Category: Sustainable Settlement and Agriculture

The Generator is founded on the simple premise that we should leave the world in better condition than we found it. The news items in this category outline the attempts people have made to do this. They are mainly concerned with our food supply and settlement patterns. The impact that the human race has on the planet.

Casual relationship with the facts

admin /14 June, 2010

A casual relationship with the facts

83 comments

Lee Rhiannon

On June 1 Shadow Treasurer Joe Hockey was interviewed by ABC TV’s Lateline program about Labor’s campaign to promote the resources super profits tax.

He told ABC journalist Leigh Sales that “The Labor Party received far more from the mining industry [in political donations], I understand, at the last election than we did”.

A closer look at the official figures belies his statement.

Analysis by the Greens www.democracy4sale.org project of donations disclosed to the Australian Electoral Commission show that in the two annual disclosure periods leading up to the 2007 federal election, resource companies directed nearly $2 million worth of donations to Labor and the Coalition.

The Coalition accepted $1,097,500 in donations from resource companies, significantly higher than Labor’s $869,200 in donations.

Poll shows 77pc against native forest logging

admin /13 June, 2010

Poll shows 77pc against native forest logging

Posted 33 minutes ago

The Greens say new polling shows the vast majority of Australians support an end to the logging of native forests.

A Greens-commissioned Galaxy poll found 77 per cent of respondents agreed that the Federal Government should step in to ban logging in certain areas.

Cornered by his own trap

admin /13 June, 2010

Cornered by his own trap

Paul Kelly, Editor-at-large
From: The Australian
June 12, 2010 12:00AM

THIS week unemployment in Australia fell to a world defining 5.2 per cent, yet it hardly rated in politics as Kevin Rudd stoically refused any substantive concession from his resources tax.

Rudd Labor needs a game-changer on the tax. The government is being suffocated. Labor cannot get clear air: it cannot convey its political message, from economic success to its health package.The polls show it; the media coverage proves it; the fears of affected Labor MPs cannot be permanently repressed. Blind Freddy knows Labor faces a political dead end on the resource tax. The government must obtain a reprieve in its war with the mining industry.

Yet Rudd yesterday rejected a media report about likely government concessions, saying: “I think we’ve got weeks and probably months of consultation yet with the mining companies.”

More of the same is untenable. The government privately knows this. It has two pathways ahead: a cosmetic fix or a serious policy retreat. There is no sign of the latter. Every public utterance from Rudd is about defending his position. At week’s end, Rudd’s trip to the west and Queensland had come and gone; it was about selling his tax, offering these states more infrastructure funds from the tax’s revenue and challenging WA Liberal Premier Colin Barnett, whom Rudd did not meet.

70.000 litres of petroi spilt at mine

admin /13 June, 2010

70,000 litres of petrol spilt at mine

Updated 1 hour 27 minutes ago

Under investigation: the Gove mine and refinery (ABC TV)

The Northern Territory Department of Resources says it is investigating an unleaded fuel spill at the Rio Tinto Alcan alumina mine and refinery at Nhulunbuy, on the Gove Peninsula.

The department says it was informed by Rio Tinto on Friday that about 70,000 litres of petrol had leaked into the ground from one of the mine’s fuel containers.

Mining tax a factor in axed 4,5 bn Hunter projects

admin /11 June, 2010

Mining tax a factor in axed $4.5bn Hunter projects

Posted 57 minutes ago

The mining tax, carbon reduction legislation and electricity prices have led to the scrapping of billions of dollars worth of aluminium smelter upgrades in the New South Wales Hunter Valley.

The ABC has been told Norwegian company Hydro has shelved its $4 billion Kurri Kurri smelter upgrade, while plans for Tomago Aluminium’s proposed $600 million potline have also been scrapped.

Escalating electricity prices are the biggest concern along with the mining tax, carbon reduction legislation and renewable energy targets.

Surge in support puts Greens in the box seat

admin /10 June, 2010

Surge in support puts Greens in the box seat

June 6, 2010

Comments 7

Once the ‘radical’ party of choice for environmentalists, social activists and libertarians, the Greens stand to clean up if they win over the conservative voters the Democrats left behind.

Last Tuesday, having received the worst polling news of his prime ministership, Kevin Rudd told a perplexed Labor caucus many Australians were reserving judgment on how they’d vote at the election.

The PM was clearly referring to the 16 per cent of voters supporting the Australian Greens, as recorded in that day’s Newspoll.

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