I watched what was billed as the Great Pulp Mill debate on 'Difference of Opinion'.
I was appalled at the amount of misinformation put out by the mill proponents, some of which could be considered as palpable lies. Such statements as, "The mill is designed to process only plantation timber and the timber that is now being exported will cease and be processed by this mill." "The trees will be turned into paper that will lock away the carbon forever." "The mill will have its own power station and will generate clean green power and will not pollute."
However, the major failings of the program were those of omission, rather than what they said.
Nobody asked the question 'what happens if it is found that the worst scenario comes about, and the mill DOES pollute and the fishing industry is decimated, the tourist industry suffers and people DO die? What will happen then? Will they close the mill down, and who pays the compensation?'
The government must have been anticipating that this could happen, despite their bellicose assertions that this is the 'world's best practice', when all the independent scientists say it is not. If instead, it DOES turn out to actually be one of the 'worlds worst performances', they have built into the approval process all those clauses that let Gunns and themselves off the hook. You cannot close the mill down legally and they are not liable for any damages. Without some possibility of this happening, there would be no necessity for these safeguards.
Nobody mentioned the potential financial disaster, or the facts that all the profits were heading offshore. Nobody said that before it has even started, in the last couple of years it has already received $247 million in subsidies and grants. Nobody said that there are another 41 pulp mills coming on line over the next eight years and that there is going to be a glut of pulp on the market. Nobody said that virtually every pulp mill in the world cannot exist without enormous state subsidies. Here, these current subsidies and possibly the even greater ones of the future, will reduce the true cost of pulp that we export and effectively becomes a subsidy for the Japanese paper companies. Very nice, if you're Japanese. Thank you very much, Tasmania!
Nobody said that the MIS Companies are being granted rights in Tasmania that no Tasmanian enjoys. Tax exempt benefits that allow them to take over our farmland and convert it to plantations at a time when the Murray-Darling is drought-ravaged and unlikely to produce any food at all. Tax-free money is being used to destroy our productive land and our carbon-rich forests. What is actually happening in this State is that the big business corporations from the mainland and overseas are being encouraged to mine our assets and plunder our future. And WE are left with the cost and the debris. We are footing the bill for our own demise, and our opinions are being ridden-over roughshod. To the big players, it is merely an election issue. Who will get the seats of Bass and Braddon, and is this policy an election winner? The perceived, and probably the actual danger of the mill is being short-circuited by anxious politicians searching for those extra party funds and that tiny margin that will tip the election in their favour, and for this, they are prepared to sacrifice the interests of Tasmania and are prepared to see that a few of the very rich become a lot richer in the process.
Barnaby Drake.
