"Dear neighbours, Writing to you like this is taking me well out of my comfort zone but the government has made it necessary because of the postal survey. I am writing to seek your approval for my partner and I to marry."

The Daily Examiner, Letter to the Editor, 15 September 2017:

Same-sex plea

Here is the text of a letter I will be sending to all my immediate neighbours: 

“Dear neighbours, Writing to you like this is taking me well out of my comfort zone but the government has made it necessary because of the postal survey. I am writing to seek your approval for my partner and I to marry.

Some of you may know us or know of us. We have lived in Yamba for two years now and settled well into the community. You may know Dean from when he worked at the cafe in town, or at the bottle shop. You may have seen me working with Landcare or at the museum, and I’ve been pretty active opposing the installation of traffic lights at Treelands Drive. Maybe you’ve seen us together doing the shopping at Coles, enjoying the beach or sharing a drink with friends at the Pacific of a Friday afternoon.

In other words, we are ordinary people going about our lives in an ordinary way, and striving to put back in to the community when we can.

All we ask now is that our relationship be granted the same respect (including legal rights but not just that) that others are able to take for granted when they marry.

This is not make-believe, we are not just playing house, we have been together for 15 years and cannot imagine not being together. We have been together through good times and bad, holidays, illness, family celebrations like weddings, the arrival of new nieces and nephews, and we have supported each other through tough times too like the loss of loved ones.

We would dearly love to declare and celebrate our relationship very publicly with our family and friends.

We have no other agenda. No scheme to infiltrate schools and indoctrinate children. I was a teacher for 24 years and wouldn’t dream of supporting anything I thought could be harmful to them. We don’t seek to restrict anyone’s religious freedom. I am more than happy to respect the beliefs of others, I just don’t want them imposed on me.

The postal survey must seem a terrible waste of time and money to most of you.

I agree. It is not how I would have preferred to see this question resolved. But it is here and while it might seem of little import to most of you, and will have no direct effect on most of you, to Dean and I it is critically important. The thought that it might not be approved is to be honest a bit scary and pretty hurtful.

We respectfully ask you to consider what I have said and return your postal ballot with a YES response.

Graeme East, Yamba

World's most successful environmental agreement has been in place for thirty years this month

CSIROscope, 15 September 2017:  

This weekend marks the 30th birthday of the Montreal Protocol, often dubbed the world’s most successful environmental agreement. The treaty, signed on September 16, 1987, is slowly but surely reversing the damage caused to the ozone layer by industrial gases such as chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs).

Each year, during the southern spring, a hole appears in the ozone layer above Antarctica. This is due to the extremely cold temperatures in the winter stratosphere (above 10km altitude) that allow byproducts of CFCs and related gases to be converted into forms that destroy ozone when the sunlight returns in spring.

As ozone-destroying gases are phased out, the annual ozone hole is generally getting smaller – a rare success story for international environmentalism.

Back in 2012, our Saving the Ozone series marked the Montreal Protocol’s silver jubilee and reflected on its success. But how has the ozone hole fared in the five years since?

The Antarctic ozone hole has continued to appear each spring, as it has since the late 1970s. This is expected, as levels of the ozone-destroying halocarbon gases controlled by the Montreal Protocol are still relatively high. The figure below shows that concentrations of these human-made substances over Antarctica have fallen by 14% since their peak in about 2000.

Past and predicted levels of controlled gases in the Antarctic atmosphere, quoted as equivalent effective stratospheric chlorine (EESC) levels, a measure of their contribution to stratospheric ozone depletion. Paul Krummel/CSIRO, Author provided

Read the full article here.

Jobs! Jobs! Jobs! cries Michaelia

This was Australian Minister for Employment and Senator for Western Australia, Michaelia Cash in September 2017:

Sounds great, doesn’t it? However, what Ms. Cash is confirming here is that 74,400 of the jobs she is claiming are in fact only part-time jobs and some would be for as little as half a day per week.

Australian Bureau of Statistics: Ordinary total employed persons of all ages

July 2016 – 11.963 million

August 2016 – 11.870 million

September 2016 – 11.910 million

October 2016 – 11.952 million

November 2016 – 12.017 million

December 2016 – 12.106 million

January 2017 – 11.844 million

February 2017 – 12.060 million

March 2017 – 12.079 million

April 2017 –  12.147 million

May 2017 – 12.214 million

June 2017 – 12.210 million

July 2017 – 12.213 million

August 2017 – 12.195 million

September 2017 – not known at this time

Comparing the month of August 2016 with the month of August 2017 then the number of additional persons in employment is estimated at 324,900 people of which est. 75,400 individuals were working part-time.

Perhaps the better figure is for a financial year. The number of additional persons in employment at the end of 1 July 2016-30 June 2017 financial year is estimated at 246,900 people of which est. 184,300 individuals were working part-time.

How many of those part-time jobs were Work For The Dole employment or were PaTH jobs is uncertain. Both these government programs are not known for leading to high levels of permanent employment.

Full-time employment reportedly now accounts for about 68 per cent of all employment, down from around 72 per cent a decade ago – with Australia having the third highest proportion of part-time workers in the industrialised world.

There is also the statistical difficulty that any growth in the number of people employed doesn’t necessarily mean an equal number of new jobs was created during the same period. Some job vacancies were created when workers permanently left the workforce, changed positions within a business or changed employer.

Something Ms. Cash would know full well.

So while the Minister can point to an improvement in employment levels, these levels are not as robust as she would have us believe.

Looking at the numbers since August 2013 Tony Abbott’s promised two million new jobs created within a decade is never likely to eventuate.

While on the NSW North Coast the unemployment rate ranges from 5.4% in Richmond-Tweed to 8% in Coffs Harbour-Grafton in July 2017. The Coffs Harbour-Grafton Labour Force Region unemployment rate continuing as the highest rate in New South Wales.

Oh, it burns! It burns!

News Corp hack Chris Kenny gets well and truly burned by ABC journalist Emma Alberici……….

"My daughter doesn't need my permission to get married. But she needs yours."

The Daily Examiner, Letter to the Editor, 15 September 2017:

Marriage certification

Those of us who thought, like the old song, that “love and marriage go together like a horse and carriage” have had a lot of confusing information thrown at us recently about same-sex couples and the way their non-marriages give them all the same rights as married people. My wife and I were surprised, therefore, to attend the Roads and Maritime Service Centre last week to change our car registration, where we were asked to produce our marriage certificate.

This led me to wonder what other equal rights might not be there, particularly when my daughter, currently unable to marry her long-time partner, gets to our age.

Will she be asked for a marriage certificate if her not legally recognised wife is in hospital, or worse? Australia Post apparently charges hundreds of dollars for a name change, but not if you can provide a – you guessed it – marriage certificate.

Those who oppose same sex marriage are resting their hopes on the oldies like me.

But if you think we are going to support discrimination against our own kids and grandkids, you are about to be very disappointed.

My daughter doesn’t need my permission to get married. But she needs yours. Please join me in voting YES.

Desmond Bellamy, Byron Bay

An NJRPP Public Briefing Meeting in Iluka, NSW, 20 September 2017

Section of the southern boundary of the Hickey Street land proposed for development

On 21 September 2017 North Coast Voices received this email from an Iluka resident on the subject of a recent meeting in that little coastal town:

At 4.30pm on Wednesday 20th September 2017 the Northern Joint Regional Planning Panel (NJRPP) held a Public Briefing Meeting at Iluka Community Hall concerning the proposed coastal subdivision of 19 hectares of environmentally sensitive land adjacent to the Iluka World Heritage Area.

The meeting was chaired by Gary West (Chair NJRPP) who was accompanied by three other panel members - Ms. Pam Westing, Clarence Valley Mayor Jim Simmons and Deputy-Mayor Jason Kingsley.

Four council staff members accompanied the panel members, including Carmel Landers who is responsible for progressing the development application through council planning processes.

Concerned residents and ratepayers filled between half and three-quarters of the hall’s seating capacity.

A number of people from the Yaegl community were present, as well as Cr. Greg Clancy who was there in a personal capacity.

The Panel secretariat had invited individuals and groups who had made formal submissions on the proposed development to register beforehand as speakers.

Around nine listed speakers presented their views and most called attention to significant problems with the development application – including street design, lot density, stormwater drainage and nutrient load, as well as loss of tree cover and habitat in the current version of this 140 lot urban development.

The Association of Iluka Residents (AIR Inc) were first off in the order of speakers. Its President introduced the issues, the Secretary expanded on key concerns, and one of AIR's members presented questions to the developer (in absentia) via the panel and Council staff, then the President wrapped up the AIR presentation.

John Edwards on behalf of the Clarence Environment Centre spoke with some authority on issues of concern regarding the proposed development.

Also rising to their feet were local residents Kay Jeffrey and Gabrielle Barto.

Ms. Jeffrey spoke very eloquently from the heart about Land Care on the World Heritage site which contains rare littoral rainforest, pointing out this development would be detrimental to flora and fauna within that site. Expressing her gratification that evidence now showed the koala was not functionally extinct in Iluka. She further pointed out that the type of development proposed was better suited to outer metropolitan urban areas such as Mt. Druitt.

While Ms. Barto spoke with a deal of on-the-ground knowledge on a range of environmental and planning concerns. She highlighted the fact that sightings of koala on and in the vicinity of the land in question demonstrated that this large lot was being used as part of a larger movement corridor.

A retired real estate agent originally from Bribie Island stated he didn't want Iluka to turn into a Bribie Island or Lennox Head, having had firsthand experience of what can happen if poorly planned developments are allowed in coastal towns. Additionally, he spoke of the problems associated with community title – in particular that by-laws and management plans on community title could be changed over time.

Another speaker suggested the development site would be suitable for acquisition by the NSW Government in order to protect the local koala population and koala habitat. Something it has apparently undertaken in the Tweed Heads region.

Grahame Lynn (who was approx.10 minutes late) was the last scheduled speaker as President of the Iluka Ratepayers Association (IRA). He proceeded to attack with some vigour the Clarence Environment Centre submission as well as those of many other individuals and groups that oppose this development. Indeed he spent most of the time in attack mode and very little time in talking up the proposed development.

Mr. Lynn as a local real estate agent has been advertising the proposed subdivision for at least the last eighteen months  – a potential conflict of interest he failed to mention to the panel. 

It was noted that up until that point, all panel members and Council staff were taking copious notes, but as soon as he started talking they stopped. I guess one loses credibility when attacking the “player and not the ball” so to speak.

By the end of the meeting I was of the opinion that Gary West as Chair had run the meeting well, making us all feel comfortable and all points of view were heard.

Anon

Iluka, NSW

Coastal Cypress Pine on the development site

Images supplied by Iluka resident

Quotes of the Week

“Tens of millions of dollars are spent annually on political lobbying for the interests of the fossil fuel sector. That investment serves the interests of a small amount of company shareholders in keeping a legacy industry alive, despite the availability of newer, clean technologies, at lower cost. In the wake of these behind-the-scenes policy negotiations, the real and present impacts of climate change, such as bushfires, coastal flooding and reduced crop yields are left at the door of future generations to deal with.” [Professor Tim Flannery writing in The Guardian, 13 September 2017]

“The main problem bedevilling Australia’s energy sector at the moment is a lack of settled policy to define the investment framework. It means companies like AGL have to guess what regulations they will face in the future.” [Journalist Katherine Murphy writing in The Guardian, 12 September 2017]

“Trump is the most ignorant, offensive president of my lifetime. His rise is a direct result of white supremacy. Period." [ESPN SportsCenter cohost Jemele Hill tweeting about US President Donald Trump on 11 September 2017]