Perhaps Australian Liberal Prime Minister, Scott Morrison, along with NSW Nationals Deputy Premier & Minister for Regional New South Wales, John Barilaro, might like to ask those 6,903 Northern NSW residents with a serious disability how they feel about their relegation to second-class citizenship in the middle of a global pandemic?

 

The Guardian, 27 September 2021:

The disability royal commission says governments should not lift lockdowns until all people with disability have had the “opportunity to be fully vaccinated” – even if states and territories hit the 70% fully vaccinated threshold.

In a scathing draft report handed down on Monday morning, the royal commission found the federal department of health’s approach to vaccinating people with disabilities had been “seriously deficient”.

People with disability living in shared accommodation, or “group homes”, were included in phase 1a of the vaccine rollout but then quietly “deprioritised” in favour of aged care residents.

The commission is now concerned people with disabilities will remain unprotected as states such as New South Wales and Victoria look to ease restrictions when 70% of the adult population is fully vaccinated next month.

“In our view, it would be grossly unfair, indeed unconscionable, if any people with disability who have not been given the opportunity to be fully vaccinated by the time the 70% threshold is reached are denied the freedoms available to people who have been fully vaccinated,” the report said.

“The unfairness is magnified once it is accepted – as it must be – that increased freedoms for the fully vaccinated increase the risk of contracting Covid-19 for people who are not fully vaccinated.

“It is one thing for people who choose not to be vaccinated to be denied these freedoms; it is quite another for people who have been denied the opportunity to be fully vaccinated also to be denied those freedoms.”

The report said the federal government should “use its best endeavours” to ensure no state or territory “significantly eases restrictions” when the 70% threshold is met unless all people with disability “have and appreciate that they have the opportunity to be fully vaccinated”.

The commission singled out national disability insurance scheme (NDIS) participants, people living in residential disability accommodation and people with intellectual disability as key groups. It said all active disability support workers should also be fully vaccinated before lockdowns are lifted…..

Among all NDIS participants, not just those in group homes, 39.9% had been fully vaccinated at 15 September……

As at 30 June 2021 in Northern NSW, the National Disability Insurance Scheme (NDIS) had 6,903 active participants (ranging from children to older adults) with diagnosed disabilities which included; Acquired Brain Injury, Autism, Cerebral Palsy, Developmental Delay, Global Developmental Delay, Hearing Impairment, Intellectual Disability, Multiple Sclerosis, as well as other Neurological, Physical, Sensory & Speech disabilities.

Perhaps Australian Prime Minister & Liberal MP Scott Morrison and NSW Deputy Premier, Nationals MP & Minister for Regional New South Wales, John Barilaro, might like to ask those 6,903 Northern NSW residents how they feel about their relegation to second-class citizenship in the middle of a global pandemic?

Have NSW Premier & Liberal MP Gladys Berejiklian and Deputy Premier & Nationals MP for Monaro John Barilaro closed their ears to an earnest cross party plea to protect the residents of Ballina, Byron Bay, Clarence Valley, Kyogle, Richmond and Tweed Valley local government areas from COVID-19 infected travellers from Greater Sydney?

The question posed in the heading to this post appears to be yes - apparently neither Liberal leader Gladys Berejiklian nor National leader John Barilaro have listened to our concerns.

On or about 25 October fully vaccinated people - who as statistics demonstrate are still capable of becoming infected and infectious - will be free to travel into regional New South Wales. While from 1 December 2021 it is likely that even unvaccinated people will apparently be able to travel around the state.

Because on 27 September 2021 the NSW Premier & Liberal MP for Willoughby Gladys Berejiklian announced a three stage plan to open up the state once average full vaccination reaches 70 to 80 per cent of the total state population of those 16 years of age and older aka the ‘adult’ population.

The plan's alleged aim is that; Only fully vaccinated people and those with medical exemptions will have access to the freedoms allowed under the Reopening NSW roadmap.

At 70 per cent; Stay-at-home orders for fully vaccinated people will be lifted. Fully vaccinated residents will be allowed to have up to five people in their homes and the reopening of hospitality venues with a booking cap of 20 people per booking, retail, hairdressing and gyms will be allowed to re-open with tight density limits. This is expected to occur on or after 11 October 2021.

At 80 per cent; Fully vaccinated residents will be able to freely travel to the regions, they will be able have up to 10 people visit their home, participate in community sport, and access hospitality venues (where drinking while standing up will be allowed indoors). All premises will operate at 1 person per 4sqm indoors, and 1 person per 2sqm outdoors and, the limit of fully vaccinated guests for weddings and funerals will be lifted. Customer caps for personal services such as hairdressers will also be removed. This is expected to occur on or after 25 October 2021.

From 1 December 2021; Further changes will be introduced including all venues moving to the 2sqm rule, masks will not be required indoors at offices, indoor pools and nightclubs can reopen, and unvaccinated people will have greater freedoms. [my yellow highlighting]

The main problems with this staged plan is that: (i) a state-wide full COVID-19 vaccination average does not reliably denote a safe level of personal or local community immunity from infection, hospitalisation and/or death from this virulent disease; and (ii) not every region or local government area in NSW is likely to have reached 70 or 80 per cent of their resident population fully vaccinated by 11 to 25 October 2021.

Percentage of residents aged 15 years and over fully vaccinated against COVID-19 in North East New South Wales, according to the Australian Government Dept. of Health

As at 19 September 2021:

Ballina – 49% of a LGA ‘adult’ population of 37,124 (full resident population is est. 45,217 in 2020)

Byron Bay – 34.9% of LGA ‘adult’ population of 29,052 (full resident population is est. 35,773 in 2020)

Clarence Valley – 41.5% of LGA ‘adult’ population of 42,953 (full resident population is est. 51,730 in 2020)

Kyogle – 41.2% of LGA ‘adult’ population of 7,285 (full resident population is est. 8,788 in 2020)

Lismore – 38.5% of LGA ‘adult’ population of 35,892 (full resident population is est. 43,667 in 2020)

Richmond Valley – 41.8% of LGA ‘adult’ population of 18,938 (full resident population is est. 23,490 in 2020)

Tweed – 45% of LGA ‘adult’ population of 80,493 (full resident population is est. 98,382 in 2020)

NOTE:

*2021 LGA ‘adult’ population figures was calculated by the Australian Government based on the sreet address recorded for persons enrolled in Medicare.

**2020 resident populations estimations can be found at: https://profile.id.com.au/

BACKGROUND

NORTH COAST VOICES, FRIDAY, 24 SEPTEMBER 2021

All five NE NSW Nationals, Liberal, Labor & Greens MPs ask Premier Berejiklian and Deputy-Premier Barilaro to adjust COVID-19 public health order by restricting non-essential travel to the region until it too reaches the 70% fully vaccinated target

Team Morrison and The Voter in 2021

 

The Shot, 21 September 2021:

Great Scott: the grand narrative of Scott Morrison

...On one end of the scale, we have the people who believe the entire charade of politics is made up and if it’s not made up then the “mainstreameeja” must all be in on it with them, sort of like fake moon landers but without the flags. On the other end are the people who let information flow over them like a long shower, obliviously taking it all in, the type who truly believe Scott Morrison once saved a lady from near death on a Sydney beach because 2GB said so…..

What Team Morrison want you to think over and above anything else, above the policy and the pressers and the talk of Oh-My-God nuclear submarines and the twitter chatter, what they want you to think when you think of Scott Morrison, when you talk to your friends in the supermarket checkout or swap the goss in your Facebook groups, when you go to vote, they want you to think that Scott Morrison is a strong leader, a hero of our times. They want you to feel it and know it deep to your bones.

They want you to think that Scott Morrison is our own powerful leader, the one that will lead Australia out of this mess, and they want that image embedded deep down into your subconscious, without any annoying detail to bother you or meddle with your own private photo album.

How they do that is by casting a vast, barely tangible net up into the sky, a grand narrative net, one that says: “Scott Morrison is strong. Scott Morrison is a hero. Scott Morrison will save you.”

The way they keep that imagery afloat is by pumping it full of air and reinforcing it all the time, constantly, every day of every week of every month in every way. Scott is strong. Scott is our hero. Scott will lead us all to safety.

Think of Scott Morrison holding up a plane in Kabul to save a woman and her baby. Or at least that’s what the Daily Telegraph told us. I’m going to ignore the dry retching noises coming from the audience, you ungrateful cynics. What’s that? It didn’t happen? Of course, it didn’t happen.

Sometimes, the truth has nothing to do with pumping the net up. Sometimes it does. As De Niro snaps in Wag The Dog,“What difference does it make if it’s true?” If you learn anything from our imaginary TED Talk, learn that reality, like detail, has no real place in the political grand narrative…...

The Sydney Morning Herald, 23 September 2021:

Scott Morrison’s momentous national security announcement last week should have been a turning point for him and the government. Instead, because he delayed making one tough call, leaving himself open to accusations of backstabbing and deception from a great friend and ally, he robbed himself of a much-needed reset.

A few days later he again squibbed what should have been a straightforward decision involving a senior colleague, on a matter which goes to the heart of transparency and probity.

The way Scott Morrison dealt with the French, and Christian Porter, says much about his management style.CREDIT:DIONNE GAIN

Both were about trust. Both provided insights into the most troubling aspects of Morrison’s character and management style. Both have left a very bad smell.

The first was the big-bang unveiling of the new Anglospheric alliance – upending decades of diplomatic endeavours in Asia – which included the planned acquisition of nuclear submarines from the US or the UK.

By waiting until the night before the announcement to advise President Emmanuel Macron (Morrison’s office refuses to answer when asked if they actually spoke) he was torpedoing the $90-billion contract with France for conventional submarines, he guaranteed they went nuclear.

The second sounded like a transmission from a parallel universe. Morrison presented Christian Porter’s resignation from Cabinet as industry minister after refusing to disclose names of anonymous donors as the action of a man upholding standards.

At the end of March, Morrison could have, should have, relegated Porter to the backbench until his personal problems were resolved, rather than try to maintain the fiction the issue was fixed by his removal as attorney-general.

The fiction was compounded after Porter released his updated register of interests, then said he could not name donors to a blind trust helping pay the costs of his defamation suit against the ABC and journalist Louise Milligan over the airing of historic rape allegations, which Porter vehemently denied.

Desperate to get some clear air for his major strategic announcement, soon befouled by the French, Morrison had tried to buy time by asking his department head, Phil Gaetjens, to advise on the bleeding obvious – whether Porter had conformed with the ministerial code of conduct.

Then on Sunday afternoon, without waiting for Gaetjens, Morrison hastily called a press conference to announce Porter had upheld those standards by opting to resign from the ministry.

He could have, should have, said Porter’s actions did not conform to the high standards expected of a member of his government and sacked him. But he didn’t. He also said Porter had disclosed the amount he had received. He hadn’t.

Incredibly, when asked whether Porter should remain in Parliament while in receipt of the money (given the disclosure rules which apply to all parliamentarians, requiring them to fess up to everything including freebie footy tickets), Morrison protested that had nothing to do with him because he was no longer Porter’s boss.

Of course. He is only the Prime Minister, the leader of the government and the leader of the Liberal Party…..

The Australian, Newspoll, 19 September 2021:

Cartoon of the Week

Alister Lockhart

Cartoon of the Week

Matt Golding

That day in August 2021 when Australia 'jumped the shark'*

On Saturday 28 August 2021, as the SARS-CoV-2 Delta Variant gradually spreads across the continent and, infections along with deaths continue to grow daily by epidemic-level numbers in Australia's most populous east coast state, this appeared in mainstream and social media....

The Sydney Morning Herald, 28 August 2021

Now that message may be close to the boastfully Pentecostal heart of Australian Prime Minister & Liberal Party MP for Cook Scott John Morrison, as well as in line with the political message he has been pushing since the beginning of the global COVID-19 pandemic in 2020. 

In fact Morrison has become quite insistent in the last week or so - in print and television interviews as well as on his feet in the House of Representatives - and like the ACL he glosses over the very real difficulties predicted by transitioning to very low public health restrictions based solely on a national vaccination percentage.

However, those difficulties stubbornly remain.......

On Saturday 28 August 2021 NSW Health recorded 1,218 new locally acquired cases of COVID-19 in the 24 hours to 8pm that night, another 8 people had died from COVID-19 infections, the number of COVID-19 cases admitted to NSW hospitals had risen to 813 with 126 people in intensive care and 54 of these required ventilation.

At Day 76 the state's public hospital system is feeling the strain after a prolonged infection surge and despite a COVID-19 'community care' system at least 8 people with COVID-19 have died in their homes.

Added to this locally acquired Delta Variant infections is still escaping into the regions and out of its state borders - the latest being two truck drivers who travelled from NSW through three other states before their infectious status was recognised.

The U.S. influenced hard-right Australian Christian Lobby (ACL) aka The Centre for Human Dignity  message is simplistic and dangerous during this Delta Variant Outbreak. Because it is targeted  at est. 52.1% of the population who state an affiliation to a Christian religion, in the hope that they will put pressure on state premiers and MPs to do the bidding of the ACL:

Take action today

Using the form below, please write an urgent email to your Premier or Chief Minister and your State MPs – it will only take a couple of minutes. Some wording has been provided for you, but feel free to adjust it as you see fit. Be concise and respectful.

As always

The salutation at the start and your name at the end will both be appended automatically. Please don't add these to the letter below, eg please do not address the email “Dear MP's name”.

When you complete your name and address in the box below, your letter will be directed to your Premier or Chief Minister and your State MPs.

Right now around 10,000 people have already used ACL's 'action' webpage as requested. According to ACL's website in February 2020 it claimed a membership of 170,000 individuals who are "seeking to bring a Christian influence to politics".  By 2021 it was claiming 175,000, however the only verifiable membership figure is the 5-member board whose names are currently concealed "Due to security concerns".

The misleading ACL message about the advisability of living with ongoing epidemic levels of COVID-19 because it restores our "freedoms" is not one supported by science or the majority of Australian medical/epidemiology experts. 

Indeed, Doherty Institute modelling suggests that even at best case scenario,  if the ACL gets its way then within 3-6mths of ‘opening up the economy’ at a 70% national vaccination rate, an est. 1,983 deaths are likely to occur including the deaths of 685 vaccinated people.

Encouraging people to ignore determining risk of infection, chronic illness or death for themselves and members of their family, on the basis of an alleged 'shared' Christian faith with the ACL, is a step too far.

That excerpts of this warped message was even published by a supposedly secular national Nine Entertainment newsprint and online asset was really 'jumping the shark'.

NOTE:
* 'Jumping the shark'. Colloquial expression meaning to lose both integrity and the plot.

Prime Minister Morrison may no longer be able to successfully hide politically inconvenient advice/facts from the national electorate

The Saturday Paper, 14 August 2021:

The prime minister may no longer be able to use a special one-man cabinet committee to so readily conceal government advice from public view, after a judge rejected it as a way to keep national cabinet’s deliberations secret.

Contrary to the Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet’s insistence, a ruling by Justice Richard White in the Administrative Appeals Tribunal (AAT) confirmed that all working documents for the meetings of federal, state and territory leaders are accessible under freedom of information law.

The government cannot cover them retrospectively by taking them to federal cabinet either, because their legal status is based on their purpose when they are created.

The ruling potentially has implications beyond national cabinet because of the mechanism Prime Minister Scott Morrison used to extend federal cabinet’s secrecy provisions. That mechanism is the cabinet office policy committee, or COPC.

Since creating it in 2019, Morrison has used this committee, of which he is the only permanent member, to extend cabinet confidentiality over anything he wants shielded from public view.

He simply declares particular meetings to be configurations of the policy committee and asserts cabinet secrecy over their deliberations. This is how he claimed cabinet secrecy when the old Council of Australian Governments was renamed “national cabinet” last year.

But Justice White ruled that simply calling national cabinet a federal cabinet committee did not make it one. He confirmed that a cabinet committee featured members of a single cabinet, from a single government and parliament. While he did not rule out external members, he found that having one federal cabinet minister was not enough.

It’s expected the senate’s Covid-19 inquiry will now seek to have numerous documents handed over, after various departments first refused access to them, citing cabinet secrecy via COPC. [my yellow highlighting]

Justice White was ruling on an application to the AAT by independent senator Rex Patrick, made after the prime minister’s department rejected two freedom of information (FOI) requests last year.

“Fundamentally, what he’s done, is to create a device that he hopes will bring all these entities under the umbrella. But it is a device and it’s an illusory device.”

Read the full article here.

On 8 April 2020, the Senate resolved to establish a Select Committee on COVID-19 to inquire into the Australian Government’s response to the COVID-19 pandemic. 

Thus far public hearings have been held between 23 April 2020 and 31 July 2021 and two interim reports have been produced to date. This Inquiry is due to present its final report on or before 30 June 2022.

The committee has not set a due date for submissions and has decided it will consider submissions provided throughout the inquiry. Submissions can be sent using the Senate's online submission system or they can be emailed to the committee.

Meme of the Week and Image of the Week

 

via 

@Biggy1883

Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison leaving COVID-19 press conference, IMAGE: Brisbane Times,13 July 2021

These days they are singing about their prime minister in Australia - feel free to join in

Well @MrDenmore it's done. I think this song's called "He Doesn't" oh and i just STOLE a Men at Work chorus to be an utter bastard. Coz it fitted nicely. Poetic license. Parody not plagiarism pic.twitter.com/UJAiF975QQ

— Glenno and Ruben (@mad6duck) July 1, 2021

Lyrics for "The Ballad of Scotty" aka "He Doesn't" courtesy of @MrDenmore 

 

I made a song out of all the hashtags & nicknames for Scott Morrison.
According to legend, if you play the song 3 times, he will be conjured from hiding and start DOING HIS JOB#ScottyFromMarketing #UnderTheDoona #MorrisonLockdown #auspol #COVID19Aus #ScottyDoesNothing pic.twitter.com/bYv96omfh7

— Nathleigh (@Nathleigh) July 1, 2021

 

The world is losing patience with the Australian Liberal-Nationals Coalition Government - Part 2

THEN

The face that the Morrison Government was showing the world....

Australian Government, Dept. of Agriculture, Water and the Environment, Australia's World Heritage, excerpt:

Australia is a member of the UNESCO World Heritage Committee, securing a seat from 2017 to 2021. The Committee consists of 21 members, elected every two years from the 193 countries that are a party to the World Heritage Convention.

The Committee makes decisions on World Heritage property nominations and state of conservation matters worldwide. It plays a vital role in the protection and celebration of natural and cultural sites around the world that hold Outstanding Universal Value. Some sites on the World Heritage List include the Great Wall of China, the Lascaux Caves of France, Machu Pichu, the Galapagos Islands, the Pyramids of Giza and the Tropical Rainforests of Borneo.

Australia has 19 sites inscribed on the World Heritage List, including ico nic sites such as Sydney Opera House, Uluru-Kata Tjuta, Kakadu, the Royal Exhibition Building in Melbourne, our mammal fossil sites at Riversleigh and Naracoorte, and the Great Barrier Reef – places that are vital to the cultural, social and economic fabric of our nation. Australia has more natural World Heritage sites than any other country. [my yellow highlighting]

Australia was a founding member of the World Heritage Convention and was last on the World Heritage Committee from 2007-2011. During this Committee term Australia led the development of the Convention’s Strategic Action Plan.

Our membership of the Committee allows us to share our extensive experience in managing our natural and cultural heritage, including by assisting other countries to prepare World Heritage nominations and build their capacity to manage sites.

During our 2017 – 2021 term, Australia will work to strengthen the operation of the Committee, placing emphasis on the effective management of existing properties, and encouraging greater geographic balance in the list and more focus on listing natural places of Outstanding Universal Value.......

The face the Berejiklian Government was showing the world.... 

NSW Department of Planning, Industry and Environment, Greater Blue Mountains Area, 3 September 2019:

The Greater Blue Mountains Area was inscribed on the World Heritage List in 2000 in recognition of its significant natural values. It possesses unique plants and animals that relate an extraordinary story of the evolution of Australia's distinctive eucalypt vegetation and its associated communities.....

The Greater Blue Mountains Area World Heritage Advisory Committee advises on matters relating to the protection, conservation, presentation and management of the Greater Blue Mountains Area, helping to fulfil Australia’s obligations under the World Heritage Convention.

The NSW National Parks and Wildlife Service manages the 8 reserves that make up the Greater Blue Mountains Area" 

What UNESCO and the media were telling the world......

United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation (UNESCO), World Heritage Council, Greater Blue Mountains Area, Description, excerpts:

Greater Blue Mountains Area

The Greater Blue Mountains Area consists of 1.03 million ha of sandstone plateaux, escarpments and gorges dominated by temperate eucalypt forest. The site, comprised of eight protected areas, is noted for its representation of the evolutionary adaptation and diversification of the eucalypts in post-Gondwana isolation on the Australian continent. Ninety-one eucalypt taxa occur within the Greater Blue Mountains Area which is also outstanding for its exceptional expression of the structural and ecological diversity of the eucalypts associated with its wide range of habitats. The site provides significant representation of Australia's biodiversity with ten percent of the vascular flora as well as significant numbers of rare or threatened species, including endemic and evolutionary relict species, such as the Wollemi pine, which have persisted in highly-restricted microsites….

Protection and Management Requirements

The GBMA is protected and managed under legislation of both the Commonwealth of Australia and the State of New South Wales. All World Heritage properties in Australia are ‘matters of national environmental significance’ protected and managed under national legislation, the Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act 1999. This Act is the statutory instrument for implementing Australia’s obligations under a number of multilateral environmental agreements including the World Heritage Convention. By law, any action that has, will have or is likely to have a significant impact on the World Heritage values of a World Heritage property must be referred to the responsible Minister for consideration. Substantial penalties apply for taking such an action without approval. Once a heritage place is listed, the Act provides for the preparation of management plans which set out the significant heritage aspects of the place and how the values of the site will be managed. [my yellow highlighting]

Importantly, this Act also aims to protect matters of national environmental significance, such as World Heritage properties, from impacts even if they originate outside the property or if the values of the property are mobile (as in fauna). It thus forms an additional layer of protection designed to protect values of World Heritage properties from external impacts. In 2007, the GBMA was added to the National Heritage List, in recognition of its national heritage significance under the Act.

A single State government agency, the New South Wales Office of Environment and Heritage, manages the area. All the reserves that comprise the GBMA are subject to the National Parks and Wildlife Act 1974 and the Wilderness Act 1987. Other relevant legislation includes the Threatened Species Conservation Act 1995, the Environmental Planning and Assessment Act 1979, the Sydney Water Catchment Management Act 1998 and the Heritage Act 1977.

At the time of nomination statutory management plans for the constituent reserves of the GBMA were in place or in preparation, and these are reviewed every 7-10 years. Currently all management plans have been gazetted, and those for three component reserves (Wollemi, Blue Mountains, and Kanangra-Boyd National Parks, which constitute 80% of the property) are under revision for greater emphasis on the protection of identified values. An over-arching Strategic Plan for the property provides a framework for its integrated management, protection, interpretation and monitoring. ....

The Guardian, 8 March 2019:

The New South Wales government has been accused of not following due process when it passed legislation to allow flooding in the heritage-listed Blue Mountains.

The Greater Blue Mountains area is already recognised globally for its environmental significance but now some sections are being assessed by the federal government for inclusion on the national heritage list for Aboriginal cultural values.

A Unesco advisory body has warned NSW legislation passed in 2018, as part of the Coalition’s plan to raise Warragamba Dam wall by 14m, could endanger the area’s cultural values.

The International Council on Monuments and Sites wrote to the Unesco world heritage centre in February 2019 arguing the legislation shouldn’t have been proposed before the commonwealth’s cultural values assessment was finalised.

“It is inappropriate ... for the NSW parliament to be enabling legislation that would impact upon established world or national heritage values or potential national heritage values,” the letter, seen by AAP, states.

The ICOMOS Australia president, Ian Travers, said it would be unacceptable for the Blue Mountains to be flooded before the presumed cultural values of the area were fully known.

“If the areas being assessed are inundated in the interim, it’s not acceptable,” he said.

“The correct process hasn’t been followed. They’re enabling legislation, which is directly contrary to what should be happening.”

Thousands of cultural sites were flooded when Warragamba Dam was built in the 1960s, and Aboriginal elders are concerned the plan to raise the wall will destroy those that are left.

“Traditional owners feel very strongly that their cultural heritage, that’s already been decimated, is about to eradicated,” Travers said.

Gundungurra elder Sharyn Halls urged the heritage centre to investigate the threat to thousands of cultural areas including burial sites, waterholes and artefacts.....

UNESCO, 43rd Session of World Heritage Committee, July 2019:

Decision: 43 COM 7B.2

Greater Blue Mountains Area (Australia) (N 917)

The World Heritage Committee,

 

1. Having examined Document WHC/19/43.COM/7B.Add

2. Recalling Decision 28 COM 15B.15, adopted at its 28th session (Suzhou, 2004),

3. Notes with concern that the State Party recognizes that the proposed raising of the Warragamba Dam wall is expected to increase the frequency and extent of temporary inundation of the property upstream of the dam; 


4. Considers that the inundation of areas within the property resulting from the raising of the dam wall are likely to have an impact on the Outstanding Universal Value (OUV) of the property, recalls Decision 40 COM 7, in which it considered that the construction of dams with large reservoirs within the boundaries of World Heritage properties is incompatible with their World Heritage status, and urged States Parties to “ensure that the impacts from dams that could affect properties located upstream or downstream within the same river basin are rigorously assessed in order to avoid impacts on the OUV”, and requests the State Party to ensure, in line with its commitment, that the current process to prepare an Environmental Impact Statement (EIS) for the proposal fully assesses all potential impacts on the OUV of the property and its other values, including Aboriginal cultural heritage, and to submit a copy of the EIS to the World Heritage Centre for review by IUCN, prior to taking any final decisions regarding the project; 


5. Also notes with concern that several mining projects exist in the vicinity of or adjacent to the property, and that some mining activities have resulted in impacts on the property, as evidenced by the incident at the Clarence Colliery, and also requests the State Party to undertake an assessment of potential cumulative impacts of all existing and planned mining projects in the vicinity of the property through a Strategic Environmental Assessment (SEA) or a similar mechanism; 

6. Reiterates its position that mineral exploration or exploitation is incompatible with World Heritage status, which is supported by the International Council of Mining and Metals (ICMM) Position Statement to not undertake such activities within World Heritage properties; 


7. Notes the information provided by the State Party regarding the Western Sydney Airport proposal and further requests the State Party to submit to the World Heritage Centre a copy of the EIS for the anticipated airspace and flight path operations, once available, for review by IUCN; 


8. Welcomes the development of a Strategic Management Framework for the property as a new integrated management instrument and requests furthermore the State Party to ensure that potential threats to the property from activities outside its boundaries, particularly mining, are fully considered in the development of this management framework and that the EIS required are carried out in conformity with IUCN’s World Heritage Advice Note on Environmental Assessment, with a specific section focusing on the potential impact of the project(s) on the property’s OUV; 


9. Finally requests the State Party to submit to the World Heritage Centre, by 1 December 2020, an updated report on the state of conservation of the property and the implementation of the above, for examination by the World Heritage Committee at its 45th session in 2021.

NOW

The Sydney Morning Herald, 22 June 2021:

The Berejiklian government has been asked by UNESCO to submit the environmental impact study on its plan to raise the Warragamba Dam wall for review before final approval out of concern about the damage the project will have on wildlife and Indigenous culture in the World Heritage area.

The request, made overnight by a committee of the UN body, fell short of matching a separate recommendation that another World Heritage-listed region in Australia, the Great Barrier Reef, be assessed as “in danger” because of climate change.

The Berejiklian government’s plan to raise the Warragamba Dam wall has been discussed at a UNESCO World Heritage meeting overnight. CREDIT:JAMES BRICKWOOD

 

Still, the government has been put on notice that the $1 billion-plus plan to lift the height of the dam wall by at least 14 metres will be closely watched by the World Heritage Committee because of the expected damage caused by even temporary inundation of parts of the Greater Blue Mountains.

In its statement, the committee repeated its request that the “State Party” ensures the environmental impact study “assesses all potential impacts on the Outstanding Universal Values of the property and its other values, including Aboriginal cultural heritage”.

The request also includes the government “thoroughly” assesses how raising the wall would exacerbate bushfire impacts and affect the longer-term recovery of “key species and habitats” burnt during the 2019-20 season…..

Read the full article here. 

It should be noted that the "State Party" is the Commonwealth of Australia and it is the Australian Government which receives and replies to all requests and correspondence from UNESCO and the World Heritage Committee.

It was the Australian Government which assured UNESCO & the World Heritage Committee in April 2019 that it "reaffirms Australia's commitment to protecting the Outstanding Universal Value of this globally significant area".

So it is somewhat puzzling that a Nine Entertainment Co (Chair - former Australian Treasurer & Liberal MP for Higgins Peter Costello) masthead The Sydney Morning Herald runs an article which redirects primary responsibility onto the New South Wales Government rather than noting it is the Morrison Government which is being held to account by UNESCO and it will be the Morrison Government responsible for any and all environmental, biodiversity and cultural losses in the Greater Blue Mountains World Heritage Area if section/s of this area is flooded.