Premier Palaszczuk’s election campaign launch speech promise to
reinstate the repealed Vegetation Management Act (VMA) could almost be forgiven
as being ill informed but now after 100 days in office for the Premier to
outline it as a priority task to be achieved is highly alarming. In a letter to
the Minister for Natural Resources & Mines Anthony Lynham, the Premier gave
the direction to, "Re-instate the
vegetation protection laws repealed by the previous government to reduce the
clearing of native vegetation”.
Property Rights Australia is most concerned that senior members of
the Palaszczuk government, including the Premier herself, have failed to grasp
that the VMA was not repealed but amended
and amended modestly at that. Unlike the over the top approach taken in
resource legislation, the Newman government amendments to the VMA were restrained,
responsible and restored basic tenets of our legal system; civil rights that
the wider community take for granted but had been denied to landowners. There
have been many column inches devoted to the horror of the reversal of the onus
of proof under the so-called “bikie laws”
including by the Labor party.
Qld was the first jurisdiction in Australia to reverse the onus of proof
and it happened under the Beattie Labor government’s Vegetation Management Act. We expect this type of attack on the Justice
system not to be repeated
The current government should be wary of pressure by various
“green groups” which are continually being proved to be lacking in substance or
in touch with real situations impacting real people in Queensland at this time.
Activists with an environmental agenda
have lost no time in getting in the governments ear with the incorrect notion
that the VMA had been repealed and landclearing is again out of control. Published articles by a group of academics
calling themselves “concerned scientists”
show little scientific integrity, deceptive selection of the facts and
exaggerated conclusions. WWF in its
latest Living Forests report
devote a whole chapter with the use of “projections” to forecast a resulting
deforestation from changes to environment legislation. WWF believes that your brigalow suckers are “critically
important” and without a word about compensation of production loss to the
landowner states the desire to see brigalow regrowth to mature for 30 years to
provide wildlife habitat. Typically Dr Tim Seelig, Queensland Campaign Manager
for the Wilderness Society makes gross exaggerations,
”The LNP substantially weakened land clearing
controls in Queensland, resulting in a return to large scale clearing and an
impending tree clearing crisis on a massive scale.”
In responding to questions in the Queensland parliament on May 13
from the Member for Warrego Ann Leahy, Dr Lynham said that, “we
have no plans to change those specific portions such as the self-assessment
criteria.” PRA believes to revert back
to the old arrangements of a deadly slow time frame to obtain permits to
harvest the self-regenerating acacia mulga crucial for drought fodder would
defy logic.
With 80% of Queensland in drought it is most likely graziers
concerned for the welfare of their livestock; feeding mulga will most likely be
the greatest contributor to any increase in the area of land clearing.
Mulga is well known for its ability to re-establish itself.
Going by where the most
fervour of the radical environmentalist is directed, provision of clearing for
high-value agriculture
is the area most at risk for attention by the Palaszczuk government. Tim Seelig
in his dedicated vehemence says,
“The LNP approved at least five massive land
clearing projects in northern Queensland, including at Olive Vale. Those five
projects total 113,000 hectares. Other approvals include almost 60,000 hectares
at Strathmore Station in the Gulf Country.”
To provide some perspective Qld is a large state covering 1,727,000
square kilometres with over 200 national parks covering 6.5 million hectares. Most agricultural production essential to feed
our population by necessity occurs off land that is thinned of its vegetation
or a large percentage cleared. Land has
been set aside for different purposes and its time environmentalists reserve
full conservation management to National Parks only and don’t transfer these
expectations to agricultural production systems. The introduction of the VMA
caught large tracts of north Qld under developed with landowners uncompensated
for declining production.
Recently the federal member of Leichhardt, Warren Entsch, gave
some perspective of the clearing being undertaken at Olive Vale calling
activists claims, “emotional clap-trap.” Mr Entsch owned Olive Vale up to the early
2000’s said that,
“He believed the area to be cleared – which
represents less than 10 per cent of the station – was mostly open country with
few trees.
“There’s not a lot of agricultural opportunities
in Cape York, but those areas that have been identified through the scientific
process are areas where we should be going, giving an economic opportunity for
people living in the area,’’
It is rather inconvenient for the environmental activists the recent
release of the international scientific paper, ‘Recent reversal in loss of
global terrestrial biomass’ that showed vegetation in Australia has
actually increased with the encroachment of trees into grassland a key factor.
Dr Bill Burrows in a 2013 paper, “Bushland at risk of continued tree and shrub
thickening in Queensland” wrote,
“Many other land types were, and remain, subject
to increased “thickening” of the over-storey or sub-canopy tree and shrub
cover, or both, over time. Likewise trees are actively encroaching on some
native grasslands . Examples of this changing structure and composition of the
vegetation include mulga thickening in country east of the Warrego River,
gidgee encroachment onto Mitchell grasslands , increased eucalypt cover in the
Desert Uplands and Central Highlands/Burdekin Catchment and tea tree invasion of grasslands in Cape
York. Even National Parks and reserves abutting grazing land are subject to
ongoing tree thickening e.g. the disappearing grassy balds of the Bunya
Mountains, acacias invading grasslands on Moorinya N.P. and rainforest invading
wet sclerophyll forest in the wet tropics.”
Rural Queensland does not need a repeat of the full extent of the poor
archaic Beattie Labor government legislation that was enforced in a vindictive,
punitive manner.
As stated by Premier Palaszczuk in her directive to Dr Lynham, “it
is important to achive the best outcomes for Queenslanders” and “to make all
decisions and actions in the public interest”.
To reverse the current strict guidelines already in place for tree
clearing in Queensland will not deliver the best outcomes for Queenslanders and
as seen in the past, replacing cooperation with coercion and heavy-handed
administration creates more problems and is not effective or productive.
PRA has been aware and is highly concerned that in recent months
of DNR&M staff appear to have been given directives to find someone to hold
up as an errant example to what would appear to be an excuse to review the
current tree clearing legislation to appease election promises made to green
groups. Legal firm Ferrier & Co
principle Tom Marland recently made the statement based on evidence from a
number of clients who have been subjected to formal inspections last month
that,
“it was clear from the imagery and mapping that
DNRM were not inspecting irregularities but were inspecting properties to
support prosecutions.
“DNRM have sufficient information to determine
whether charges should be laid. The purpose to inspect and speak with
landholders is to falsely obtain a confession or some form of omission of
guilt.”
PRA strongly advises landowners that if departmental staff
approaches them on a land clearing matter to immediately seek legal advice. In
these circumstances usual country hospitality and openness should not apply.
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