton.
Sorell Council redundancies ...?
The Hag
07.03.14 4:30 am
Hag has been told of mass redundancies at Sorell Counil My informant says at least 25 people were told by email that their services were no longer required.
Tasman National Park Goes Under The Knife
Ted Mead
06.03.14 4:25 am
Tasmania, summer, 2014: Wilderness is still being lost ... Just take a look!
• Peter McGlone, Director, Tasmanian Conservation Trust Inc: Government research shows that a Two Capes Track would be a better business investment ... ‘Clearly the Liberals are supporting the Three Capes Track because they think a bigger track will win more votes but in doing so they are abandoning sound business principles because research shows that a shorter less costly Two Tracks will generate at least as much income. ‘The most recent economic analysis of the likely income generated by the Three Capes Track (by Syneca Consulting in 2012 and released following the 2013 state budget estimates hearings) shows that it is likely that the half track, or Two Capes, will generate as much income as the full track but it will cost much less to construct and maintain.
• Luke Martin, in Comments: What complete and utter rubbish. The huts on Three Capes will look nothing like this, as anyone who has been briefed on the plans by Parks & Wildlife will attest. The perimeter areas around the huts are absolutely not being cleared as this picture fabricates. The bushfire protection zone around the huts requires understory and overhanging limbs up to 2 metres in height to be removed. Everything else stays including all the large trees, and therefore the canopy around the huts.
Kim Peart
06.03.14 3:30 am
Is it possible to understand the Russian bear, without looking into history and in the past we can find the claws of present actions by the Russian state.
Senate vote confirms Greens only party standing up for farmers against big mining
Senator Larissa Waters, Australian Greens mining spokesperson (Pic)
06.03.14 3:00 am
The old parties have voted down the Greens’ bill to give landholders the right to say no to coal and gas, in the Senate today, confirming the Greens are the only party standing up for farmers against the big mining companies.
• TFGA president Wayne Johnston: TFGA sets out state election priorities
A Rational Fact: Tony Abbott’s timber speech with added facts
A Rational Fear
05.03.14 7:28 am
Tony Abbott gave a speech to the Australian Forest Products Association that was a little light on facts. Understandable since the coalition have shut down many of their independent science and fact finding bodies. So here at A Rational Fear we made some phone calls and found some facts and decided to pump up his speech with them.
• Mercury: Former forestry boss warns of heritage risk to international markets
Light rail among Greens’ major policy initiatives
Nick McKim MP Greens Leader
05.03.14 5:20 am
The Tasmanian Greens today launched their election campaign with three major policy initiatives. Tasmanian Greens Leader Nick McKim spoke at the launch about the tremendous momentum enjoyed by the campaign. The Greens are remain upbeat about the possibility of winning a second seat in Denison. Mr McKim spoke about how Tasmanian is on the cusp of something remarkable and how the Greens are the only party offering Tasmanians leadership and a positive, future-focussed vision for the future of their great State.
• Nick McKim: Fiscal strategy submitted
Greens introduce Bill to protect the Public Interest against Trojan horse provisions ...
Greens spokesperson for Trade, Senator Peter Whish-Wilson. Pic: Peter Whish-Wilson
05.03.14 5:17 am
... in Trade Agreements Today Greens spokesperson for Trade, Senator Peter Whish-Wilson introduced the Trade and Foreign Investment (Protecting the Public Interest) Act 2014 into the Senate. The purpose of the Bill is to protect Australian laws by banning Investor State Dispute Settlement (ISDS) provisions.
The Zombie Pulp Mill. Doctors’ warning
Garry Stannus, Dr David Strong and Dr James Markos
05.03.14 5:15 am
Last week (Thursday 27 Feb) we went to another Launceston Tailrace Centre meeting. (Sigh! And grin! And gee, there have been many such meetings, there and at other venues!) We heard GEOFF COUSINS (Businessman, environmentalist and author) and PEG PUTT, (Former leader of the Tasmanian Greens, CEO Markets for Change) address the meeting about the Pulp Mill and the past and recent business and legislative endeavors to take one corpse, stand it on its feet and make it walk, as if alive. The Zombie pulp mill.
• Dr David Strong and Dr James Markos, Doctors for the Environment Australia: New evidence of the risks of air pollution puts an expiry date on the previous health assessment of a pulp mill in the Tamar Valley. Download the supporting evidence ...
CSIRO report supports climate change
Climate Control News. Joint report with the Bureau of Meteorology
05.03.14 4:45 am
A definitive report on observed changes in long term trends in Australia’s climate has been released today (Tues) by CSIRO and the Bureau of Meteorology.
• Climate Central: Australia in for Hot Days, Higher Fire Risk, More Droughts
Labor, Greens to hold Senate inquiry into Manus Island violence
ABC
05.03.14 4:35 am
Labor and the Greens will team up to establish a Senate inquiry into recent deadly violence at the Manus Island immigration detention centre.
Liberal and Labor Both Out-debated
Angela Marsh, Southern Beaches Conservation Society Dump the Toxic Dump MR.
05.03.14 4:30 am
Despite both the Labor and Liberal party being asked on several occasions, from mid February, to provide a candidate for the Waste of Tasmania Debate no candidate was available for the 90-minute debate.
Tom Allard, SMH. Pic: of George Brandis
05.03.14 2:12 am
Australia has been ordered to cease spying on East Timor and its legal advisers, in a landmark decision by the International Court of Justice relating to a bitter dispute between the two countries over $40 billion of oil and gas reserves in the Timor Sea.
• This mantra is seriously delusional ...
• Greens announce tourism plan
• RFS sell-out. New shows announced
• Geordie Williamson to join Island magazine as Fiction Editor
• Monday, March 10: Standing Together for Tibet
#10; Last election the Greens won five seats out of twenty five.
In simplistic terms that’s 100,000 people…
