Gladstone harbour - the truth and the pain to bring it to light

Truth never lost ground by enquiry. - WILLIAM PENN, Some Fruits of Solitude

 

Truth will ultimately prevail where there is pains taken to bring it to light. - GEORGE WASHINGTON

Photo by John Mikkelsen

Finally the truth has come out in the major metropolitan newspapers about what has been killing marine life in Gladstone harbour. To be fair the situation wasn’t helped by the Gladstone Port Corporation (GPC) withholding reports from public examination for over two years. The local newspaper, the Gladstone Observer, has finally reported the news instead of printing the version presented by the GPC without too much outside inquiry. The full page advertising by GPC at the time may have been co-incidental.  

The enquiry for truth has largely been pursued in the alternative media on blog sites. The most prolific writer about the disaster besetting Gladstone harbour is John Mikkelsen or Mikko to his online friends, a semi-retired journalist living at the time at Tannum Sands who could see first-hand the fish deaths, could talk to the local fishermen and the scientists who came to investigate.

John Mikkelsen in his latest blog post, Gladstone Harbour- dredging up what went wrong, writes of the “latest of the belated reports emerging showing how environmental breaches went unreported in Gladstone Harbour;” referring to Tony Moore’s December 20th Brisbane Times newspaper article, Gladstone Harbour bund wall failures explained.

The Australian in the November 18^th issue carried the article, Fish fears rise over LNG port dredging, revealing how GPC withheld reports for more than two years containing evidence contrary to the GPC claim that the problems were all caused by a flood in 2011, a scenario that as time went on became increasingly apparent to be unlikely.  The author of this article in the Australian is the Environment editor, Graham Lloyd who has since followed up with two more articles, Bad build blamed for fish deaths and Gladstone port plea to stem toxic leak.



 

Photo Brisbane Times

The evidence now available supports what John Mikkelsen has been writing since September 2011. His articles were published in two of Australia’s largest blog sites, Something’s really fishy in the Gladstone waters at The Punch on October 2011 and then on the 26^th at ABC’s Unleashed, Gladstone fish can't read.

But the enquiry into truth was not without cost, on October 17^th 2011 Mikko who several years previously had held the position of editor of the Gladstone Observer wrote:

“”Yesterday I watched a convoy of tugs towing barges loaded with dredging spoil past Tannum Sands to the dumping grounds in open waters just outside the entrance to Gladstone Harbour, the scene of widespread controversy surrounding continuing catches of sick fish and dead marine animals.

On Wild Cattle Island, a national park just south of Tannum beach, I saw the carcass of another dead adult turtle washed up at low tide, the latest in more than 200 strandings.

In the past week, local media outlets have all run full-page advertisements from the Gladstone Ports Corporation stating “Water quality in Gladstone Harbour is OK”. Tell that to the fish.

Meanwhile, for almost five years I have been writing a weekly column, ‘What Goes Around’ in The Gladstone Observer. For the past month, I have focussed on the harbour controversy but it has now been axed because of “budget restrictions”. All online comments to articles relating to the harbour and diseased fish were removed just over a week ago and since then new articles have not allowed online comment.

All that could be coincidental and I am not suggesting otherwise, just presenting the circumstances. My last article, published in today’s Observer (October 17)”

The above quote was published at a community blog site that no longer deserves to be named. This article attracted several thousand views to the ongoing comments that kept people up to date to the unfolding situation at Gladstone harbour. Most of these views would have been from people keeping themselves informed rather than those actually commenting.  Unfortunally the article also attracted a couple of people with the zealous desire to discredit the evidence being presented and although living far away from Gladstone were very persistent in harassment often using cherry picked Google searches. The article was deleted in November 2012 because of the abuse of trust that the community placed in one person to hold the site’s password; it was deleted for no other reason than this person choose at the time to disagree with it.

The original post was copied and is available at the pindanpost blog site. Many pages of updated comments, including informed scientific commentary, are lost.   

It appeared that the motivation to persistently harass the events at Gladstone harbour to be reported and commented upon was that environmental groups had subsequently become active about the issue and that if the ‘greenies’ were making statements they had to be automatically wrong. While it is certainly easy to find many examples of the extreme end of the environmental movement in their ‘the end justifies the means’ approach using alarmism, misinformation and even sabotage, it is simplistic to assume that everyone interested in environmental issues are of bad character with incorrect information. Whenever in this harassment it was pointed out the greenies were involved with Gladstone harbour, Mikko would patiently reply that “even a broken clock is right twice a day.”    

Social media can be and is being used for good; the enquiry into the truth about Gladstone harbour would not have proceeded without the use of blog sites. However it also provides a soap box for those that society would not have otherwise have provided for some people. It brings out the ‘haters’ from both the politically left and the right. It provides the opportunity for you to hear the viewpoint that you want to hear and to attack every view expressed by other sources that have been pigeon holed as wrong. Social media provides the opportunity for those that wish to rant, engage in absolutes and abuse just as it can provide the opportunity for enquiry, positive engagement and thoughtfulness. 



Photo sourced -

Science panellooks at water, not sick fish

 Those of us who are politically conservative and are interested in a balance of conservation with economic development and community values should stand strong against the attacks of some on the left who believe that the only legitimate comment on environmental issues is owned by them. Also those of us you are politically conservative and are interested into the enquiry into the truth of a situation should resist the weakness that requires one to retreat to known absolutes and not allow new events to challenge one’s thinking. Sometime there are circumstances where you end up on a parallel course to others that are normally in opposition; it appears that some are so insecure in their own convictions that they create an artificial world of “East is East, and West is West, and never the twain shall meet”.

 

 

Congratulations Mikko for the truth belatedly being reported in the major metropolitan main stream media. You have stuck to your guns; the truth has ultimately prevailed thanks to the pains you took to bring it to light. The pursuit may have not been without pain; there are a few people that owe you an apology.

The event of November 2012 was the catalyst for the beginning of this blog site and below is the list of the posts published by John Mikkelsen about the Gladstone Harbour

Turtle, dugong deaths 'directly linked to dredging'

Did the floods two years ago cause this?

 

Gladstone fishers unimpressed by compensation offer

Dredging resumed at the height of Gladstone's record flood

Gladstone Ports Corporation swimming in sea of controversy

Gladstone Ports Corp should stick with coal, not seafood marketing

Science panel looks at water, not sick fish

Resource consultants 'like supermodels who won't get up for less than $5000 a day'

Photo sourced from,

Bacterial infection ‘linked to dredging’

Call to halt Gladstone port development proposals

UNESCO's latest warning on threats to Great Barrier Reef

Bacterial infection ‘linked to dredging’

Fishers' lucky to have survived toxic algae'

‘Mining captures politics’ – author claims

Author calls for Royal Commission into 'political capture by mining'

 

Gladstone Harbour- dredging up what went wrong

 

UPDATE #1

May 9 2014

The independent report to federal Environment Minister Greg Hunt was released on and it reveals that there was an obvious determined attempt to cover up the whole devastating effects of the dredging and leaking bund wall, coinciding with the fish disease and toxic algae outbreaks.

Bad build and oversight failure at Gladstone gas hub.

.

Farming Advocacy (or Agvocacy) 101

by Sherrill Stivano

 

First published at Feedlots, Farms & Family  

It has been a very eventful couple of years in the world of farmers on social media. For me it kicked off with the ABC Four Corners program “A Bloody Business”, regarding the Live Export of cattle to Indonesia and the cruelty encountered in some abattoirs at slaughter point.

Image sourced from http://www.causematters.com/

It was at this time I entered into the social media world, firstly dipping my toe into the waters of Facebook only to lose a leg to the first activist I encountered. The leg was quickly followed by my temper as I watched all Australian farmers being branded cruel and evil. I am not proud of my first encounters. I struggled with my temper as I was horrified at the things that were being said about our hard working Australian Farmers.  People I know to be generous, kind and compassionate. People who work hard and encounter many difficulties daily yet keep on moving forward. Things like:

“All farmers with terminal illnesses should have their throats cut to see how painful it is”

Or

“Hand over your children and see if they scream”

As you can imagine, these types of statements got some very strong reactions from me and many other farmers who were following the threads. Sadly, however much I want to say this type of behaviour was confined to the activists’ side I cannot.

Now here we are over two years later. What have I learnt? Have I changed my tactics? Can I hold my temper? The answers are lots, definitely and most of the time.

So exactly what have I learnt as an Australian farmer? Gosh I am unsure of where to start here as I have learnt so much!

While initially shocked at the vitriol and hatred encountered and pointed squarely in the direction of Australian Farming, I learnt that not all people use so
cial media to bully, defame and demean others.  There are many out there who are very genuine in their concerns and really want to understand what is entailed on a daily basis in different farming industries.

I learnt that many in the general public are quite removed from farming and how their food is produced, but only a handful are removed from their senses. Most people are happy to accept a factual polite explanation. Most people are reasonable.

I learnt that manners will create ongoing conversations and that there are many out there who while not actively involved in a conversation, still watch and can be reached never the less. I have learnt that you will never convince everyone, but to respect the different opinions out there. I have learnt that not only does religion start wars, but given time so will dietary arguments, especially when agendas are pushed by radical members of movements.  

 

I learnt that there was also a large and growing rural community on social media and contrary to the claims by some industry bodies that social media had no place in agriculture, these farmers have been able to prove otherwise. Many had been told to get the word out themselves and they have been doing an excellent job of it.  I have also learnt that rural Australia really is a small world which is a wonderful thing when it comes to closed social media groups and verification of members. It seems there is always someone who knows someone who knows someone. This is a great strength.

 I learnt that we farmers are far from silly when it comes to technology however rural technology just may not be able to keep pace with us! NBN? What NBN? Signal drop out or failure is the bane of a rural advocate.

There are so many things that I have learnt, but perhaps the biggest so far has been the fact that farmers can make a difference as shown with the back down by Coles from selling the Animals Australia Make it Possible campaign merchandise, solely due to the social media revolt by farmers. I only hope that the real reason for the massive backlash by farmers is being heard. Coles, who have suddenly made themselves the moral guardian of farming ethics (very same company now accused by the ACCC – Australian Consumer Competition Commission of misleading and deceptive marketing on a separate issue) aligned themselves with an organisation who are all about animal RIGHTS NOT animal WELFARE. An organisation who has repeatedly pushed an agenda to end all livestock farming, commencing with live export and intensive farming methods. An organisation who uses illegal methods of hidden surveillance  to obtain footage of what may or may not be cruelty (as it is heavily edited). To do so members trespass on farms which are not only businesses but family homes. From this edited footage they have pieced together an advertising campaign to illicit donations from the public. Not a single dollar will be spent on ensuring the welfare of a single animal however. This is where the outrage stems from. Social media provided farmers the perfect horse they could saddle up, muster support and stampede a major corporate company into retracting its poorly judged support for an organisation who had in their own minds been masters of the social media game.

 

So how have my tactics changed? There is actually a skill in getting your facts out there, and the Australian public really does trust its farmers. I have watched many very good rural advocates, people who had never really thought they would be at the forefront of rural advocacy. These clever, witty and genuine people have taught me many things.

 

 

So these are my top 12 of Farming Advocacy 101 ………….

1. ENGAGE – Engage with the general public everywhere. In towns and cities. On buses, trains and planes.
2. KEEP COOL – Expect resistance and at times agree to disagree and walk away from an argument before it deteriorates into personal attacks
3.  PLAY THE BALL – Engage on the facts and argument, not the opponent. Personal attacks are not attractive and do not paint anyone in a good light.
4. RESPECT – Respect the general public and their entitlement to an opinion that is different to yours. You can however ensure it is an educated opinion by offering facts to counter their opinion.
5. FACTS – Use facts you know to be true based off actual experiences. These facts are always so believable simply because they are true.
6. SHOW & TELL – Keeps photos of your farm and your animals and farm operations on your phone ready to show anyone who  may be interested when travelling. A picture says more than a thousand words, just ask an activist.
7. POSITIVITY – When engaging others do so in a positive and polite manner and you will generally be treated in the same manner.
8.  UNDERSTANDING – We can’t expect the general public to understand farming if we don’t tell them about it, but make sure explanations do not equal whinging. It is a fine line from the general public’s point of view
9. SOLUTIONS – Be proactive and find solutions to problems. Talking about a problem repeatedly becomes tiresome if no solution can be found.
10. IMPROVEMENTS -   Even the best farming operations have room for improvements, but make sure they can be on YOUR terms. Be proactive don’t wait to be told.
11. RESPONSIBILITY – It has become clear that the responsibility for public perceptions lies with farmers and farmers are one of the most trusted professions in Australia. We are responsible for bringing about change and we are responsible for educating the Australian consumer about their food
12. PROUD – Australian farmers are some of the most innovative in the world producing food that is clean, green and disease free. Hold your head up high as an Australian farmer and be proud. Share your pride in your farm, crops and animals. It is contagious.

 

Lastly……can I hold my temper? Hmmm I will say most of the time. I try hard and revert to pasting facts I have stashed away when someone has stirred the pot a little too hard. I sometimes write several scathing replies, but never post them and then walk away. Or at least most of the time I do………………….. 

 

Previous post by Sherrill

Acceptable cruelty for seven months?

 

.

 





Family farmers fight back

 Farmers on a daily basis are the providers of welfare for the animals under their care. Their ability to provide this care and provide food for people worldwide is under constant scrutiny of radical animal rights activists with unrealistic expectations, ignorant of animal production systems and a worldview that gives animals human emotion and reasoning.

This last week there was a significant skirmish between the farming community and Animals Australia (AA) and the supermarket giant, Coles. Farmers rightly took umbrage at Coles aligning itself with AA by contributing funding for this animals rights group that has a record of attacking family farmers.

Farmers are notorious for not working together not only between the different agricultural sectors but even within. This lack of unity has often made the farming community easy pickings by those who wish to attack them. This last week has been a lesson of what can be achieved when the farming community pulls together. It also clearly demonstrates the power of social media. It was not only those directly under attack in AA's latest campaign, the pork and poultry industries, but farmers right across all farming production system rose up and said enough is enough.

Below is a snapshot of the last week from four different sources.

 

Animals Australia - The Wolf Amongst the Sheep by Bess Gairns

Animals Australia has waged open and unrelenting campaigns against Australia’s agricultural sector as well as the culture and history of our rural communities.
Currently 10 of the 16 campaigns that Animals Australia are engaged in are directly aimed at Rural Australia. From the banning of culls and controls of feral animals such as foxes, cats and pigs, to the use of kangaroos for meat and hide, the use of sheep for wool, right through to their greatest conquest to date, Live Export.

So what’s the big deal? Why do farmers cry ‘wolf’ every time Animals Australia appears on 4 corners?

Most farmers would agree that Animals Australia gets up their nose for two big, undeniable reasons…

Firstly, they are a lobby group. All the funds raised by animals Australia are poured directly back into more marketing, advertising and political lobbying. Animals Australia DO NOT have a single animal shelter or refuge. They DO NOT promote education within our community or abroad, instead their funds are utilised to carry out ‘undercover’ investigations and to spread propaganda through the community. Animals Australia make no effort to work with industries or communities in advocating better animal welfare practices instead they advocate for blanket bans and legislation changes directly to government, whilst louering the wider community along with them.

Secondly, their vegetarian/vegan agenda. Farmers, like all Australians, believe in a person’s right to choose vegetarianism, but they are trying to fight a battle against a group that wants Australian’s to lose their right to CHOOSE to be omnivorous. Animals Australia is admittedly one of the biggest proponents of veganism in this country. They have their own vegetarian website www.whyveg.com that asks all of us to ‘Pledge to go Veg’ and this is where the real agenda behind the vendetta becomes blaringly obvious. Animals Australia don’t lobby for change in agriculture because they aim for better welfare, they do it because their long term goal is to force the hand of government to phase out animal farming for the uses of meat, dairy and bi-products. They are every bit the wolf that farmers see them for, despite wearing grannies nightgown.

Coles retreats at bush boycott     by: SUE NEALES, Rural reporter  From: The Australian 

COLES is expected today to deliver farmers their first victory in their battle with the supermarket giants, pulling from sale shopping bags supporting Animals Australia.   

Angry beef and fat lamb producers yesterday called for a mass boycott of Coles supermarkets because of their partnership with the animal rights group, saying the retail giant was deeply "anti-farming". 

Sheep producers who supply Coles with thousands of lambs a year yesterday announced a blackban on sales to the chain. The moves follow outrage within farming circles at the decision to sell the Animals Australia bags at 500 of its stores this month.

 

Queensland cattleman Stuart Ogg said he was appalled at Coles's misjudgment and would make sure none of his Brahman-cross cattle ended up as prime beef steaks in its stores.  "Coles always seem to be looking for a point of difference or a cheap publicity stunt and don't care who they hurt in the process," the Carnarvon Gorge grazier said. "We have a very solid and sustainable industry; Coles siding with Animals Australia is a slap in the face for industry -- it's like them saying they don't think we are producing our meat properly."

 

One of NSW's biggest prime-lamb producers, Andrew Freshwater, announced he would be halting the supply of thousands of lambs a year to Coles until it reversed its stance.

 

Mr Freshwater said five other suppliers -- all the major producers in the eastern states -- were backing his stance, while other farmers intended to stop buying fertiliser and insurance from Wesfarmers. "I've had a gutful; (it's time) to make Coles sit up and take notice," he said.

 

NFF chief executive Matt Linnegar said Coles could not have it both ways -- it could not claim to be the best friend of farmers and a strong supporter of homegrown produce while supporting Animals Australia and its extremist anti-farming campaigns.

The truth about Australian animal welfare by Fiona Lake
This a good article that answers well the reaction of Lyn White of AA after Coles were forced to back down . Fiona has her blog article copyright protected which means that it can't be copied and pasted to here. I encourage you to follow the link and read Fiona's article.

 

If farmers fold  by Glenda Grey

PRA: 2013 Conference



Property Rights Australia - 2013 Conference and AGM

Friday 14th June 6.30 pm Meet & Greet at the Highfields Tavern -  Highfields Toowoomba.

Saturday 15th June 8.30am Conference

Highfields Cultural Centre – Highfields Toowoomba

 

8.00am  Registrations Open

8.30am Welcome

Joanne Rea, Chairman,

 

Opening Address

Ashley McKay –

10 years PRA history and achievements

Alex Sparkes

Farmz website designer - 

Social networking and agriculture. 

His story and insights into the future.

Troy Rowlings 

 Rural Press QCL -  

How do we get the message

across in the City Press 

 Phillip Sheridan

Barrister

  Vegetation Management Act amendments 

and Crown review of VMA update

 

 

 

 

 

Tom Marland

Creevey Russell Lawyers

Powerlines, Pipelines and Porky Pies

-      All infrastructure projects

that can cross your land including

railways, roads, Powerlink, Sunwater 
 

Garry and Kerry Ladbrook

Landowners Yuleba

Our experience with Powerlink

 Richard Golden

Landowner Yuleba –

Living and Working in a Gasfield

Trenton Hindman 

 Landholder Wyandra

Dr Bill Burrows expert report
on Hindman vs Sargent. 

 and more to be announced 

 

3.00pm Action Group Workshops Electives

    3.50pm Vote Of Thanks And Close
4.00pm Afternoon Smoko

 

 Conference dinner to follow at your own cost

To register please email Property Rights Australia  pra1@bigpond.net.au
 

Registration required for morning & afternoon smoko and for lunch. 



UPDATE #1

 Announcement of further presentations

Queensland Minister for Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestries, John McVeigh will give a presentation. 

Basin Sustainability Alliance will also give a presentation in regards to water and the coal seam gas industry.

The agenda has been shuffled about a little. The Action group workshop electives have been brought forward to earlier in the day and will end at 4pm for afternoon smoko

.

Empowering Fairleigh

Alison Fairleigh recently won the Qld rural woman of the year award for her work with rural mental health advocacy and promotion of social media as an opportunity to help improve the health and well being of people in rural and remote Australia. From the 7th to 10th of April the National Rural Health Conference was held in Adelaide and as invited speaker Alison gave a truly inspirational presentation.

 

Photo sourced from Farming ahead online

 

Please click on the following link and listen to Alison Fairleigh with -

 Empowering rural communities through social media

 

Alison has a blog site called Talking Fairleigh. It has been one of the recommended places to visit by this site; the link along with the last published post can be found in the right hand column of this page under My Blog List. Another recommendation in our list is Michael Trant's, Farmers way of life whom Alison points out in her presentation as a major social media success story for rural people. The #Hadagutful campaign in WA has been a success; it has shown that a minority group, (that is what farmers are these days in Australia), can in the face of economic ruin and facing interest groups of far greater political power, can start to turn the situation around and bring hope.

 

The Knitting Nannas from the NSW Northern rivers area have shown how by thinking outside the square and using a bit of imagination that the public's attention can be captured and a message delivered with no high budget, no restriction of age and using social media.

 

As Alison indicated it was completely out of left field that a youtube appeared by a complete unknown, Cassandra McDonald which brought to a halt the efforts from a considerable public relations budget from the supermarket giant, Coles.

 

Ask An Aussie Farmer face book page has been a major success. Started a little over a year ago it now has over 4,500 likes. The description for the page reads as follows -

"We are a group that is passionate about Australian farming, with expertise and first-hand knowledge across a broad expanse of agriculture in Australia, including access to experts and professionals. We reside all over this country and some even live far away from our shores but are still involved in the diverse industries of Australian agriculture. The reason for hosting this page is so those that live, breath, know, and are enthusiastic about Aussie Ag can answer your questions and tell their stories”

The internet has been a great break through for people who live and work in regional, rural and remote areas. Social media has broken the tyranny of distance. It is no longer the case that you have to physically go to a capital city to get your point of view across; it can all be done from home at very little cost