Impacts of plantations for the proposed pulp mill

The expanding area of plantations intended to feed the proposed pulp mill, is already having a major impact on the state.

Water

This is a briefing paper on the current debate over the future of Tasmanian forestry and Gunns’ planned pulp mill prepared by TAP Into A Better Tasmania, November 2010. A pdf is available for downloading from below.

For further information please contact media spokesman Robert McMahon on 0448 547 290 or email bob@orielstudio.com.au

Introduction

A stalled proposal for a world scale pulp mill, the slow motion collapse of the forest industry, the astonishing alignment of environmental groups behind industry for a plantation-based pulp mill and the prospect of big money changing hands marks an extraordinary period in a small island’s history.

So how did all this happen? It’s time to examine the causes in detail because to misdiagnose the causes invites the wrong solution. One solution being proposed, for example, involves ‘compensating’ the forest industry to the tune of over a billion dollars. But that in turn carries its own serious consequences eg. lack of funding for public hospitals.

The interpretation of the causes presented here provides a big picture perspective from a hitherto ignored community view, the one that the special interest groups involved don’t want to hear.

So how did we arrive at the point where the aims of some environment groups now mesh with industry, where conservationists signed up to support a plantation industry and a pulp mill in Tasmania, and the community was sidelined?

The story started decades ago.

Here is the online copy of the first edition [Summer 09/2010] of TAP's newspaper. You can download a pdf of the four A3 sized pages at the bottom and print off copies.

Its purpose is to detail in newspaper format how the proposed pulp mill, the fourth-largest kraft pulp mill in the world, threatens the health, jobs, lifestyle and investments of the community.

Introduction - Why jobs?

Creation of new jobs is the central pillar in the case for winning the hearts and minds of Tasmanians for Gunns’ proposed pulp mill. Gunns’ CEO John Gay said the “mill would create jobs and long-term job security for a significant part of Tasmania's workforce” [1]. This position is echoed by the Forest Industry Association of Tasmania chairman, CFMEU forestry division, Timber Communities Australia, the Tasmanian Chamber of Commerce and Industry, and both Liberal and Labor parties, as well as some northern council mayors.

The promise of thousands of new jobs helped ex-Premier Paul Lennon justify rescuing the ‘critically non compliant’ Gunns pulp mill in 2007 with a special act of Parliament, the Pulp Mill Assessment Act (PMAA). The other main pillar of support for quickly passing the PMAA, the urgency of Gunns’ commercial needs, has now been discredited. However, the creation of new jobs remains as the central justification for the project by Liberal and Labor. Labor is positioning itself for the 2010 March election as the pro-jobs party and the Greens as anti-jobs.

What we are asked to believe

There are several competing stories around the pulp mill proposal that we are asked to believe. We can choose to believe Gunns’ PR man Matt Horan, who says it will create 2000 construction jobs [2], or we can believe Gunns’ secret advice to the George Town Council engineer that only 1250 building workers are needed [3]. We can choose to believe Horan that the pulp mill will create “about 16,000 jobs in the future," [4] or we can believe consultant ITS Global that it will create only 292 direct long term jobs [5].

We can believe Gunns’ stated wishes that underskilled Tasmanians with no experience in pulp mills will get preference over skilled outsiders from interstate or the thousands of overseas experienced pulp workers who have been made redundant in the global downturn. Further, we can believe that the fourth largest kraft chemical pulp mill in the world will happily co-exist with fishing, tourism and nature-based activities, boutique wineries, organic food producers and farming [6].

We are also asked to believe the Liberal and Labor story that Tasmania as a provider of undifferentiated bulk commodities is better than one based on the State’s distinctive and unique attributes that give businesses in tourism, fishing, wineries, organic foods, and others a competitive edge.

The consequences of choosing to believe the wrong story are serious. So what are the job facts and which story stands up?

Open letter by Buck and Joan Emberg, Co-Chairs of the Voters’ Block, Tasmanians Against the Pulpmill (TAP) to all candidates in forthcoming elections (Legislative Council, - May 09, local councils - October 09, state - March 2010, federal - 2010).

January 2009
TO: Charles/Charlotte Blog MHA (all federal, state and/or local politicians and possible candidates).
FROM:  Buck and Joan Emberg, Co-Chairs of the Voters’ Block, Tasmanians Against the Pulpmill (TAP)

Dear Ms/Mr Blog,

Do not take this letter personally, although it will probably have an effect upon you in some way, large or small.

 RALLY and MARCH - DEMOCRACY BETRAYED – TASMANIANS BETRAYED                                             ROYAL PARK LAUNCESTON Saturday May 14^th 2011 at 11.30am.        

“We’ll be flying hundreds of black flags”, said Bob McMahon TAP spokesperson.

“The flags and the choice of black as the colour of the rally is to signify those dark days in March 2007 when the great betrayal of our democracy took place.

“That was when the Pulp Mill Assessment Act, the ‘fast track’ assessment, was rubber stamped through both houses of parliament by Labor and Liberal. The only dissent was from the four Greens in the lower house and a handful of honourable independents in the upper.

“Let’s be absolutely clear as to what happened back in March 2007. The legislation was substantially written by the company which it so obscenely favours – this they have never denied – and the bill was escorted through the corridors, bar, and chambers of Parliament by a squad of lobbyists, lawyers and heavies from Gunns, the CFMEU and the logging industry.

“It was tantamount to a coup d’etat.

“That Labor and Liberal politicians and their fellow travellers in the upper house were the willing patsies of this gross abuse of parliamentary democracy should never be excused or diminished in any way,” continued McMahon.

“It was one of the most shameful episodes, perhaps THE most shameful episode, in out political history. It demonstrated a breathtaking contempt for the institution of parliamentary democracy by the very parliamentarians whose sacred duty it was to uphold.

“The great irony is that it was all for nothing,” said McMahon. “There is no pulp mill. Not a single cent of investment money has been attracted to the project in six and half years. It remains, as it always was, a grand delusion. Yet unprincipled government has wasted vast sums of public money on it, money that should have been allocated to health, education, policing, aged care etc.

“The pulp mill is over. The nightmare of an uncompetitive, world scale resource gobbling industry for an island that is not world scale, has held Tasmania back for six and a half years.

“Let us get on with what we do best in Tasmania, establishing innovative, creative, small to medium business directed at the quality end of the market.

“The pulp mill has already destroyed two premiers. As sure as night follows day it will destroy a third unless she cuts herself free from the mill insanity and embraces and articulates a positive vision for Tasmania,” concluded McMahon.

RALLY SPEAKERS

Dr Frank Nicklason, Royal Hobart Hospital and a Gunns 20.

Peter Cundall, campaigner without peer.

Lucy Landon-Lane, Pulp The Mill.

Kim Booth, Greens.

Bob McMahon, TAP spokesperson.

CONTACT: Bob McMahon 0448 547290 or 63944225

______________________________________________________________________________

3 March 2011 Joint Media Release  TAP Into A Better Tasmania (TAP) and Tasmanian Public and Environmental Health Network (TPEHN)

Community Groups TAP and TPEHN join in condemning the ‘forest principle agreement’ because it is very specifically tied to the delivery of the Gunns' Tamar Valley pulp mill.

As reported in The Australian yesterday, Bill Kelty said ‘green’ groups must strike a deal on the Gunns' Tamar Valley pulp mill or miss out on permanent protection of 565,000 hectares of native forest.

“There you have it. This is what the ‘roundtable’ negotiations have been about all along,” commented Dr Alison Bleaney of TPEHN.

“From the point of view of Gunns and the Labor Party, the forest ‘roundtable’ was about delivering the Long Reach pulp mill. From the ENGO’s side it was about delivering protection to native forest. They were the two glittering prizes up for grabs and to pretend otherwise is misleading,” said TAP spokesperson Bob McMahon.

“In order for both sides to get what they wanted it was important to exclude the community first and foremost. Why? Because it was expected that the community would be opposed to any trade-off of the sort so bluntly expressed by Kelty”, continued McMahon.

“After all, the community was going to have to pay the price for the sort of deal the forest industry negotiators had in mind. The community had to be sidelined and kept in the dark. Thus the secrecy. We were the sacrifice."

“That the blatantly undemocratic, rigged and secret ‘roundtable’ negotiations and the ‘forest principles’ that resulted (including in principle support for plantations and ‘a pulp mill’) received the enthusiastic support of the ALP is no surprise."

“That the Greens have also been enthusiastic supporters of the undemocratic negotiations as constituted, and the ‘forest principles’ that resulted from the illegitimate process, is deeply distressing for the community and incredibly damaging to the Greens themselves,” said McMahon.

“Kelty has made it abundantly clear that the success of the Gunns/ALP pulp mill is dependent on the signing of the ‘forest principles agreement’,” said Dr. Bleaney.

“Therefore, both TAP and TPEHN, demand that The Wilderness Society, Environment Tasmania and Australian Conservation Foundation either refuse to sign the agreement as it exists or insist that the Gunns Tamar Valley pulp mill be specifically excluded from the agreement as a principle."

“We expect many other community groups will join us in making this demand”.

“It is not too late for the Greens to redeem themselves either”, confirmed Bob McMahon. “They will have to stop the doublethink and unequivocally withdraw their support for the ‘forest principles’ as they stand and the illegitimate roundtable process which produced them. It is not good enough for the Greens to say they do not support the Tamar Valley pulp mill while supporting a process designed from the very beginning to deliver that very same pulp mill.

“Dr Bleaney and I want to put this bizarre chapter of Tasmanian history into context. This is a monumental issue of social justice. Should the environment groups sign up to the ‘forest principles’ deal as it currently exists it will be viewed as a great betrayal of current and future generations of Tasmanians, whose social, economic and environmental horizons will be severely diminished and restricted by the demands Gunns mill will place on our basic resources of land and water and of the huge public subsidies the mill will need in order to compete against cheaper producers in developing countries.

Contact:   

Bob McMahon 0448 547290 TAP

Dr Alison Bleaney 0417 302549  TASMANIAN PUBLIC and ENVIRONMENTAL HEALTH NETWORK

At the time of the Nov 07 federal election the Voters Block listed 15000 voters who pledged not to support any political candidate who favoured the pulp mill. Both Labor and Liberal parties supported the pulp mill whilst the Greens and several independents were strongly opposed.

Federal election results for Tasmania

In the Senate, the Greens vote reached the Senate quota barrier of 14.2% for the first time and may reach 18% or more than 50,000 as counting continues.

You can download the file 'How to vote against the pulp mill in federal elections.pdf' and take with you to the polling booth.

House of Representatives
Lyons
3 C. E. C.
2 Cassidy
1 Quin
4 Family First
6 Labor
5 Liberal

Bass
2 Wiener
4 C. E. C.
6 Labor
1 Millen
5 Family First
3 Bennett
7 Liberal

Braddon
4 Family First
6 Liberal
1 O’Halloran
5 Labor
2 Dick
3 L. D. P.

Franklin

What: Rally and march at Franklin Square, Hobart.

When: 12.30pm Saturday 17th November.

Why: To call on the elected government to stop the pulp mill. Geoff Cousins and Richard Flanagan to speak.

Organisers: The Wilderness Society

Contact Sarah by email sarah.truscott@wilderness.org.au or in the campaign centre on 03 6331 7488.

YouTube video advertising the rally. Click

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