Council for Civil Liberties condemns regulations allowing for bans on public gatherings on public land

Excerpt from New South Wales Council for Civil Liberties post, 20 June 2018:

NSW Civil Liberties Council (CCL) is appalled to learn that in 12 days, the NSW State Government will have incredibly wide powers to disperse or ban protests, rallies, and virtually any public gathering across about half of all land across the state.

On 16 March this year, the NSW State Government published the Crown Land Management Regulation 2018(NSW). Included was a provision which provided that public officials would have broad power to “direct a person” to stop “Taking part in any gathering, meeting or assembly”. The only exception provided for is “in the case of a cemetery, for the purpose of a religious or other ceremony of burial or commemoration”. Alternatively, public officials have broad discretion to affix a conspicuous sign prohibiting any gathering, meeting or assembly – again, unless the public gathering was a funeral.

Police, Local Council officials, and even so-far unspecified categories of people or government employees could soon have the power to ban people from holding public gatherings on public land. The territory where these incredibly broad powers would apply are called Crown Land - land owned by the State Government. This includes town squares, parks, roads, beaches, community halls and more.

These powers will come into effect from 1 July. If these regulations are allowed to stand, the effect will not just be that protests, rallies and demonstrations can only occur at the sufferance of police and other officials. It will be that virtually all public events will only occur with the tolerance of public officials. Our right to assemble on public land will become something less than a license. That right may temporarily be granted by public officials, but it may just as easily be withdrawn, at any time, for any reason. The penalty for defying such a ban or order to stop meeting in public could be up to $11 000……

The time to speak out against these regulations is now. CCL objects to these regulations in the strongest possible terms, and urges their immediate and unconditional repeal……

Excerpts from Crown Land Management Regulation 2018 under the Crown Land Management Act 2016:

9 Conduct prohibited in dedicated or reserved Crown land

(1) A person must not do any of the following on dedicated or reserved Crown land:

(e) remain in or on the land or any part of the land or any structure or enclosure in or on the land when reasonably requested to leave by an authorised person,  

Maximum penalty: 50 penalty units.

13 Activities that can be prohibited on Crown land by direction or notice under Part 9 of Act (1) Each of the activities specified in the following Table is prescribed for the purposes of sections 9.4 (1) (b), 9.5 (1) (b) and 9.5 (2) of the Act:

3 Holding a meeting or performance or conducting entertainment for money or consideration of any kind, or in a manner likely to cause a nuisance to any person

4 Taking part in any gathering, meeting or assembly (except, in the case of a cemetery, for the purpose of a religious or other ceremony of burial or commemoration)

6 Displaying or causing any sign or notice to be displayed

7 Distributing any circular,

Excerpt from Crown Land Management Act 2016 No 58:

1.7   Definition of “Crown land”

Subject to this Division, each of the following is Crown land for the purposes of this Act:

(a)  land that was Crown land as defined in the Crown Lands Act 1989 immediately before the Act’s repeal,

(b)  land that becomes Crown land because of the operation of a provision of this Act or a declaration made under section 4.4,

(c)  land vested, on and from the repeal of the Crown Lands Act 1989, in the Crown (including when it is vested in the name of the State).

Note.

 Clause 6 of Schedule 7 provides for certain land under Acts repealed by Schedule 8 to become Crown land under this Act. Section 1.10 then provides for this land to be vested in the Crown.

Land that will become Crown land under this Act includes land vested in the Crown that is dedicated for a public purpose. This land was previously excluded from the definition of Crown land in the Crown Lands Act 1989. See also section 1.8 (2).

Berejiklian Government stacks the deck ahead of next NSW state election

Echo NetDaily, 29 May 2018:

Nationals MLC Ben Franklin has defended new political donation laws after being accused by the Greens of ramming it through last Thursday night and providing only a week for the opposition to digest.

The new rules, say the Greens, will see ‘third party’ groups like unions, GetUp, Sea Shepherd and World Wildlife Fund see their spending caps halved to $500,000.

Additionally the new laws apply to local councils, where some will be able to spend more per voter than others, the party says.

Yet the Electoral Funding Bill 2018 ‘includes some positive measures’, including ‘the definition of prohibited donors, increased transparency and some spending caps in local government election’.

Ballina Greens MP Tamara Smith described the new laws as ‘the most undemocratic ever seen in the state’.

‘Community groups like GetUp, Sea Shepherd, World Wildlife Fund and Marriage Equality have had their funding caps slashed while the old parties have given themselves a massive windfall in both money to run elections and money received after elections,’ Ms Smith told The Echo.

‘The Greens have led the charge when it comes to supporting caps on electoral expenditure but we say that if third party environmental and social justice groups have had their spending halved why haven’t political parties?’ she added.

The Guardian, 23 May 2018:

The legislation would cap campaign spending by an advocacy group at $500,000 during the lead-up to an election, down from the current limit of up to $1.288m, which applies to both major political parties and third-party groups.

Major parties would keep the higher cap on communications spending. The caps operate from 1 October in the year before an election until election day.

The 22 Liberal, Nationals, Shooters, Fishers and Farmers and Christian Democratic 

party members of the NSW Legislative Council voting for NSW Electoral Funding Bill 2018 on 23 May 2018 were as follows:

Amato, L	Blair, N	Borsak, R
Brown, R	Clarke, D	Colless, R
Cusack, C	Fang, W	Farlow, S
Franklin, B	Green, P	Harwin, D
Khan, T	MacDonald, S	Maclaren-Jones, N
Mallard, S	Martin, T	Mason-Cox, M
Mitchell,	Nile, F	Phelps, P
Ward, P

Which resulted in the bill officially passing in both houses of the NSW Parliament on 24 May 2018.

Aboriginal elders calling for NSW Berejiklian Government to commit to expanding the youth Koori court program

The Guardian, 7 May 2018:

Aboriginal elders have called for the NSW government to commit to expanding the youth Koori court program after an evaluation found it halved the amount of time young people spent in detention. The court began as a pilot project at Parramatta children’s court in February 2015 but has not received ongoing funding. A University of Western Sydney evaluation has found it cut the average number of days spent in youth detention, as well as helping address underlying issues such as unstable accommodation, lack of engagement in education and employment, and disconnection from Aboriginal culture. Elders said it reached children who had little family support and were isolated from the community. 

Everytime someone buys a bottle of water in Australia it has consequences for a community somewhere in the world

By November 2017 Tweed Shire's est. 93,458 residents faced a water security trifecta.

Floods in the first quarter of the year had affected water quality and local infrastructure, a  tidal anomaly in August had caused saltwater to enter the Bray Park Weir, the following month Terranora Lagoon was contaminated by raw sewerage from the treatment plant and the walls of Clarrie Hall dam still needed raising to cope with urban water needs.

Water sustainability still remains an issue in 2018.

In this case it appears to be Black Mount Pty Ltd and Mt. Warning Spring Water Company's commercial water supply needs which are the main culprit.......

Echo NetDaily, 13 April 2018:

A call for the halt of water mining in the Tweed Valley has been made by NSW Greens MP and North Coast spokesperson, Dawn Walker in state parliament this week and is supported by the Tweed Water Alliance. Concerns over the impact on underground water resources, alleged poor compliance with extraction licenses and the damage caused by heavy vehicles have all been raised.

‘Water is our most precious resource and gigalitres of water beneath Tweed Valley are being sucked up and bottled for commercial profit, leaving the community high and dry with the impacts. Water mining licences are being handed out by the government without adequate monitoring and in many cases, water meters haven’t even been installed,’ said Ms Walker.

Water mining licences are controlled by the state government while work on the property and permission for truck movements are controlled by the local council.

‘We certainly support the ban,’ said Jeremy Tager, spokesperson for the Tweed 

water alliance who believes the water extraction companies are ‘operating lawlessly’.

‘Extracting water is a lose lose prospect for here and most other places. Water is taken away from local users; it creates little or no employment as most of the operators are water transporters. That means the trucks come in and get filled up and then are taken away to be bottled elsewhere.

‘They only pay a a small road contribution to drive these big trucks on rural roads that were never designed for them.’

In December 2017 the Tweed council voted to amend their LEP (local environment plan) 2014 to remove the clause that the previous council had put in to allow water extraction for bottling water in the Tweed shire. This has been sent to the state government for approval as part of the Gateway process. If the state government decide that the change can proceed then Tweed council will be able to put the LEP amendment on public display.

The state government can also request that a ‘savings clause’ be put in that would allow current applications that are waring to be assessed to be allowed.

Echonetdaily asked the state government what the time frame for responding to the Tweeds request for removing the water mining clause from the LEP was and if they would request the inclusion of a ‘savings clause’.

A spokesperson for the department of planning and environment responded stating that; ‘The department is currently in the early stages of assessing a proposal from Tweed Shire council to remove the water extraction and bottling clause to the Tweed Shire 2014 LEP.

Local extractor takes council to court

Larry Karlos, a local water extractor, is currently taking the Tweed Council to the Land and Environment court to appeal their decision not to allow them to increase the size of the trucks they use to transport water from six meters to nineteen meters.

‘The council refused the application for 19m trucks because they felt that the road was no suitable for that size truck,’ said Tweed Mayor Katie Milne.

‘Urlip Road is really narrow and in some places it is only one lane. There are also areas where it is very steep on one side and has a steep drop off on the other.

ABC News, 21 March 2018:

It's the new battle in the bush — the bottled water wars.

On one side is Australia's $800-million-a-year bottled water industry and its suppliers, on the other, rural residents who fear their most precious resource, groundwater, is being squandered.

"It's dividing the local community," said Larry Karlos, one of half a dozen water extractors in the Tweed Valley in northern New South Wales.

He's been pumping water from an aquifer beneath his property for 16 years.

But his recent bid to increase the amount he sells to bottling companies has ignited local opposition.

Fourth-generation farmer Patrick O'Brien fears his children's future is being jeopardised for the profit of the water industry.

"If they don't stop this type of thing then, you know, what's going to be left?" he told 7.30.

“What's going to left for future generations? No-one was really worried when they were trucking the water out in small amounts, but then they want more, they want more trips, they want bigger trucks."

Only a handful of NSW landowners to face court over Murray-Darling Basin water theft allegations?

ABC News, 8 March 2018:

The NSW Government will prosecute several people over alleged water theft on the Barwon-Darling, eight months after Four Corners investigated the issue.

WaterNSW has named the people it is taking to the Land and Environment Court over alleged breaches of water management rules.

They are prominent irrigator Peter Harris and his wife Jane Harris, who own a major cotton farm near Brewarrina in the state's north-west and were named in the Four Corners story.

The couple have been accused of taking water when the flow conditions did not permit it, and breaching licence and approval conditions.

Three members of another prominent family are also facing charges: cotton grower Anthony Barlow from Mungindi near Moree and Frederick and Margaret Barlow.

The Barlows have been accused of pumping during an embargo and pumping while metering equipment was not working.

WaterNSW gave false figures: Ombudsman

WaterNSW announced the prosecutions an hour before the NSW Ombudsman released a scathing report saying the agency had given the Government incorrect figures on its enforcement actions.

The state's ombudsman, Michael Barnes, found WaterNSW gave incorrect figures when it provided statistics that showed there had been a significant increase in enforcements between July 2016 and November 2017.

"The information provided to us indicated that the updated statistical information from WaterNSW that we'd published was significantly incorrect," he said.

"There had, in fact, been no referrals for prosecutions and no penalty infringement notices issued in the relevant period."

Mr Barnes said he initiated a separate investigation after his office received complaints about the figures, and he found WaterNSW had inflated the statistics.

"As part of our investigation, we confirmed with Revenue NSW that no penalty infringement notices were issued by WaterNSW in the relevant period," he said.

The ombudsman said he raised the issue with WaterNSW, which has admitted to the mistake and apologised.

Mr Barnes also said he believed the error was unintentional.

The agency's CEO, David Harris, said staff have now manually reviewed all actions taken.

"Some of the detail WaterNSW provided was incorrect and, although it was revised, it is not acceptable and we are acting to ensure it does not happen again," he said……

NSW Ombudsman, Correcting the record: Investigation into water compliance and enforcement 2007-17: A special report to Parliament under sections 26 and 31 of the Ombudsman Act 1974, 8 March 2018, Amended enforcement outcome statistics:

A brief respite in the NSW Berejiklian Government's war on the natural world

"Clearing under the Code may threaten the viability of certain threatened species at property and local landscape scale. The risk highest in overcleared landscapes where most clearing is likely to occur under the Code." [NSW Office of Environment & Heritage, "Concurrene on Land Management (Native Vegetation) Code", August 2017, p. 3]

Sometime in 2017 a document was prepared for the NSW Minister for Environment & Heritage and Liberal MP for Vaucluse Gabrielle Upton to sign in order for increased clearing of native vegetation across New South Wales to occur.

This new land clearing policy came into effect in August of that year but faced a legal challenge.

The Coffs Coast Advocate, 9 March 2018:

THE Land and Environment Court has delivered a massive blow to the NSW Government by ruling its land clearing laws invalid because they were made unlawfully.

The Nature Conservation Council (NCC) launched a legal challenge to the codes last November arguing Primary Industries Minister Niall Blair failed to obtain concurrence from Environment Minister Gabrielle Upton before making the codes, as is required by law.

This morning the government conceded this was the case and NCC chief executive Kate Smolski was was quick to pounce.

"Today's ruling is an embarrassing admission of failure by the government and a great victory for the rule of law and the thousands of people who have supported us in taking this action,” she said.

"It is deeply troubling that the government disregarded the important oversight role of the Environment Minister when making environmental laws but we are even more concerned about the harmful content of the laws themselves.

"By the government's own assessment they will lead to a spike in clearing of up to 45 per cent and expose threatened wildlife habitat to destruction including 99 per cent of identified koala habitat on private land.

"Premier Berejiklian must act now to prevent further plundering of our forests, woodlands and water supplies by scrapping these laws and making new ones that actually protect the environment.”…..

The NSW Government is yet to issue a statement on the decision.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Nature Conservation Council (NCC)

Media Release, 9 March 2017:

Court finds NSW Government land-clearing laws invalid

The Land and Environment Court today ruled the NSW Government’s land-clearing laws invalid because they were made unlawfully.

“The government has bungled the introduction of one of its signature pieces of legislation, and in the process demonstrates its careless disregard for nature in NSW,” Nature Conservation Council CEO Kate Smolski said.

“Today’s ruling is an embarrassing admission of failure by the Berejiklian government and a great victory for the rule of law and the thousands of people who have supported us in taking this action.”

The Nature Conservation Council, represented by public interest environmental lawyers EDO NSW, launched legal challenge against the government’s land-clearing codes last November.

NCC had argued through its barristers Jeremy Kirk SC and David Hume the codes were invalid because the Primary Industries Minister failed to obtain concurrence of the Environment Minister before making the codes, as is required by law. The government today has conceded this was indeed the case.

“It is deeply troubling that the government disregarded the important oversight role of the Environment Minister when making environmental laws, but we are even more concerned about the harmful content of the laws themselves,” Ms Smolski said.

“By the government’s own assessment, they will lead to a spike in clearing of up to 45% and expose threaten wildlife habitat to destruction, including 99% of identified koala habitat on private land.

“These laws were made against the advice of the scientific community and against the wishes of the vast majority of the many thousands of people who made submissions.

“It would be completely cynical for the government to immediately remake these laws without first correcting their many flaws and including environmental protections the community wants and the science says we need.

“Premier Berejiklian must act now to prevent further plundering of our forests, woodlands and water supplies by scrapping these laws and making new ones that actually protect the environment.”

Ms Smolski pledged to continue the campaign to overturn weak land-clearing laws.

“As the state’s peak environment organization, we will do everything we can to expose the damage of land clearing and will not stop until we have laws that protect nature,” she said.

“These laws are a matter of life or death for wildlife. More than 1000 plant and animal species are at risk of extinction in this state, including the koala and 60 per cent of all our native mammals.

“Land clearing is the main threat to many of these animals, and the laws this government introduced unlawfully are pushing them closer to the brink.

“It is regrettable that we had to take the government to court to make it abide by its own laws, but it demonstrates the critical role organisations like ours play in our democracy.”

Media Release, 2 March 2018:

Environment Minister knew 99% of koala habitat would be exposed to land clearing by contentious new laws, FIO document shows

A document obtained under freedom of information laws shows the Berejiklian government knew its new land clearing laws would cause extensive harm to wildlife habitat but pressed ahead with the changes anyway.

“This is damning evidence that the Environment Minister approved these new laws knowing they would expose 99% of identified koala habitat on private land to clearing,” NCC CEO Kate Smolski said.

“The document also shows the Minister was warned the laws could cause a 45% spike in land clearing and that they would mostly benefit very large agribusinesses that could clear land on a massive scale, not smaller enterprises and farming communities across the state.

“It shows what we have suspected all along – environment policy in NSW is being dictated by the National Party and the powerful agribusiness interests the party represents.

“Minister Upton knew these laws were very bad for threatened species and bushland, yet she approved them anyway. This is a disgrace.”

The document, obtained by EDO NSW for the Nature Conservation Council, was prepared by the Office of Environment and Heritage for the Environment Minister and outlined the consequences of Ms Upton agreeing to land-clearing codes proposed by Primary Industries Minister Niall Blair.

Key warnings in the document include:

* “The regulatory changes will further increase agricultural clearing by between 8% and 45% annually.” (Page 3)

* Clearing under the code risks: “Removing key habitat for threatened species, including koala habitat (less than 1% of identified koala habitat in NSW is protected from clearing under the Code)” and “Increasing vulnerability of threatened ecological communities”. (Page 6)

* If unchecked “such clearing could destroy habitats, cause soil and water quality impacts”. (Page 5)

* “The main benefits are likely to be private benefits for large farming operations which broadscale clear under the Code.” (Page 6)

“These are terrible laws that put our wildlife at risk,” Ms Smolski said. “Premier Berejiklian should act immediately to protect the thousands of hectares of koala habitat at risk by exempting sensitive areas from code-based clearing. “In the longer term, she should go back to the drawing board and draft new laws that protect our precious wildlife and bushland.”

Download the FOI document here. 

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Snapshots from NSW Office of Environment & Heritage, "Concurrence on Land Management (Native Vegetation) Code", August 2017:

UPDATE

The respite ended before it really began………

The Guardian, 11 March 2018:

But the government made no delay remaking the laws, announcing on Saturday it had been completed.

“The remade code is identical to the previous one and is an integral part of the new land management framework which gives landowners the tools and certainty they need,” said David Witherdin, the CEO of Local Land Services, which oversees clearing under the codes.

The move was condemned by the NCC.

FACT CHECK: Port of Yamba-Clarence River cruise ship and international cruise ship terminal proposal

In online debates concerning the NSW Government's proposal to make the Port of Yamba an official cruise ship destination and possibly build an international cruise ship terminal I have noticed a few misconceptions creeping in - so this post is a brief fact check.

The misconceptions are coloured red.

* The “MV Caledonian Sky” cruise ship is smaller than the “Island Trader” cargo ship and not much bigger than the Manly Ferry.

“Caledonian Sky” at 4,200 gross tonnage, dead weight of 645t, 90.6m length, 15.3m width, 4.25 maximum draft is over twice the size of the “Island Trader” which is 485 gross tonnage, dead weight of 242t, 38.8m long, 9m wide and maximum draft of 2.8m.

The four Manly ferries are 70 metres in length, 12.5 metres wide, with draughts of 3.3 metres and displace 1,140 tonnes and, only operate in a deep water harbour.

* Cruise ships already come into the Clarence River.

There hasn’t been an ocean-going cruise ship carrying passengers enter the Clarence River in a good many years. There is some anecdotal information that one small cruise ship of indeterminate size entered the Clarence River sometime in the 1990s, but that appears to have been both the first and the last time that a local resident can recall its passage which ended with this vessel scraping its bottom on "Dirrangun" reef as it left. 

The last regular passenger service from Sydney to Port of Yamba ended in the mid to late 1950s when the small steamers operating on the NSW North Coast run were withdrawn.

Despite local media reports to the contrary, the “Caledonian Sky” has not entered the Port of Yamba in the past – this cruise ship’s scheduled visit in October 2018 will be her maiden voyage into the Clarence.

* There is not going to be any dredging of the Clarence River entrance or estuary if Port of Yamba becomes a cruise ship destination and an international cruise ship terminal is built.

A representative of the NSW Dept. of Transport raised eyebrows in apparent astonishment when I mentioned that particular belief. Although diplomatically silent the implication was clear - dredging would have to occur.

* Medium to small cruise ships will not have a problem entering the Clarence River because they will have a pilot on board.

In 2015-16 there were 18 ship visits to Port of Yamba, none were cruise ships and the majority of vessels piloted into the Clarence River came in for ship repair at Harwood Island.

However, even with a pilot on board a cruise ship may ground in a relatively narrow navigation channel. The “Regal Princess” grounded in Cairns Harbour in March 2001 as it sailed a 90m wide & est. 8.3 m deep navigation channel with a pilot aboard. The subsequent official investigation found that the dimensions of the Cairns port channel were too restrictive for the 32.25 m wide “Regal Princess”.

Because the Clarence River estuary is strongly tidal the position and width of its main navigation channel can vary and the Yamba-Iluka bar at the river entrance is problematic. 

The bar crossing appears to have been last dredged in 2004.

An Australian Navy tug 29m long, 8m wide with a draft of est. 3.4m grounded on the bar at the river mouth in October 1946 and from time to time cargo ships entering or leaving the Clarence have temporarily grounded when sand builds up outside the river entrance.

* Having cruise ships and a cruise terminal will raise personal incomes in the Lower Clarence Valley.

This argument is often put forward by governments pushing coastal development proposals.

St. John's (population over 108,000) - a regional port in Canada popular with small cruise ships - is currently conducting its own investigation into economic returns from cruise ship visits, because it was told this year that the average amount of money spent onshore by a cruise passenger can be as low as $28.20 and for a crew member as low as $20.79. Note: The Canadian dollar is roughly on par with the Australian dollar.

International cruise lines are usually the source of any financial information on passenger spending and industry observers tend to think that industry figures may be inflated. So it is not surprising to find one independent report published in 2015 states that passenger and crew spending in Cairns was 22 per cent lower than the figure supplied by Cruise Lines International Association (CLIA) a group representing the interests of cruise lines.

By the industry's own optimistic calculations, if all “Caledonian Sky” passengers come ashore then they should at a minimum spend in total between $4,750 and $5,937 during the five or so hours the ship is moored on the river in October next year.

Except that the cruise ship’s itinerary shows these approximately 114 passengers will have both breakfast and lunch on board ship before sailing away and, in the approx. three hours in between meals, will take a walk up to the Yamba Lighthouse at no charge, visit the Yamba Museum which has a gold coin entrance fee or cross to Iluka to wander the Nature Reserve up to Woody Head and back which is fee free - although it may be possible that the ship rents a mini-bus to transport passengers to Iluka wharf for return to the ship.

However, even then this hardly lives up to the cruise ship industry’s boast that each passenger spends on average $200-$250 a day in Australian regional ports.

* If ships the size of the "Rainbow Warrior" can navigate to the Harwood slipway then quite a few of the small similar size cruise vessels can safely do the same.

The second “Rainbow Warrior” was a yacht with 555 gross tonnage, 55m long, 9m wide with a draft of 3m. The third and current “Rainbow Warrior” has 855 gross tonnage, deadweight 180t, is 57.9m long, 11.3m wide and has a maximum draft of 5m.

To date I cannot find any cruise ships of similar size operating on the Australian east coast ocean route.

All east coast ships in P&O’s fleet are large ships, as are Holland America’s fleet. Princess Cruises’ ships are all large and, the  Royal Caribbean’s fleet is also composed of large ships. Ditto Carnival’s fleet and Celebrity Cruises’ ships. Norwegian Cruise Line, MCS Cruises and Cunard Line fleets contain only large vessels. While Oceania Cruises’ fleet is composed of somewhat smaller ships, but with drafts nudging 6m to 7m it probably wouldn't consider entering the Clarence . By comparison Noble Caledonia’s single cruise ship on the east coast is the ship with the shallowest draft found to date, but it may have difficulty coming over the bar in October 2018 and/or with swinging around to depart the estuary.

* Cruise lines are philanthropic - they will help people and the environment by giving money to a local cause.

Some but not all cruise lines do occasionally give money to institutions and causes within ports they regularly visit. It is often looked upon by port communities as 'guilty giving'. 

For example, in 2014 one of Carnival Cruise Line's ships severely damaged a section of pristine reef in the Cayman Islands. The next year the Carnival Foundation announced it was giving a $75,000 donation to the Cayman Islands-based Central Caribbean Marine Institute toward restoration of an ecologically distinct and globally endangered coral species. 

The Cayman Islands government had to step in before the cruise line would hand over $100,000 to the Cayman Islands National Trust towards the Magic Reef Restoration Project to cover the 11,000 sq feet of endangered coral that the "Carnival Magic" crushed.

If the international cruise ship industry genuinely had a social conscience then there wouldn't be reports like "Sweat Ships" (2002) which looks at the abuse of workers' rights aboard cruise ships.

* Modern cruising is really a form of eco-tourism

There is nothing inherently ecological about the design and functioning of a modern cruise ship. 

Modern cruise ships:
* predominately still use bunker fuel when underway and diesel/gas power when berthed if there is no dedicated shore electricity supply available to them; 
* give off emissions when these fossil fuels are burned and these emissions can and do sometimes exceed permissible levels of air pollution;
* emit underwater noise which disturbs whales and dolphins;
* are usually noisy when moored or berthed due to the need to generate power and/or provide entertainment for passengers;
* sewerage and waste water storage systems can sometimes malfunction or fail; 
* have been known to illegally dump sewerage whilst in port;
* will sometimes dump chlorinated swimming pool water overboard;
* sometimes illegally discharge oily waste into the ocean;
* will sometimes have issues with unlawful garbage disposal on some voyages; and
* anti-fouling paint on their hulls leaches into the waters at wharfs and affects the surrounding marine ecosystem.

* The state government will never be able to dredge the bar or the river because of Native Title.

Yes, Native Title covers the Clarence River from just below Ulmarra to the river mouth and out past the two breakwaters where it creates a 350m buffer around "Dirrangan" reef, as well as a narrower ocean water boundary out from the shoreline starting at Woody Head and going on down past Wooli.

Any cruise ship approaching the entrance to the Clarence River would be sailing in waters covered by Native Title.

However, Native Title rights are non-exclusive and so contain a number of qualifications. Therefore people of goodwill across the Clarence Valley and the wider Northern Rivers region will need to speak up in support of the Yaegl People's stated position if the Berejiklian Government decides to proceed with its international cruise ship terminal proposal.

Excerpt from Native Title Determination Yaegl People #2 Part B:

General qualifications on native title rights and interests

8. Native title does not exist in:

(a) Minerals as defined in the Mining Act 1992 (NSW) and the Mining Regulation 2010 (NSW); and

(b) Petroleum as defined in the Petroleum (Onshore) Act 1991 (NSW) and the Petroleum (Submerged Lands) Act 1982 (NSW).

9. The native title rights and interests described in paragraphs 6 and 7 do not confer:

(a) possession, occupation, use and enjoyment to the exclusion of all others;

(b) any right to control access to, or use of, the Determination Area.

10. The native title rights and interests in the Determination Area are subject to and exercisable in accordance with:

(a) the laws of the State of New South Wales and of the Commonwealth;

(b) the traditional laws acknowledged and traditional customs observed by the Yaegl People; and

(c) the terms of any Indigenous Land Use Agreement, which may be registered by the National Native Title Tribunal in respect of any part of the Determination Area made after the making of this Determination…….

Other interest which existed at the time Native Title over “Dirrangun” was determined are protected.

10. Other interests generally

(a) Rights and interests, including licences and permits, granted by the Crown in right of the State of New South Wales, the Clarence Valley Council or of the Commonwealth pursuant to statute or under regulations made pursuant to such legislation.

(b) Rights and interests held by reason of the force and operation of the laws of the State of New South Wales or of the Commonwealth.

(c) Rights and interests of members of the public arising under common law or statute including, but not limited to the following:

(i) any public right to fish;

(ii) the public right to navigate; and

(iii) the international right of innocent passage through the territorial sea.

(d) So far as is confirmed pursuant to section 18 of the Native Title (New South Wales) Act as at the date of the Determination, any existing public access to and enjoyment of:

 (i) waterways;

(ii) the bed and banks or foreshores of waterways;

(iii) coastal waters;

(iv) beaches;

(v) stock routes; and

(vi) areas that were public places at the end of 31 December 1993.

(e) The rights of:

(i) an employee, agent or instrumentality of the State of New South Wales;

(ii) an employee, agent or instrumentality of the Commonwealth;

(iii) an employee, agent or instrumentality of any Local Government Authority, to access the Determination Area and carry out actions as required in the performance of his/ her or its statutory or common law duty.

Sea claim judgment: Yaegl People #2 v Attorney General of New South Wales [2017] FCA 993 (31 August 2017)