Regional community transport pilot program for seniors offering a NSW Government sponsored $250 Westpac Visa Card for personal travel costs commences 29 January 2020 - how to apply

Older residents in Ballina Shire Council, Byron Shire Council, Kyogle Council, Lismore City Council, Richmond Valley Council and Tweed Shire Council and Clarence Valley Council areas in the Northern Rivers region may be eligible to participate in the NSW Government two-year trial of a new a community transport scheme, Regional Seniors Travel Card (RSTC).

The trial offers a $250 prepaid card to eligible seniors in regional, rural and remote areas to be used towards the purchase of fuel and transportation services, such as taxi services and NSW TrainLink train and coach services.

Applications will open on 29 January 2020 and cards will be distributed from mid-February 2020.

To be eligible for a Regional Seniors Travel Card, applicants must:

a) permanently reside in an Eligible Area within NSW; and

b) currently receive the Age Pension (applicants must have been receiving the age pension for at least one month); or

c) currently hold a Commonwealth Seniors Health Card (applicants must have held their card for at least one month) (“Eligible Person”).

The RSTC is issued by Westpac as a Visa card and no user fees apply to this card.

The Card can only be used at selected retailers and service providers in Australia. Depending on the Merchant, the Card may be used in store, online or over the telephone. It is your responsibility to confirm that your Card can be used at the Merchant for Authorised Transport Expenses prior to use. If you are unsure, you should ask the Merchant before incurring a travel expense.

‘Card Services is available throughout the Pilot by calling 1800 569 070. Card Services will become available online at nswregionalseniors.cards at a later date. You can call us on 1800 569 070 for an update as to when Card Services will become available online.’

Applications for the 2020 RSTC will close on 30 November 2020.

The application period for the 2021 RSTCs is 1 December 2020 - 30 November 2021. 

Chromium-6: bushfire temperatures of up to 1,000 degrees can endanger human health long after the flames have gone out

"Fire-induced oxidation of Fe oxide-bound Cr(III) may represent a largely unexplored, yet globally-significant pathway for the natural formation of hazardous Cr(VI) in soil." [Burton E.D. el al, April 2019]

Echo NetDaily, 15 January 2020:

Scientists from Southern Cross University have made a startling discovery about the lethal threat of soils scorched by bushfires. 

The team, led by Professor Ed Burton, has found the naturally occurring metal chromium 3 can be converted by extreme bushfire heat into the highly toxic and cancerous chromium 6. 

Professor Ed Burton of Southern Cross Geoscience is looking at the levels of a toxic element in bushfire affected soil. 

Chromium 6 is the substance spotlighted by renowned American environmentalist Erin Brockovich, who blew the whistle on high concentrations in the water supply of her home town in southern California.

Professor Burton’s breakthrough research has confirmed bushfire temperatures of up to 1,000 degrees can endanger human health long after the flames have gone out. 

‘We’ve seen bushfires create conditions in the surface soil that transform the safe, naturally occurring chromium-3 into the toxic, cancer-causing chromium-6,’ Professor Burton said. 

‘Chromium-6 can cause lung cancer and leach into waterways.’ 

Professor Burton, an expert on the geochemistry and mineralogy of soils, sediments and groundwater systems, said frontline firefighters were immediately at risk but the contamination of water within catchment areas posed a wider threat. 

‘We know that firefighters have higher incidences of chromium in their urine and are more susceptible to cancer than other groups....

See the following peer-reviewed articles concerning the carcinogen Chromium-6:

Burton, E.D., Choppala, G., Karimian, N., Johnston, S.G. (2019) A new pathway for hexavalent chromium formation in soil: Fire-induced alterations of iron oxides. Environmental Pollution 247, 618-625; and 

Burton, E.D., Choppala, G., Vithana, C., Hockmann, K., Johnston, S.G. (2019) Chromium(VI) formation via heating of Cr(III)-Fe(III)-(oxy)hydroxides: A pathway for fire-induced soil pollution. Chemosphere 222, 440-444.

It should be noted that wildfires can also affect and possibly increase the mobility of other minerals naturally found in the soil. 

Initial research suggests that an example of this may be the carcinogen, arsenic. Additionally, past research suggests the potential of higher mercury content in freshwater fish after wildfire events.

Open Letter from the NSW South Coast: Dear Mr Morrison

Excerpt from Nick Hopkins open letter published in The Canberra Times, 17 January 2020: 

Dear Mr Morrison,

Today I stand by the smouldering ruins of my beautiful home on the NSW South Coast. Since New Year's Day, climate change has suddenly become very personal for me.

Like thousands of others, Nick Hopkins and Heike Sutherland are dealing with the loss of their family home. Picture: Supplied

You have said you understand my grief. I have heard you are a religious man. My fervent hope is that your God grants you the humility to admit that you do not understand me at all. You have stood by as members of your party have insulted, belittled and ignored people like me when we urged you and your predecessors to take climate change more seriously.

You took no action when my Deputy Prime Minister called people like me a raving lunatic when we dared to link the bushfire emergency to climate change. By your silence you are complicit. May your God grant you the wisdom to understand that my rage at you and your predecessors is an entirely rational response to a set of present and oncoming unnatural disasters from which you have failed to protect me.

You have said you understand my suffering. My heartfelt desire is that your God grants you the ability to see how hollow and insincere that feels to me when you (and Labor) continue to promote the thermal coal industry, which is fanning the flames of intense suffering of humans and animals worldwide. Australian coal is out there in the world being burnt every day and night. Please Mr Morrison, if only for God's sake, join the dots.

If you come to console me in my time of grief, I will not shake your hand until you and your colleagues promise to refuse donations from all fossil fuel companies. I would dearly like to be consoled by you, but I am choking on the hypocrisy of your actions. Until you get serious about political donation reform, your pronouncements will always be tainted by the stench of your largest donors.

You will not earn my respect until you and your colleagues dare to take the Australian public on a journey to transition away from thermal coal mining and exports. Tobacco farmers in the US transitioned away from their industry when the link between cigarettes and cancer become public. And when the link between asbestos and mesothelioma was understood, we left all known reserves in the ground. However, now that the link between the burning of coal and disastrous weather events is well established, both you and the opposition have thrown your support behind opening up the Galilee Basin, starting with the Adani mine.....

Read the full letter here.

Groups have been knitting & sewing around the globe to help Australian wildlife in the 2019-20 bushfire season

Clarence Valley Independent, 15 January 2020:

Anna Key says of her mum Nicki, that she was knitting pouches for Australia's bush fire injured animals until her hands were red raw and there had to be a better way. The answer was social media. Why have a handful of knitters when you can have thousands... maybe even tens of thousands? Image: Fran Dowsett

It all started with her mum “knitting a Koala pouch”. For week after week the Australian population has read and viewed accounts of bushfire devastation, not just along the east coast but on the far side of the country in Western Australia and South Australia. 

Whilst most of us feel individually helpless to do anything to assist, there are those individuals who take up the challenge and put their talent to the test. 

Yamba’s Anna Key is the first to admit she has no particular ‘talent’ so far as knitting, sewing and professional bushfire assistance is concerned. However she “loves digital marketing”. 

Anna’s story started on Friday January 3. “I was sitting watching my mum, Nicki, knitting a woollen koala ‘pouch’; it was the eighth pouch she had knitted (after a call for assistance from the Country Women’s Institute at Maclean) since fires began around Yamba and Angourie some months before”. 

Anna said she thought her mum’s efforts were commendable but the process was very time consuming and she would only be able to knit a handful of pouches. “I was sad and concerned with the whole online tone of argument and general panic about the fire situation.” 

“If only our tears could put out the fires” Anna kept saying. 

“My mind clicked into gear…what if could use my social media skills to enlist the help of dozens, or even hundreds to help?” Anna searched the internet for patterns and designs for pouches to post on her Facebook page. 

“I was struggling to find anything useful and then I came across the site of the ‘Animal Rescue Craft Guild’. I downloaded the patterns from their site and posted them to my Facebook page ‘Heist Jewellery’”. 

Anna says she is friends with the wife of Brazilian heavy metal band lead singer, Max Cavalera, of ‘Soulfly’. The band has 873,610 followers on their page – so plenty of exposure. They posted her Australian animal fire rescue information on their page, helping gain traction around the world. 

“That was on the Sunday and other musicians (from members of ‘Devilskin’, ‘God Forbid’, ‘Primer 55’ and ‘Toshi Iseda’) jumped aboard and also posted the information… a movement had begun”. 

“By Monday morning I had 11,000 shares and by breakfast it was 12,000.” 

Overnight, craft groups had started in the US, Canada, South Africa, NZ and the UK. Knitters from Portugal, Belgium, Hong Kong and Singapore soon joined with children at schools in Minnesota, Ottawa, Missouri and Utah forming knitting, sewing and crocheting bees. All this within a few days! 

Anna has since started the Global Craft Movement HQ F/book page so as to centralise all the activity. Information on international drop off locations is included on the page as well as information of the bush fire situation and the effect it is having on our native wildlife. 

The online statistics which have resulted from Anna’s action are truly amazing. Since she first accessed the ARCG site on January 3, that organisation’s group has grown from 37,000 to over 200,000. The Guild have since requested a temporary pause on any new craft projects so they can complete a stock take of what has been made and access what is still needed......

NSWRFS Commissioner: hazard reduction burning is not a panacea

https://youtu.be/NoEYok70dxQ

Australian Bushfire Season 2019-20: Northern Rivers communities once again demonstrate that they care

Echo NetDaily, 17 January 2020:

11 volunteers headed up to farms near Tabulam last weekend to help get fences back in place following devastating bushfires in December. Photo supplied.

Having his and his neighbours farms devastated by fires in December, including the loss of one of their homes, local Byron Shire resident Bart Vanarey had put the call out for helping hands to rebuild fences on their properties. He was not left disappointed and had 11 people  last weekend and another 11 are people coming up this weekend to help get their perimeter fences re-built on the properties near Tabulam.

‘The response has been very heartening,’ said Bart.

Getting fence  farms near Tabulam last weekend to help get fences back in place following devastating bushfires in December. Photo supplied.

‘It was such a good weekend with helpers coming from all over the world (only in Byron Bay) from the Canary Islands, Ecuador, Canada, Texas and of course Lismore, Byron and Lennox.’

Even in the rain the volunteers got down to the hard yakka and kept building fences and while Bart was claiming they had managed to erect 700m of fencing he was told he was ‘dreamin’ and it was more like 400m.

The call was also heard by a tractor hire company who has donated a tractor to help with the fencing. Bart is continuing to raise funds for the materials and and has raised more money for another 170 fenceposts and 80 concrete fenceposts to be delivered to the properties....

As the black crows of the NSW logging industry begin to gather for an assault on remaining forests, this from Australian Labor Party Leader.......

MEDIA RELEASE – ECOLOGICAL AUDIT NEEDED FOLLOWING NATIONAL DISASTER – WEDNESDAY, 8 JANUARY 2020

THE HON ANTHONY ALBANESE MP
LEADER OF THE AUSTRALIAN LABOR PARTY
MEMBER FOR GRAYNDLER

TERRI BUTLER MP
SHADOW MINISTER FOR THE ENVIRONMENT AND WATER
MEMBER FOR GRIFFITH

ECOLOGICAL AUDIT NEEDED FOLLOWING NATIONAL DISASTER

The Morrison Government should convene a meeting of state and territory environment ministers and commence an Australian Natural Asset Audit, amid estimates that up to one billion animals have perished in the nation’s bushfire disaster.

The Government must also guarantee continued funding for the nation’s Bushfire Cooperative Research Centre, which will cease to exist from July next year because it does not conform to the Government’s rewritten guidelines for CRCs, which favour commercial research.

Australians love the bush. Many of us live in the bush and our precious wildlife is deeply ingrained in Australian sense of identity.

With more than eight million hectares burned so far this bushfire season, we must turn to land management specialists and scientists to assess the scale of this ecological disaster and advise governments on a national approach to recovery efforts.

The Melbourne-based Bushfire Cooperative Research Centre is building disaster resilient communities across the country by bringing together all of Australia and New Zealand’s fire and emergency services authorities with leading experts across a range of scientific fields.

In 2013 the Labor Government provided $48 million to fund the centre for eight years through to June 2021 based on warnings by scientists that climate change would increase the severity and frequency of extreme weather events.

Despite its strong record of success and ongoing need for national collaboration over natural disasters, the centre is ineligible for further funding under the Morrison Government’s current CRC Guidelines.

This bushfire season, up to 26 lives have been lost and at least 1800 homes have been destroyed.

Our key focus must be to support affected communities, victims and families of those who have lost their lives.

But Australians have also been shocked by graphic and heart-rending images of dead and injured wildlife as well as farm stock.

It is critical that as part of the recovery we understand the impact of the tragedy on the National Estate, including our wildlife, and that we better understand how to reduce bushfires and protect our precious natural habitat.

As part of whole-of-government approach to rebuilding our communities, the Federal Government must act now to better protect Australia’s unique natural assets.

The bushfire emergency is a national crisis that requires a national response.

Labor is proposing:

1. An Australian Natural Asset Audit

• The Morrison Government should immediately commence Australian Natural Asset Audit to understand the true impact that these devastating bushfires on our national icons and natural assets. The audit would assess the loss of our native animal and plants species that have been wiped out an unprecedented rate during the bushfire crisis engulfing Australia, and would assess habitat loss and impacts on environmental assets.

• The Commonwealth should mobilise Australian scientists and land management professionals to immediately begin the mammoth task of assessing the ecological and biodiversity damage to Australia’s natural assets. The audit would enable the government to bring together Australia’s best ecologists and on the ground practitioners, including rangers from our national parks, local and state government environmental management staff, farmers and indigenous leaders from impacted areas.

• The audit should be used to inform short, medium and long-term recovery efforts, including urgently supporting the Threatened Species Scientific Committee on immediate actions to increase the recovery, management and protection of Australia’s threatened species, including any new listings required, and to recommend proactive measures for the next bushfire crisis.

2. Start national recovery planning now: The Commonwealth should urgently convene a meeting of the environment ministerial council to commence recovery planning now

• Immediately start recovery planning through the joint environment ministerial council with the states, to assess animal hospital services, demand and funding and short to medium-term recovery measures in key habitats for existing critically endangered species.

• The Government should also take steps to activate a coordinated national group of Landcare volunteers in an Australia-wide effort to recover and regenerate our key natural assets and to protect the economic benefits and jobs that flow from our international reputation as a natural wonderland.

3. Immediately guarantee funding for the Cooperative Research Centre

• Prime Minister Scott Morrison must provide funding certainty to the Bushfire and Natural Hazards Cooperative Research Centre.

• The Bushfire and Natural Hazards CRC has less than 18 months of funding left and is currently ineligible for renewed funding under the Morrison Government’s amended CRC Guidelines.

• The Centre predicts a return on Commonwealth investment of 7:1 through reduced loss of life and injury, reducing government costs and reducing insurance costs.

For example, the town of Gracemere in Queensland was saved in 2018 as a result of science-based predictive capacity developed by the Centre.