ISSUES ... The Forests ... including the associated under-stories of 10 Days on the Island ... literary prizes ... log trucks ... and public interest ...

The Rape of Tasmania, RICHARD FLANAGAN
There is in all this a constant thread: the Bacon ­government's real mates are not workers, but millionaires. Behind the smokescreen of statistics, beyond the down-home cant of "timber folk" peddled by the woodchippers' propagandists, is a simple, wretched truth: great areas of Australia's remnant wild lands are being reduced to a landscape of battlefields in order to make a handful of very rich people even richer ..." RICHARD FLANAGAN
Earlier ...
The Manning beef, THE TRANSCRIPT
The Manning Beef, GRAPHIC PICTURE EVIDENCE

APRIL/MAY 2004

Blind Freddie and Rene ... and Rene's eyes begin to open ... or do they? ... and the Greens' theory
And Blind Freddie could see that the biggest political wedge to be inserted in the sensitive rump of Tasmanian Labor is forestry ... HAG

Paradise lost?
Finally, in my opinion we have not lost a paradise because there was never one. Tasmania is a great place to live, with normal people working hard to make the best of the opportunities and challenges we face. You may call that a paradise if you wish; I just call it home ... LUIS APIOLAZA

Richard Flanagan replies to Peter Volker ...
I never said rivers 'had dried up', Peter. That's you verballing me with your facts ... What artists, where, and when, Peter? What you write is not fact ... Where did I ever say those who work in the timber industry are corrupt, Peter? I know many people in the industry and I get on well with them. They are decent people doing their job. What I have done in the past is report what a veteran forester, Bill Manning, said in his evidence to a Senate committee, that forestry management had been corrupted ... RICHARD FLANAGAN

The secret state ...
I utterly endorse Richard Flanagan's views on the political atmosphere in Tasmania. Having recently returned to the State to live, I feel I am not being excessively paranoid in finding I have returned to a 'Secret State'....where deals are done behind closed doors between the government and corporations and the hapless public are left to live with the consequences after the deal is all sewn up. The latest attacks on Richard Flanagan (and they are by no means the first) only strengthen my belief ... LETTERS

Which rivers have dried up?
I am always amused by the statement about “monocultural” tree plantations. What about monocultural grass paddocks, poppy fields, vineyards, fish farms, potato fields, apple orchards, herds of dairy cows etc. etc.? Are they any better? PETER VOLKER

Flanagan in the firing line ... the writer's response
Tasmanians ought beware; if you care about this island and stand up to those who are destroying this island’s natural heritage for profit, if you take a position the evidence repeatedly shows is shared by the majority of Tasmanians, this government will seek to destroy your reputation, it will seek to intimidate you, and you will be made appear an enemy of our society. Not since the days of Bjelke Petersen’s moonlight state, have we seen a government of such dubious intent behave with such thuggery toward its own ... RICHARD FLANAGAN

Paradise lost ... with napalm, the article
Of course, it can be argued that in an ever more ubiquitous, bland world the destruction of one more unique piece of our natural world, while regrettable, is at times such as these small change next to the horror of Madrid, or the tragedy of Iraq. But in the lineaments of the struggle in a distant island it is possible to see a larger battle, the same battle the world over, of that between truth and power ... RICHARD FLANAGAN

The most honest campaign Forestry ever ran
In the last few weeks the still and clear autumn weather at my place has been ruined by Forestry's burnoffs. The smoke from these burns is regularly inverted and sits in the valley bottoms overnight before dispersing the next morning. Six thousand people live in the valleys near my property ... JASON LOVELL

Paradise lost ... with napalm
I am writing this in our autumn, once Tasmania's most beautiful season. But the china-blue skies are now nicotine scummed, as smoke from the burning of old-growth forest floats over Hobart, an inescapable reminder that the destruction of ancient woodland - like no other in the world - is accelerating ... RICHARD FLANAGAN, The Guardian, UK

Tears ...
On a probably otherwise lovely autumn day in the North Eastern Tasmanian Highlands, I am sitting inside, gasping for air and try to penetrate the 150m visibility outside in the early afternoon. The smoke haze is not only mentally depressing, it is physically debilitating. Weather conditions compressed the enormous FT emissions into the valleys ... ROELF ROOS, Letters

We saved the Franklin but we lost Tasmania ...
And I did 264 film stories of Tasmania and I got angrier and angrier and angrier.
I said buy a politician, sell a politician but never be one.
Now you’ve got your job cut out for you trying to be a voice of reason anywhere, but the Tasmanian Parliament of those days was really a bear pit.
I said Moss there’s one thing I would like to know. Would Hawke have stopped the Franklin if this had been a Labor Government because as you recall Whitlam would not stop the flooding of Lake Pedder because of the Reece Labor Government down here. And Moss Cass said No, Hawke wouldn’t have moved if it had been a Labor Government. So I said oh thank God. You know my conscience is eased.
There are still bits of it that sticks today. When we went into the areas that hadn’t been logged it was the same old magic. It really brought tears to my eyes getting down in there and looking at that water, you know the brown water, the Peter Dombrovskis swirls on it.
NORM SANDERS

The "F" word gets a workout...
Scientists query Forestry Tasmania's watery knowledge ... Nippon Paper writes to the Premier ... and Hollywood angsts over the Tasmanian devil Excerpts, links

Can't see the wood for the trees
The health of Tasmania's forests is important for the state's future, but it is important to remember that the island is home to a living, breathing and isolated community, which is facing some extraordinary challenges to lift itself out of widespread poverty and cultural narrowness. An international and local focus on Tasmania's forests which ignores these other challenges and opportunities is missing the point. Saving tall and ancient trees is worth nothing if around them exists a declining and decaying social and economic fabric .. GREG BARNS, Guardian Online

Peter sees the light
".......I'm sure all those people who know my history with Forestry Tasmania might find the following a bit difficult to believe, but confess I must and set the record straight...." Peter Adams HAG

Weld Valley ... the facts
The report is of such a standard that a first year science student would receive a fail if it was submitted for assessment .... PETER VOLKER

Blind Freddie and Rene
And Blind Freddie could see that the biggest political wedge to be inserted in the sensitive rump of Tasmanian Labor is forestry .... HAG

Remarkable myrtle or just another dead old stump?
No matter where you stand in the forestry/logging/clearfell and tourism debate, this is a story of how intense the debate can become .... FRANK STRIE

Research Challenges “Scientific” Basis of Clearfell Forestry
The study demonstrated that logging old growth forest in the Weld Valley significantly alters the diversity and abundance of plants and invertebrate animals. Poor soil structure and loss of soil organic matter, following the clearfell-burn and sow treatment, appears to adversely affect forest health and its ability to produce good timber ... NEIL CREMASCO

Well off Centre
I’ve lamented before on the absence of information on the progress of the Huon Wood Centre in our media. I even once suggested it would be a useful exercise for the scribes to have a nice picnic day out in the country and pay a visit there to see what was happening. It fell on deaf ears (probably not sexy enough as an idea). But I really would like somebody to bring me up to speed on this enterprise... THE OLD BEAR

The Tasmanian Forest Charter ...
The Forest Charter demonstrates there is a path out of the present debate that makes sense economically, socially, and environmentally. It shows we can have jobs and trees, and with it, a better future. All we need is the political will to make it happen ... The Tasmanian Community Alliance

Australia's Inhumane Plantation 2020 Vision ...
The industry's Plantation 2020 Vision equals man's further expulsion from 'the garden'. In an era of mass extinctions - heralding an environmental crisis of enormous magnitude - here in Australia wild, unmanaged stands of trees are forbidden, lest the nation's paper economy be hurt. Change is painful for politicians but the other option isn't worth considering ... BRENDA ROSSER

Kudelka goes bush
Jon Kudelka watches pollies on the stump .... KUDELKA

What Mark Latham should do ...
Just as Beattie decided to end broad scale tree clearing in Queensland and in the end go it alone without Howard, federal Labor should, with or without bipartisan support, move to save the Styx Valley and place the environment on the national agenda as a Labor issue ... CAMERON MILNER, Queensland state secretary of the ALP, The Australian

Dialogue of the deaf ...
I, for one, am weary of being a bit-player in the dialogue of the deaf ... DUNCAN KERR

Protect Tasmania's ancient forests ...
The Australian Democrats are supporting today's rally for forests, and call on the Tasmanian Government to end export wood-chipping, stop clear-felling in native forests and ban the use of 1080 poisons in forestry operations. Both Coalition and the Labor Government's have continued to refuse to act to protect our forests...
ANDREW BARTLETT

What Essie told the thousands ...
As I travel this world with my work I cannot believe that places as magical, as beautiful as the old growth forests of Tasmania are being destroyed to make a few rich men even richer. It is obscene, it shames us all, and it must end ...
ESSIE DAVIS

Thousands tell Latham: IT'S TIME ...
Thousands - estimates ranged from 7 to 15,000 - packed out State Parliament House lawns today to hear ...
LINDSAY TUFFIN

The Bulletin on the forests, tourism or woodchips?, Alistair Cooke ...
The fate of Tasmania's old-growth forests looms as the slow-burn issue for this year's federal election ...
Now Mark Latham must choose between Tasmanian Labor votes and Greens votes on the mainland ...
The economic value of tourism in forested areas is considerably greater than the value of logging or woodchipping . Typically between 10 and 30 times greater ...
In Tasmania, you have your forests on wheels ... Sydney Morning Herald analysis ... LINKS

Jim Bacon, deep thinker? ...
Pesticides in our drinking water tanks, most of the native forest gone, repeated collisions with log trucks (on roads never designed for the purpose), housing now far less affordable, almost the highest rate of cancer in the world, plantation trees in our fire breaks, the end of secure well-paid employment, a corporate bought-out press, family farms destroyed en-masse, wildlife systematically poisoned and landownership now dominated by multinational corporations ...
It's understandable that Mr Lester, as a former Bacon staffer, should want to defend his erstwhile boss ...LETTERS

Get a job ...
Those hoping for generational change and overdue progressive thinking in the Tasmanian Parliamentary Labor Party would be sadly disappointed, if the attitude conveyed in an email sent to me - with the address of the office of Labor minister Steve Kons on it - is anything to go by ...
NEIL CREMASCO
The Mercury report

Royal Commission ... why not? Crikey goes beserk. The full Gay, Lennon transcripts...
In October, 2002, tasmaniantimes wrote, It keeps bubbling away like a stream though an old-growth logging coupe. And despite the best efforts of the spin doctors who say the stream is still clear and fresh and beautiful it is getting increasingly brackish, muddy and unpalatable ... It is of course the forestry debate; the debate that won't go away ...
LINDSAY TUFFIN
Earlier ...
The Rape of Tasmania, RICHARD FLANAGAN
The Manning beef, THE TRANSCRIPT
The Manning Beef, GRAPHIC PICTURE EVIDENCE
AND
The Greens make much of the vast profits of Gunns and apparently tawdry profits of Forestry Tasmania but I have yet to see, hear or read what an end to logging will cost the Tasmanian economy ...
LETTERS

Four Corners in the forests...
Read for yourself ...
THE TRANSCRIPT
PLUS,
LETTERS
PLUS,
Earlier ...

Stop the whole log exports ...
Why are we continuing to export whole logs when our neighbours have admitted that it is no longer viable. Is this yet another example of our forest resources being flogged off to allcomers while the people of Tasmania are left to pick up the tab? GRAHAM GREEN

Four Corners in the forests...
Bob Brown on Timber Communities Australia ...
WMDs ...
Schools...
Trams ...
Trees ...
Doctor Know-It-All ...
THE AGORA
PLUS,
BEER!

Titles fight
It could be advantageous to stop looking at the frequently discussed dominance of timber interests in Tasmania through the "corruption goggles" and start exploring the Tasmanian forestry experience in the context of overseas examples. EDWARD GATTY

Diary of a long night ...
Woke with waves of nausea. Dreamt about Paul Lennon in shaved head, saffron robe in a cloud of incense, chanting the calming mantra “40% of the State is locked up….40% of the State is locked up" ... NEIL CREMASCO

Clearfelling Bacon's angst ...
Lost in the wilderness... Out in the sticks ... MARGARETTA POS

The Economist does Tassie...
It begins under the heading, The convicts would be astonished. The island has always been burdened by its past. Under its old name, Van Diemen's Land, it was notorious as Australia's most violent British colony, a place where convicts were brutalised, and Aborigines hunted down ... LINKS

Working class traitors...
As the global woodchip market increases its stranglehold on the major Australian players, the flow-on effect is that workers at the bottom of the feed chain are suffering enormously ... The few remaining decent operators are beginning to buckle under the pressure, and leave the industry rather than stoop to illegal practices ... To say that this industry is on the cusp of a crisis that may very well see it implode within this decade is not an exaggeration from where I am sitting ... MICHAEL COOK

Working class heroes...
Yeah right, Mr McLean. The logging industry in Tasmania really is a working class utopia! ... NEIL CREMASCO

More bad news ...
A national debate; Beekeepers last stand; Rising Aussie$ adds to Southwood doubts; What the Premier told Nippon ... LINKS

The bad news just keeps coming, Jim
It is the type of adverse publicity about Tasmania that enrages the Premier ... THE OLD BEAR

A cry from the heart ... our nightmare
... Industrial "forestry" (read clearfell/plantation industry) began to quickly dominate the West Calder/Takone region. We began to notice planes and helicopters a hundred plus feet in the air spraying several kilometres away several times a year ... BRENDA ROSSER

MARCH 2004

Ban Tasmania ...
The Guardian, UK, report on a call for a ban on Tasmania .... LINK

Kudelka goes bush
Jon Kudelka watches pollies on the stump .... KUDELKA

Research Challenges “Scientific” Basis of Clearfell Forestry
The study demonstrated that logging old growth forest in the Weld Valley significantly alters the diversity and abundance of plants and invertebrate animals. Poor soil structure and loss of soil organic matter, following the clearfell-burn and sow treatment, appears to adversely affect forest health and its ability to produce good timber ... NEIL CREMASCO

Well off Centre
I’ve lamented before on the absence of information on the progress of the Huon Wood Centre in our media. I even once suggested it would be a useful exercise for the scribes to have a nice picnic day out in the country and pay a visit there to see what was happening. It fell on deaf ears (probably not sexy enough as an idea). But I really would like somebody to bring me up to speed on this enterprise... THE OLD BEAR

The Tasmanian Forest Charter ...
The Forest Charter demonstrates there is a path out of the present debate that makes sense economically, socially, and environmentally. It shows we can have jobs and trees, and with it, a better future. All we need is the political will to make it happen ... The Tasmanian Community Alliance

Australia's Inhumane Plantation 2020 Vision ...
The industry's Plantation 2020 Vision equals man's further expulsion from 'the garden'. In an era of mass extinctions - heralding an environmental crisis of enormous magnitude - here in Australia wild, unmanaged stands of trees are forbidden, lest the nation's paper economy be hurt. Change is painful for politicians but the other option isn't worth considering ... BRENDA ROSSER

What Mark Latham should do ...
Just as Beattie decided to end broad scale tree clearing in Queensland and in the end go it alone without Howard, federal Labor should, with or without bipartisan support, move to save the Styx Valley and place the environment on the national agenda as a Labor issue ... CAMERON MILNER, Queensland state secretary of the ALP, The Australian

Dialogue of the deaf ...
I, for one, am weary of being a bit-player in the dialogue of the deaf ... DUNCAN KERR

Protect Tasmania's ancient forests ...
The Australian Democrats are supporting today's rally for forests, and call on the Tasmanian Government to end export wood-chipping, stop clear-felling in native forests and ban the use of 1080 poisons in forestry operations. Both Coalition and the Labor Government's have continued to refuse to act to protect our forests...
ANDREW BARTLETT

What Essie told the thousands ...
As I travel this world with my work I cannot believe that places as magical, as beautiful as the old growth forests of Tasmania are being destroyed to make a few rich men even richer. It is obscene, it shames us all, and it must end ...
ESSIE DAVIS

Thousands tell Latham: IT'S TIME ...
Thousands - estimates ranged from 7 to 15,000 - packed out State Parliament House lawns today to hear ...
LINDSAY TUFFIN

The Bulletin on the forests, tourism or woodchips?, Alistair Cooke ...
The fate of Tasmania's old-growth forests looms as the slow-burn issue for this year's federal election ...
Now Mark Latham must choose between Tasmanian Labor votes and Greens votes on the mainland ...
The economic value of tourism in forested areas is considerably greater than the value of logging or woodchipping . Typically between 10 and 30 times greater ...
In Tasmania, you have your forests on wheels ... Sydney Morning Herald analysis ... LINKS

Get a job ...
Those hoping for generational change and overdue progressive thinking in the Tasmanian Parliamentary Labor Party would be sadly disappointed, if the attitude conveyed in an email sent to me - with the address of the office of Labor minister Steve Kons on it - is anything to go by ...
NEIL CREMASCO
The Mercury report

Royal Commission ... why not? Crikey goes beserk. The full Gay, Lennon transcripts...
In October, 2002, tasmaniantimes wrote, It keeps bubbling away like a stream though an old-growth logging coupe. And despite the best efforts of the spin doctors who say the stream is still clear and fresh and beautiful it is getting increasingly brackish, muddy and unpalatable ... It is of course the forestry debate; the debate that won't go away ...
LINDSAY TUFFIN
Earlier ...
The Rape of Tasmania, RICHARD FLANAGAN
The Manning beef, THE TRANSCRIPT
The Manning Beef, GRAPHIC PICTURE EVIDENCE
AND
The Greens make much of the vast profits of Gunns and apparently tawdry profits of Forestry Tasmania but I have yet to see, hear or read what an end to logging will cost the Tasmanian economy ...
LETTERS

Four Corners in the forests...
Read for yourself ...
THE TRANSCRIPT
PLUS,
LETTERS
PLUS,
Earlier ...

Stop the whole log exports ...
Why are we continuing to export whole logs when our neighbours have admitted that it is no longer viable. Is this yet another example of our forest resources being flogged off to allcomers while the people of Tasmania are left to pick up the tab? GRAHAM GREEN

Four Corners in the forests...
Bob Brown on Timber Communities Australia ...
WMDs ...
Schools...
Trams ...
Trees ...
Doctor Know-It-All ...
THE AGORA
PLUS,
BEER!

Titles fight
It could be advantageous to stop looking at the frequently discussed dominance of timber interests in Tasmania through the "corruption goggles" and start exploring the Tasmanian forestry experience in the context of overseas examples. EDWARD GATTY

Diary of a long night ...
Woke with waves of nausea. Dreamt about Paul Lennon in shaved head, saffron robe in a cloud of incense, chanting the calming mantra “40% of the State is locked up….40% of the State is locked up" ... NEIL CREMASCO

Clearfelling Bacon's angst ...
Lost in the wilderness... Out in the sticks ... MARGARETTA POS

The Economist does Tassie...
It begins under the heading, The convicts would be astonished. The island has always been burdened by its past. Under its old name, Van Diemen's Land, it was notorious as Australia's most violent British colony, a place where convicts were brutalised, and Aborigines hunted down ... LINKS

Working class traitors...
As the global woodchip market increases its stranglehold on the major Australian players, the flow-on effect is that workers at the bottom of the feed chain are suffering enormously ... The few remaining decent operators are beginning to buckle under the pressure, and leave the industry rather than stoop to illegal practices ... To say that this industry is on the cusp of a crisis that may very well see it implode within this decade is not an exaggeration from where I am sitting ... MICHAEL COOK

Working class heroes...
Yeah right, Mr McLean. The logging industry in Tasmania really is a working class utopia! ... NEIL CREMASCO

More bad news ...
A national debate; Beekeepers last stand; Rising Aussie$ adds to Southwood doubts; What the Premier told Nippon ... LINKS

The bad news just keeps coming, Jim
It is the type of adverse publicity about Tasmania that enrages the Premier ... THE OLD BEAR

A cry from the heart ... our nightmare
... Industrial "forestry" (read clearfell/plantation industry) began to quickly dominate the West Calder/Takone region. We began to notice planes and helicopters a hundred plus feet in the air spraying several kilometres away several times a year ... BRENDA ROSSER

JANUARY-FEBRUARY 2004

The Rape of Tasmania, RICHARD FLANAGAN
There is in all this a constant thread: the Bacon ­government's real mates are not workers, but millionaires. Behind the smokescreen of statistics, beyond the down-home cant of "timber folk" peddled by the woodchippers' propagandists, is a simple, wretched truth: great areas of Australia's remnant wild lands are being reduced to a landscape of battlefields in order to make a handful of very rich people even richer ..." RICHARD FLANAGAN
Earlier ...
The Manning beef, THE TRANSCRIPT
The Manning Beef, GRAPHIC PICTURE EVIDENCE

Timber Communities Australia
Senator Bob Brown lifted the lid on Timber Communities Australia in the Senate this week ... http://parlinfoweb.aph.gov.au/piweb/view_document.aspx?id=940297&table=HANSARDS
(If you have been unable to access this particular Hansard it's because, to quote Parlinfoweb:
The reason why the link is no longer working is because the Hansard is now finalised. If you look at the details of the speech, there's a field called Proof. If Proof = No then the Hansard requires no further updates and is considered finalised. You can now browse to the document using ParlInfo:
http://parlinfoweb.aph.gov.au/piweb/index.aspx
1. Select Browse
2. Select the Chamber collection from the left hand menu
3. Select Senate Hansard
4. Continue selecting the appropriate folders. In this case you will need to navigate to 11 Feb 2004 folder.
Alternatively, you can search on the hansard title and sort it by relevance.)


PLUS, the Crikey debate
http://www.crikey.com.au/whistleblower/2004/02/12-0005.html

Has WA Labor's Saving Old Growth policy been a disaster for the state?
Paul Lennon: Mr Speaker, the Manjimup Shire has been greatly affected by the reduction of resource ... The flow-on effect of this on the community has been absolutely devastating ...
Geoff Couser: I travelled to WA last month, and drove down the main street of Manjimup ... the Manjimup statistical region has an unemployment rate lower than the rest of WA; lower than the national average; lower than Tasmania’s. WA is doing well because it has not been held back by the small-minded, blinkered thinking which is prevalent in our government ... GEOFF COUSER

Jim meets the Bruvvers ...
Well what a day it was for the uneasy brotherhood that is the Tasmanian union movement and its political masters, the state Labor government ... so this prompted a question from me inquiring if the phasing out of old growth logging by 2010 would still be a reality. To this he answered ... not if it meant losing Tasmanian jobs as that is all he and his government were about - people not trees. Dear oh dear, silly me ... EDDIE STORACE
PLUS, Links:
Flaming fools kill forest giant
Protection call as giant dies
Libby Lester
LETTERS

Attending to business
... The company’s managing director, Mick Galpin, also mentioned the “monopoly stranglehold” of Gunns on logging trucks which he said meant a constant forcing down of drivers’ pay and pressure to do longer hours ... THE ROVING EYE

Odd movements...
Here’s an odd thing. I was on Hobart’s Davey Street Monday when a log truck went past ... THE OLD BEAR

Ruffling Jim
I see where the aldermen of Hobart City Council have managed to ruffle the feathers of our top man for roads, Infrastructure Minister Jim Cox ... THE OLD BEAR
OCTOBER-NOVEMBER-DECEMBER, 2003

Evan Rolley and Southwood (1)
Mr Rolley tried to reassure the audience that Forestry Tasmania’s sunny, optimistic claims about the project’s alleged benefits to the community had withstood full economic, environmental and social scrutiny ... NEIL CREMASCO

The devils' disease
The latest .... LINKS

That clearfell pledge
Spin or substance? HAG

The Green Factor
And talking of repetition. Note the recycling in the following ... By THE ROVING EYE

The missing masterpiece
The Tasmanian National Parks Association has been following with great interest the incredible tale of the recently found ‘missing masterpiece’ by Italian Master Leonardo da Vinci ... GREG WOOD

Hands off Maria ... again
The alarm bells should be ringing again for a concerned public over the State Government’s intentions for Maria Island ... THE OLD BEAR

Nightmare on wheels...
Do other Tasmanians have this nightmarish vision ...? THE ROVING EYE

Not for sale ...
If this Government ignores what is happening at the other end of the Cradle Mountain Lake St Clair National Park where overwhelming visitor numbers have already forced a total change in visitor access infrastructure, then it is guilty of either gross ignorance or gross incompetence, neither of which are acceptable ... GREG WOOD

Gutwein's walk ...
A fascinating day in Tasmanian politics... LINKS

The threat to a Tasmanian heritage icon...
Yet another piece of Tasmania's built heritage from the early 1800s is under threat from the developer-set, aided and abetted by Tasmania's heritage watchdog The Tasmanian Heritage Council ... Just what is the Tasmanian Historical Cultural Heritage Act, 1995 supposed to do? Is it to protect Tasmania's built heritage - vanishing at an alarming and ever-increasing rate ... Or is it designed to protect the developer from concerns over heritage issues? ... CYCLOPS

The great log truck puzzle...
I would have thought that for such a survey to be effective, the log truck operators - the main contributors to the late night sleep-disruption of the residents - should not have been aware of it. Yet they were told beforehand by DIER that the survey was going to be done! Where’s the sense in that? What’s the rationale? I find it incredible that the main target should have been put in the picture ... THE OLD BEAR

Sawlog surplus...
A leaked Forestry memo reveals... THAT DOCUMENT
PLUS
A RAPACIOUS PLUNDER ... what I reckon

The "elevation" of Premier Bacon...
Premier Jim Bacon was gently eased from his position as chairman by the 10 Days on the Island festival board. He was "elevated" ... upstairs ... into the newly created position of Festival Patron - while ex-Governor Guy Green took over as chairman ... MARGARETTA POS

A small victory for thousands of Tasmanians ...
This is a small victory for the thousands of Tasmanians who supported the artists' stand .... and it is especially a victory to the extraordinary group of artists who were willing to make a stand in a small, close community attracting the wrath of Government and festival organisers ... LETTERS

Doubts on Southwood...
Bad news for Southwood, says ... NEIL CREMASCO

Environmentalists, Gunns and the Japanese ...
Environmentalists have escalated their battle against Tasmanian timber and logging group Gunns by putting the heat on the company's powerful Japanese customers ... LINKS

Been there, done that ...
... thank you, but I have spent hours in Tasmanian forests over the years, seeking to get an understanding from those who live and work in that environment about the science of forests and the ecology of them. And ... John Howard and Bob Brown in the constitutional bed together ... LETTERS

An invitation to Greg Barns ...
If Mr Barns is so passionate about quality of life for all, he may like to take up my invitation to come up here for a day in the North East forests!? ... Come on Greg, let's walk and talk together - about global issues, local issues, community issues, opportunity issues, threatening issues. No hidden agenda, just purely quality exchange ... LETTERS

Peter Cundall at the National Press Club ...
What Cundall will say ... PONCE

I think, therefore I write (3)...
LOOSE words
Logs, damn logs and statistics and KB ...
Monty's jealous ...
Thank you, Geoffrey and Gwynn ...
It's obvious ...
River Derwent ...
LETTERS

I think, therefore I write (2)...
Logs, damn logs and statistics ...
The meaning of hypocrisy
Tell us about the filthy Derwent
Only small, forgotten, economic backwaters experience such place rootedness ...
On seeing trees
LETTERS

I think, therefore I write ...
In response to Greg Barns on Coetzee
What it's all about ...
Monty: You're still alive!
Woe to you Scribe, Hypocrite (2)
Mr Synge, I still don't agree with you, but thanks
The amazing response to the Ruth petition
Mr Cheek wants to destabalise ...
Get a life!
Bottom of the barrel
Oh Monty, not you too...
... LETTERS

Give Bob a column ...
The Times needs to abandon its policy of publishing opposition media releases and instead give this man a column immediately. Putting a rocket up the stale buffoonery that is the state opposition under Rene Hidding is exactly what's required. Moreover Bob's newly found Green tinge and boosting of the state's tourism industry suddenly makes him relevant again ...
And,
When will Linz and his fellow grieving journos, cartoonists and editors at The Mercury, The Advocate, The Age, the SMH and The Australian stop taking their salaries from newspapers that continue to be printed on paper derived from the Styx? ... Monty
LETTERS

Big Bob and that story ...
And, so the rest of the Fourth Estate have latched onto the story tasmaniantimes.com posted a year ago... and posted again on Monday ... THE UNDER-STORY

The paradoxes of life in Tasmania ...
There is life outside Tasmania
Rapid growth and sustainability ... LETTERS

Hector's outa there ... Examiner Editor Rod Scott's logic hammered ...
This is an ugly point - but a natural progression from the type of rhetoric utilised by Mr Scott. Carried to its logical extent, this type of argument smacks of cultural relativism, and would potentially throw into serious question the actions of many internationally-funded altruistic organisations, including the World Wildlife Fund, The Catholic Church ...
AND,
Hector the Protector is outa there... LETTERS

They don't believe you ...
Premier Jim Bacon and the Bacon-Lennon Government appear to have a credibility problem ... LINDSAY TUFFIN
AND,
Introducing, THE OPPOSITION....

Hector the Protector, Connect, the waterfront, the RFA...
Hector the Protector, aka Neil Smith, is behind bars. He returned from his mother's funeral to hand himself in yesterday (with pix)
I certainly don't agree with all of Greg Barns' opinions, but as far as I'm concerned, he hit the mark dead on with his article ...
They can woodchip the buildings, burn-off the rest, and use 1080 on any pesky survivors. Then the whole area can be re-built with uniform rows of townhouses on a thirty-year cycle ... LETTERS
AND, $1000 for HECTOR ...

Here we go again...
Pulp mills ... back to the future ... LINKS

See for yourself (3)...
Reports, spectacular up-to-the-second pix from the Styx protest ... HIGH LIFE
PLUS
The UK Guardian report ...

Legislative Council betrays its own traditions...
Compared with the Legislative Council of the 1960s, the Council of today has the courage of a mouse. Nowadays MLCs meekly acquiesce to the wishes of the Government, Forestry Tasmania and the logging industry. Forestry interests today hold far more sway over the Council than did the much-feared HEC of the 1970s ... GEOFF LAW

Oh god, not Matty ...
No, Matty, say it isn't true... the Hound Dog come to heel with The Emperor!!! HAG

Hector's last days... UPDATE
The law under which he was charged was repealed in January 2000. Interestingly, people who are current Labor ministers (Judy Jackson and Paul Lennon) spoke strongly against this law when the then Liberal Government introduced it in 1992. Ms Jackson even said it was “draconian and intimidatory, intended to put people off from protesting” LETTERS

Styx pix ...
See for yourself ... tree hugs in the Styx .. A PICTURE PAINTS (2)...
PLUS,
A hug from Radio National, LETTERS

The Manning Beef ... the files
See for yourself ... graphic pictorial evidence presented by former Forestry auditor Bill Manning to a Senate inquiry .. A PICTURE PAINTS (1) ...

To the Point...
For lovers of Tasmania’s magnificent outdoors - from the grandeur of mountain to the beauty of bush, stream, lake and beach - there is an important event to attend at Lake St Clair on Sunday (November 9) ... I. D. CLAIR

In their own words ...
... Trying to eliminate Saddam...would have incurred incalculable human and political costs ... Only a psychopath would chop down a rainforest to make paper. It just doesn't happen ... QUOTE, UNQUOTE

A Cry Out of Africa
Sometimes in the mail a letter from the other side of the world arrives whose contents can help put our Tasmanian experience into a global perspective. ... PETER ADAMS

Vast Grey Wall
... but I know that the people before us lived with and not against the life-sustaining systems of the island - and that this demands respect and acknowledgement, not false and insulting constructs of degeneracy and debasement ... PETE HAY

The Manning Beef ... he was not alone ...
Links to Simon Bevilacqua's (The Sunday Tasmanian) analysis of the Manning Beef
PLUS,
Catalyst
The Age
LINKS

I guarantee they will be shocked ...
At an estimated cost of $10,000 per hour, they'll see things that never appear in the media - and I guarantee they will be shocked LETTERS

It's time for ... Pollywatch!
It was an interesting situation: the outburst from the gallery seemed mild compared with the loud, derisive interjections that were constantly shouted across the floor of the House ... It's high time that we showed our parliament that we do care. That we do expect a high standard of behaviour, intelligent debate, and government with integrity ... WENDY ARMSTRONG

The show trial of Senator B
It might take a Franz Kafka or his fictional Joseph K to remind us of the surreality of a state, perhaps more correctly a state of mind, where an individual asserting the primacy of rule of law, transparency and accountability in law and governance is labelled deviant... NATASHA CICA

The Lady's not for turning ... the Manning beef debate
Game over, says the deputy Premier ... LINKS

The times are out of joint
In spite of the best economic statistics, the rosiest forecasts ... how is Jim Bacon both perceived, and to be remembered? His Treasurer gets the accolades for economic management; his Attorney General gets the guernsey as reformer. Mao was the Great Helmsman ... Jim Bacon is ... LINDSAY TUFFIN
PLUS,
More bad publicity on Catalyst, ABC: Letters
More for the Big End of Town, The Mercury
More bad news on the devils' disease, The Mercury

Forestry and buffer zones...
A threatened species ...
LETTERS
AND,
the direct link to Simon Bevilacqua's article. Delays kill crays in forestry deadlock, The Sunday Tasmanian
AND,
How The Age reported the tree-huggers
AND,
And what Graeme Sturges thinks ...

Letters go beserk ...
Bush's visit is a symbol of everything rotten about Howard's Australia.
Get down to State Parliament this week
Connect
Too high an estimation of the role of science
A poem...
LETTERS

The Manning beef
Particularly over the last five years, the forest industry has become so woefully negligent in its practices that it has been forced to be exempted from all other state environmental, planning and land management legislation for the simple reason that were it to be judged by the legislation that other Tasmanians have to abide by, it would be found to be comprehensively in breach of Tasmanian law ... The BILL MANNING transcript
PLUS:
LINKS: The whistleblower's nightmare; The Age Special Report; Gunns and Labor, ABC; Plantation problems, The Age

A cry from the heart
I have attempted to illustrate how my husband and myself have been ignored, made irrelevant by both big business and governments. We have learnt that in the C21st there is only one goal that matters in life - the chase for bigger and bigger profits and that the almighty dollar is to be worshipped above all.
PLUS, see for yourself ... GAY KLOK

The seductive power of greed
We can learn to counter the seductive power of greed by knowing it for what it is and what is does. We must look beyond the shifty-eyed eloquence, deceptions, lies, false reassurances and diversions of the greedy and see things as they are. PETER CUNDALL

Bad noise, bad health
An important national meeting is being held in Hobart tomorrow, one of particular relevance to the many Tasmanians suffering health problems because of noise... THE ROVING EYE

Mr Cox and the zilch factor
The residents of Dynnyrne on the Southern Outlet are wondering just what’s needed for the Tasmanian Government to take positive action on the problem of excessive traffic noise, particularly from log trucks at night. THE OLD BEAR

Can it top Mary?
Will Mr Manning's evidence be enough to at last pierce the anaesthetising mist pumped out by Bacon's Tasmanian "system", or will it be smothered to the point that it won't even be enough to knock Mary Donaldson off the front page? NEIL CREMASCO

The Manning beef
Bill Manning's explosive evidence to a Senate inquiry
PLUS:
What the local papers ran:
UPDATE
LINKS

Mr Cox and engine brakes
The Old Bear takes it up to minister Cox THE OLD BEAR

Evan Rolley and Southwood (2)
Tasmania is not Wizard of Oz terrority and I wouldn't expect the Tin Men of this state to ever regain their hearts, but I do take heart that the collective pain of those people in the audience for the Southwood Symposium will continually be harnessed to propel us all into civil disobedience in order to protect that which is being destroyed. Another take on the Southwood Symposium, Evan Rolley and Southwood (1) PETER ADAMS

Cause for complaint
I'm not happy ... THE ROVING EYE

Bacon fails to leave his comfort zone
... this is little more than an insult to the intelligence of Tasmanians. People who see the scale and severity of the assault on our forests know just how meaningless his statement is. Those who are more distant can get a feel for it by the sheer number of log trucks on our roads. The growing number of people on the mainland who are disturbed by what’s happening here because they’ve seen it reported in the Bulletin or in The Australian or in The Age or in the Sydney Morning Herald or on A Current Affair or on the Sunday Program or on Insight or on 60 Minutes won’t be reassured either ... GEOFF LAW

SEPTEMBER

Forests policy ... the questions keep coming ... the publicity gets worse
Another national program ponders Tasmanian forestry policy and asks ... why? HAG

It's time
For too long, Tasmanians have been crying out for reforms which end forestry’s ability to ride roughshod over the community's wishes. BENEDICT BARTL and SIMON GATES
PLUS:
Top piece ... Letters

Greens' Recherche Bay website weapon
The Greens have launched a website in their campaign to fully preserve Recherche Bay from clear-felling. LINK

Out, damned trucks
Yet another distressed citizen of Tasmania has given voice to his pain over the bane of present-day living for many people - the dreadful night noise intrusion caused by logging trucks. THE ROVING EYE

Logging and the devils ...
Your wrong, Kevin; no, you're wrong, Eddie; No, you're right, Kate! THE AGORA
PLUS:
Who is listening, Mr Bacon...?

Unsound policy ...
The draft (noise) policy is deficient in many other respects apart from its non-readability. ... THE ROVING EYE
PLUS:
All gummed up...

Forestry divide ...
It's all in Jim's head... NEIL CREMASCO

Correcting the Premier
A report on how an item of history has been righted in Hansard and how with it Premier Bacon has been corrected for a bad mistake of fact he made in State Parliament. .... THE OLD BEAR

Gunns v Greens... the Mayne analysis
Links and a long Mayne perspective.... CRIKEY
PLUS:
A different view on old growth, sawmills, addictions ... Letters

Gunns v Greens...
Stephen Mayne, the procreator of the irreverent Sceptics' Bible, Crikey, is anticipating with enormous relish tomorrow's (Friday, August 29) Extraordinary General Meeting of Gunns Ltd. Gunns v. Greens ... the Crikey debate
CRIKEY on the loose
PLUS:
A different view on old growth and sawmills ... Letters

That's not the REAL New Tasmania...
Mr Castles and Ms Pafitis The REAL New Tasmania should really take time out for a good old reality check ... TIMBER JACK

The REAL New Tasmania...
... This reflected what we had heard Tasmanians say they wanted for Tasmania. This was a big, bold dream, not the hyped, small, dumbed down thing the Government is currently peddling ... GERARD CASTLES and ANNA PAFITIS
PLUS:
Thanks ... Letters
PLUS:
What the Greens reckon ... A Press Release

The public demands ...
We are being accused of vandalism - ironically, by nations like Britain who have already lost all, or nearly all, of their original forests. For overseas visitors, the notion of forests untouched by an axe is magnetic. DUNCAN KERR
PLUS:
Peter Carey in the Styx The Mercury
PLUS:
Bacon pledge on parts of Recherche The Mercury


AUGUST

A terrible and fierce love
The Alphabet of Light and Dark is a book about what it means to be Tasmanian .... "As long as we continue with the philosophy of destroy it now, fetishise it once it's gone, we show only how little we have learned from the past" ... DANIELLE WOOD

Gunns v. Greens ... the Crikey debate
Crikey.com.au is calling on all sides in the Tasmanian logging debate to put their case before the EGM on August 29. ... CRIKEY

Dear Mr Bacon ...
The question that has to be asked, though, is: "What long term wounds are being created by justifying fear as a means to achieve an economic or political end?" PETER ADAMS

A cry from the heart (2) ... the Derwent Valley
We fully accept that this process will be a long slow one, but the longer it takes the stronger our stance. The groundswell of disappointment and anger is growing. We will endeavour, through logical and strategic planning, through sheer decency and determination, to engender in all communities affected by this decision, (including the Brighton and Glamorgan areas) an unceasing statewide demand for due process that no government could afford to ignore ... ANNE ASHBOLT

A picture tells a ... Picture One...
Pictures from acclaimed artist Ron Brooks' solo protest against old-growth forest logging ... taken in Federation Square, Melbourne. by, Hugh McSpedden (humania)
And why Ron is doing it ...
Why I'm handing back my Centenary Medal ...
THE OTHER PICTURES:
Two
Three
Four
Five

Alone, alone ... all, all alone ...
Tasmania stands alone with its industrial age mentality ... when will Mr Bacon show some leadership and listen to the people instead of his corporate mates? Let’s be unique and special ... GEOFF COUSER

Gunns v. Greens ... the Crikey debate
Crikey.com.au is calling on all sides in the Tasmanian logging debate to put their case before the EGM on August 29. ... CRIKEY

Closed to the Public
The nation's Senators shut the doors on public interest... JOHN MADDOCK ...
OR DID THEY?
Setting the record straight

Le Grand Tour...
With Paul Lennon having upset the good citizens of the Derwent Valley A cry from the heart over his views on increased truck movements through their area as a consequence of the development of Southwood (oops, sorry, that’s the Huon Wood Centre), use of the Plenty link from Judbury needs a first-hand appraisal. Just what’s it like going through this neck of the woods? THE OLD BEAR

A cry from the heart ... the Derwent Valley galvanises ...
The topic was irrelevant and the tone was condescending ... the crowd told him so. Poor Mr Lennon was unable to proceed. He was howled down and repeatedly requested to listen to our issues. I will give him his due… he took the abuse for a very long period. But he only had to stop and listen. We were not there to harass Mr Lennon, we were there to protect our community... ANNE ASHBOLT
PLUS:
Letters

A wake-up call to our politicians
A wake-up call is being issued to all our politicians. ... in the form of a dawn-to-dusk vigil at Parliament House on August 19. ... PETER ADAMS
PLUS:
Letters
PLUS:
Gunns forced to extraordinary general meeting... The Mercury ...
AND And what The Wilderness Society says about its challenge
AND The Crikey debate
PLUS:
Acclaimed craftsman Kevin Perkins in The Mercury
PLUS:
The Eleventh Hour, Dr John Young
PLUS:
An alternative to the log-truck superhighway. The Mercury
PLUS:
Forests and the ALP: The Mercury
PLUS:
Photos by Matt Newton:
Trees! Banner! http://www.rapidexposure.com.au

The chips are down ...
Hag's mate The Old Bear has another lash at log-truck noise THE HAG
PLUS:
Letters

The old-growth compromise is a done deal ...
Timber folk have the goodwill to, and have, accepted the RFA and all the other forestry land use “compromises”. The challenge is for the Tasmanian environmental movement to prove their understanding of “compromise” by demonstrating their goodwill... BARRY CHIPMAN
PLUS:
Letters

We care, do you? ... THE RESPONSE ...
Waspish shreds of logger claptrap ... what's wrong with emotion? ... the Forest Practices Board ... the reaction to Peter Volker's ... We care, do you? and PETER VOLKER'S reaction ...
THE POSTMAN

We care ... do you? ...
So Mr Green The log ships doesn't want any myrtle cut down in the north-west. Well if people didn't want to buy it, then there would be no need to cut it ... PETER VOLKER

Why I'm handing back my Centenary Medal ...
... I no longer feel happy, if I ever did, to hold this medal handed on to me by a body politic which, from our national leaders down, continues to treat the Australian people and the truth with such disdain and contempt, which continues to display such duplicity of values, which continues to show such a lack of generosity, such smallness and meanness of spirit...
AND...
...I had simply, dumbly, trusted that our State Government would surely not be so stupid, so irresponsible, as to allow a place as unique as The STYX to continue to be vandalised in this way ... RON BROOKS
PLUS:
Letters
PLUS:
Knitting the Styx

Sermon from the Mont (2) ...
Monty stirs passions with his exploration of the murky under-story of the Styx... MORE RESPONSES

The log ships ...
This is what you would expect in a Third World country... GRAHAM GREEN

The end of 1080 ...
A Supreme Court decision last week effectively ends the use of 1080 in Tasmania says ... CHRISTOPHER PURCELL (You read it here first!)
PLUS:
Roland Browne in The Mercury


Sermon from the Mont (1) ... Lest we forget ...
Monty goes trawling through the murky under-story of the Styx... BRUCE MONTGOMERY
PLUS:
Letters


Keep on truckin' (2) ...
The Roving Eye has another bash at log truck noise... and suggests an alternative... THE HAG

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

JULY

The forestry wars ...
Tasmania's never-ending forestry wars have moved to the home of the world's tallest flowering plants. Here's the Mercury report ...
Thousands in Styx stand
PLUS:
What the world thinks
"Here lies the paradox of Tasmania, which markets itself as the clean, green land but appears hellbent on destroying its most precious natural resources..." and the forestry industry replies...
PLUS:
Letters

Donnybrook at Dynnyrne ...
My Irish blood is up and I’m joining in, donning the gloves in the hope of seeing some justice achieved for those Dynnyrne people hit night after night by the sounds of truck traffic, notably the log carters. THE OLD BEAR

The Agora ...
Incredible as it may seem at a time when Tasmania is approaching its bicentennial, all of these heritage sites are currently under threat ... International interest in these French sites is at an all time high. Real tourist potential lies in their preservation ... those LOG TRUCKS ... and HELP! LETTERS

Keep on truckin' ...
You pick up some strange mates shambling around the Pale Ale fountains of Tasmania. Hag last night encountered a bellicose creature who wanted only to be known as The Roving Eye (!?) and who is obsessed with trucks. Mind you Hag doesn't blame him ... recently in one stagger from the Town Hall to the Southern Outlet turnoff in Macquarie St Hag counted 17 (seventeen) fully-laden sustainable old-growth log trucks (tho' Hag is an unreliable drunk and may have been seeing double (B-doubles)) ... THE HAG

Another major world newspaper reports on Tasmania...
"Here lies the paradox of Tasmania, which markets itself as the clean, green land but appears hellbent on destroying its most precious natural resources..."
Letters
And the forestry industry replies...

That letter...
The Examiner splashed with it (Page 1), The Mercury put it on Page 13, the Advocate Page 37 (or thereabouts, somewhere near births and deaths) ... the letter on Forestry Tasmania finances which has caused not a little angst in Government circles. Deputy Premier Paul Lennon has confirmed that the letter - which appears undated - was written in May this year. THE POSTMASTER

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

JUNE

The real threat to Tasmania Together
Tasmania Together is threatened, not by any "hijacking" by critics of current forestry practices, but by this State Government's hubris and failure to embrace the Tasmania Together vision, goals and benchmarks ... STEPHEN JEFFERY'S short, sharp response to John Halfpenny Making the dream happen

Making the dream happen...
Logging has been used to hijack the Tasmania Together ideals and to divert attention away from the social and economic needs of most Tasmanians ... JOHN HALFPENNY

The Eleventh Hour
We have now reached the Eleventh Hour ... we are in the process of making our second big mistake ... of losing the last of the timber that gives Tasmania not just a commercial advantage but a special identity in the eyes of the world ... the southern Celery Top will be gone. So will the Leatherwood that supports our beekeepers and enables them to survive and ensure the pollination of our apple industry. Our Myrtle, the timber that underpins our craft and solid furniture industries will be gone too ... on purpose, a purpose that we still have the ability to change if we have the political will. Dr JOHN YOUNG

How Suddeutsche Zeitung sees Tasmania (2) ...
Here it is ... the full monty: The page-feature by major German newspaper Süddeutsche Zeitung - described as Germany's opinion-shaper - published on 28 April. By URS WALTERLIN

How Suddeutsche Zeitung sees Tasmania (1)
Hard on the heels of French morning newspaper Le Figaro's less-than-flattering analysis of Tasmania's attitude to its ancient forests - which caused a certain amount of angst in the corridors of power Legal threat, Here we stand - comes news of another analysis ... this time by Germany's opinion-shaper Suddeutsche Zeitung...
......
AND the debate rolls on ... with Timber Communities Barry Chipman claiming victory against the mighty BBC TCA and the BBC, Letters...
......
AND the BBC having another lash, Giant tree devastated by fire
......
AND more feisty words, http://www.theadvocate.com.au/_news%20archive/0306_residents.htm

Clearfelling, woodchipping ... an economic appraisal
Tasmania would benefit by as much as $387 million a year in product revenue, 1,230 new timber processing jobs, 1,070 indirect jobs and $15 million a year in royalties, if the 25% of state forests that are of sawn timber and veneer quality, which are currently woodchipped, were better utilised. TAYLOR BILDSTEIN ...

The threat to a Tasmanian taste icon: leatherwood honey
Tasmania’s beekeeping industry is in decline because native flowering trees, like Leatherwoods, are being replaced with eucalypts. “If you lose the Leatherwood you basically lose the commercial beekeeping industry,” says Dr Simon Pigott. TAYLOR BILDSTEIN ...

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

MAY

The bee's sting
We can learn from the humble bumblebee... TAYLOR BILDSTEIN ...

Native birds under threat
Fragmented landscapes are threatening Tasmania's unique and beautiful native birds, the Thousand Cuts conference is told TAYLOR BILDSTEIN ...

Tasmania ... last card to fall
Now it's up to Tasmania to be the last card to fall and to get a process where we phase it out entirely, where we look to restoring landscapes rather than destroying them ... the Thousand Cuts conference is told
TAYLOR BILDSTEIN ...

Time to embrace public accountability
The Thousand Cuts conference in Hobart has a message for the State Government ...
TAYLOR BILDSTEIN ...

A win for the little guy
Gordon Craven 1, State Government 0...

A cry from the heart (4)
LIBBY LESTER was way ahead of every other journalist or media outlet in recognising the significance of the burning of Australia's biggest tree ... an extraordinary failure of care which drew this emotional response from botanist Alan Gray: ``I have a particular feeling about Eucalyptus regnans, which are second in size only to Californian redwoods, and I take it almost as a personal affront to see this happen to a tree of such magnitude. I consider things like this should be a national monument, anywhere else in the world it would be a glorified monument ...." But in Tasmania...

A little encouragement
How A FEW PEOPLE reacted to the State Government's threat of legal action on tasmaniantimes...

Big story
LIBBY LESTER asks a highly-relevant question about news values...

Doctors and forests
SUBMISSION to a Senate committee by Tasmanian doctors on the effects of Tasmanian forestry policy...

The Truth About Monty
A PRESS RELEASE reveals where veteran Tasmanian journalist and former Tasmanian bureau chief for The Australian Bruce Montgomery is heading ...

Here we stand
While readers in New York, London and Paris can read about the tragedy of Tasmania in major articles in the New York Times, the Observer and Le Figaro, you won't read about it in Tasmania if Tasmanian Premier Jim Bacon has his way. LINDSAY TUFFIN

Legal threat on ....How France's Le Figaro sees Tasmania
The State Government threatens legal action against tasmaniantimes.com for running the Le Figaro article LINDSAY TUFFIN

How France's Le Figaro sees Tasmania
Leading French morning daily newspaper Le Figaro pays a visit to Tasmania ...

A cry from the heart (3)
Stumbling into Lofty Coleman. LINDSAY TUFFIN

A cry from the heart (2)
GAY KLOK finds a worm in the apple orchard ...

A cry from the heart (1)
CHRISTOPHER PURCELL had a dream ...

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

APRIL

Gerard Castles tells Monty
And, so it goes on ... into a future, perfect. GERARD CASTLES takes issue with Monty ...

Monty tells the truth
It appears HAG - seeing flying pink elephants - has stuffed up. She is mortally sorry and has re-entered rehab. MONTY tells it as it is...

What Hag wrote - under the banner headline: Monty tell me it isn't true...
HAG hears another senior sceptic has joined Labor's massive army of adviser/spinners... And Big Brother is watching you...

Sausage meet
TAYLOR BILDSTEIN watches from the sidelines as the Republic Bar in Hobart hosts the great sausage meat debate... and, what ARCHIE ROACH had to say...

Future Perfect cops a blast
Future Perfect and its supporters cop a lashing from a Hilary Bray-style anonymous critic ... should THE HAG run it ...

A response to Henry
RICHARD FLANAGAN responds to comments by Professor Henry Reynolds inferring an ambush of the Pacific Region Literary Prize.

Dear Heather Rose
10 Days' festival artistic adviser ROBYN ARCHER's letter to dissenting writers/artists' spokesperson Heather Rose, April 21, 2002.

A history of poison
A trawl through the history of the 10 Days on the Island furore, with extracts from that fine organ of public record, THE MERCURY

Henry, it's nonsense
So, did artists deliberately ambush the Pacific Region Literary Prize as suggested by prize chairman Henry Reynolds? HEATHER ROSE has the answer...

Granite chips
The island state has become an international literary cause celebre as Peter Carey pulls stumps. LINDSAY TUFFIN

The drip on granite
Pesky greens, recalcitrant writers ... more annoying splashes in the corridors of power. LINDSAY TUFFIN

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

DECEMBER-JANUARY

A Prayer for Preservation
The spin is dizzying ... and the questions just keep coming. John Gay, boss of Gunns, the nation's biggest woodchipper, has authorised TV ads lauding Tasmania's wonderful track record on caring for Tasmania's old-growth forests, using former newsreader Steve Titmus as everyone's-nice-cup-of-tea front man. And there have been some interesting statistics floating about as well, not least the revelation that Mr Gay earns $686,000 a year plus bonus options while Deputy Premier Paul Lennon continues to defend the jobs of forestry workers who, he says, earn as little as $25,000 a year. LINDSAY TUFFIN reports.

The God of Tall Things
The religious dimension of Green politics has been around a long time ... as this LINDSAY TUFFIN interview with Rev Lance Armstrong, first published in The Sunday Tasmanian in October 1990 reveals.

Nature Writing Prize
A new nature writing prize has been announced for Tasmania.

Days of Dissent
Environmental wood sculptor PETER ADAMS is disturbed by 10 Days on the Island Festival artistic adviser Robyn Archer's assertion that there were "nil" signs of dissent against Forestry Tasmania sponsorship of the festival. He wrote a hard-hitting response to The Australian. It is yet to be published. Here is an edited version.

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

NOVEMBER


A Tiger by the Tale
Richard Flanagan may have withdrawn Gould's Book of Fishfrom his island state's own literary prize -- in vehement protest at Forestry Tasmania-associated sponsorship -- but the gongs are still flowing for the Tasmanian literary tiger, most recently in Melbourne in early November where he had plenty of bite in this, his acceptance speech for the Victorian Premier's Literary Award.


Fanatics for Forests
Geoff Law (see Law's Law below) is a fanatic and his fellow travelers are misguided, writes GREG BARNS ... "Just as James McCauley - another Tasmanian literary figure of the 1950s and 1960s, was a fellow traveler of Bob Santamaria. Beware all of them!"


A Write Stuff-up
THE PONCE gets to grips with the story behind Robyn Archer's apparent invitation to Forestry Tasmania to be major sponsor of 10 Days on the Island, at a time when Tasmanian literary tiger Richard Flanagan wins another award for Gould, Leonardo DiCaprio lines up to lock himself in a seawater cell as Gould and the "cultural fascists" get shirty...

It's pronounced "Sheesh!" ...
The proposed logging of a pristine corner of Recherche Bay has got the pollies running for the dictionary. Outrage abounds over revelations that his rare slice of Tasmania’s maritime history in the remote south is to be clearfelled. But State Parliament's airing of the issue got a little side-tracked. A Hansard extract reveals all.


Law's War
Geoff Law is a wilderness warrior ... an environmental activist at the forefront of campaigns fought in Tasmania over the past two decades, most recently high-profile actions against the nation’s biggest woodchipper, Gunns, and associated campaigns against old-growth forest logging, clear-felling, 1080 poisoning. PHILIPPA DUNCAN, a journalism student at the University of Tasmania, interviewed Law for this profile...

New Pacific Prize Shock
Renowned Australian writer TIM WINTON has pulled his novel, the Booker-shortlisted Dirt Music,from the Pacific's richest literary competition, the Tasmania Government sponsored Pacific Region Literary Prize, worth $40,000.

The Ghost of Eric
The Hag takes beer on the fringes of last weekend's ALP conference and discovers that the great Labor tradition of head-kicking from the Halcyon days of Electric Eric Reece is alive and very unwell.

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

OCTOBER

Wood Spits Chips
DANIELLE WOOD says Greg Barns was barking up the wrong tree when he called her a "deep Green fanatic".

The difference between Santamaria and Brown
Greg Barns has drawn political equivalences between the Groupers and the Greens, by pointing to zealotry in their leadership and fanaticism in their following. Whilst some of Barnsí observations are fair and accurate, his conclusions miss the mark, writes NATASHA CICA.

A greener shade of emerald
When the worldwide environmental movement steps outside its area of expertise, it is hard to take it seriously, writes born again Democrat GREG BARNS.

The Groupers and the Greens
What do the Greens have in common with the defunct National Civic Council? More than you might think, according to Republican Movement chief GREG BARNS.

Still waiting, Paul
The only sight sadder in Tasmania than the stuffed thylacine in the Hobart Museum is that of a desperate politician reworking the oldest trick in the island's politics.
RICHARD FLANAGAN reports

Cinderella misses the ball
A SECOND high-profile Tasmanian writer has pulled the plug on the Tasmanian Readers' and Writers' Festival, part of next year's 10 Days on the Island Festival.

Flanagan's terrible choice
RICHARD FLANAGAN tells Tasmania Pacific Prize chair Henry Reynolds why he has asked his publisher to withdraw Gould's Book of Fishfrom consideration for Australia's richest literary award.

The State we're in
TASMANIA hovers on the brink of a golden age – if the Government and its cheerleaders are to be believed.

In the forest of a night
It keeps bubbling away like a stream though an old-growth logging coup. And despite the best efforts of the spin doctors who say the stream is still clear and fresh and beautiful it is getting increasingly brackish, muddy and unpalatable.

Bob Cheek - the understory
Bob Cheek has been clearfelled – and his fledgling tilt at the mighty log-train of established foresty industry power has become but a footnote to Tasmanian political history.

It could be the Callithumpians
We were once accustomed to hearing people say that Tasmania has the most generous, the most just, the fairest political system in the world. And so it was. But this is not a claim that anyone makes much anymore, writes PETER HAY

Brown on Labor and the Greens
Tasmanian Green Senator Bob Brown included this subjective analysis of Tasmanian political history in a Matters of Public Interest speech to Parliament on August 29 last year. It makes fascinating reading - particularly the stated links between big business and political power in Tasmania.

RAPID RESPONSE EMAIL: What do you think?

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