Posted by Jim on May 18, 2011
An alert Maryborough member has drawn attention to the announcement of a new coal exploration permit in the Mary Valley, 25 kilometres south of Maryborough, east of the Bruce Highway, by Scorpion Energy Pty Ltd. Scorpion Energy was established only 18 months ago and presently only has a one page web presence without any content.
The continued allocation of coal exploration permits in the Mary Valley by the Queensland Government shows scant regard for the environmental values of the Mary Valley – values which the Federal Government endorsed when it refused the Bligh Government’s planned dam at Traveston. This is the sixth exploration permit in the Mary Valley that the Queensland Minister for mining has issued.
The National Party opposed Traveston Dam and supported the environmental arguments against its construction. Why are Warren Truss, the Nationals’ Federal member for Wide Bay and David Gibson, the LNP State member for Gympie, silent on coal mining and coal seam gas, which Tiaro Coal Corporation plans to develop along Munna Creek, which will do vast damage to the ecology of the Mary River and the Mary Valley? Are the Nationals and LNP compromised by their links with the coal industry?
The silence of the Nationals is a true indication of how committed to the environmental values of the Mary Valley they really are.
Greens leader, Bob Brown, supporting the community in opposing Traveston Dam.
Photo by Arkin Mackay, www.stoppress.com.au,
reproduced with permission
Jim McDonald, Wide Bay Greens Spokesperson, 18 May 2011
Posted by Jim on March 26, 2011
Online comment on article in Daily Telegraph, “Australia keeps selling off the farm”:
If Warren Truss spent as much time looking after his farming and regional constituency, thinking positively about a real food security policy, as he does advocating against mining taxes on behalf of his mates in the coalmining lobby, perhaps less of this would be happening. The Mary Valley in his own electorate – some of it good farming land – faces devastation on a Hunter Valley scale from coalmining and CSG. What has Warren said about it? Nothing.
Jim McDonald, 26 March 2011
Posted by Jim on October 31, 2010
At the last Federal election the Liberal National parties made a huge play on voters regarding the number of school buildings being built under the Building the Education Revolution (BER) program. They claimed there was massive rorting of the system.
On Thursday this week the Coalition failed in its bid to pass several motions against the Government to establish a judicial inquiry into this program.
Opposition education spokesman Christopher Pyne didn’t even turn up to vote on his own bill to force a judicial inquiry into the Government’s schools building program.
Where is the integrity of this man and his party?
I attended a David Helfgott concert recently in their new school hall built through the BER program at the Christian College and I didn’t hear anyone there complain of this great asset for the community.
St Patrick’s College have a new science wing as no doubt all other schools in our area have positively benefited from this scheme.
Builders and associated businesses were able to maintain workers at a time of global uncertainty. Our community wasn’t dragged down into an unemployment vortex that Mr Pyne and his coalition partners would have had us go through.
No doubt there will be those who say where ‘will the money come from’ to pay for this. Without having access to Treasury data I can’t respond, but one project alone the Chevron Gorgon Project in WA is projected to bring in $50billion to the Australian economy over the next 40 years. One would hope that this one project alone would assist balancing the books.
Are people cynical of politicians?
We have proposed coalmines on our doorstep, coal seam gas projects and potential devastation of some of Australia’s best farmlands.
Is Mr Truss and the coalition or Labor responding to these concerns within the electorate. No!
Kent Hutton, Letter to Editor, Gympie Times, 29 October 2010
Posted by Jim on October 20, 2010
Mr Truss should stop misinforming Queenslanders about the Greens fishing policy. He cannot know what the Federal Government will do under the Marine Parks inquiry until the reports come in.
The Nationals under Senator Boswell and Mr Truss have whipped up hysteria in response to the patent need to manage Australian fisheries. They and their supporters in the industry have been less than honest in their portrayal of our fishing policy.
The Nationals’ policy states that “greater care must be taken to ensure these delicate eco systems are protected.” But the Nationals have no plans for managing Australia’s fisheries and their subversive campaign against the review is against the national interest with respect to the future of seafood resources and contrary to their own broad statement on fisheries.
The Greens’ comprehensive fishing policy can be accessed online at http://widebaygreens.org/2010/07/570/.
Jim McDonald, Greens Spokesperson, Wide Bay Electorate, posted on mysunshinecoast, 20 October 2010
Letter published, Gympie Times, Saturday 23 October 2010
Posted by Jim on August 13, 2010
Green Candidate’s response to Coalition promise to pledge $125,000 to support the Mary River Catchment Coordinating Committee riparian tree planting program:
I welcome Mr Truss’s initiative to support the wonderful work done by Mary River Catchment Coordinating Committee, but it could be a matter of too little too late. As well as the ecological vandalism from the State Government pipeline, the Mary River faces major threats from open-cut coalmining at Tiaro, the beautiful Munna Creek and Aldershot. Mr Truss has been silent on protecting the Mary River from the inevitable impacts on groundwater and aquifers on the health of the Mary River. The proposed mines will also threaten the heritage of the internationally recognised Great Sandy wetlands at the mouth of the Mary River.
While the promised funding would assist the work of the Mary River Catchment Coordinating Committee, Mr Truss commits nothing to protecting the Mary River from environmental disaster arising from coalmining.
Comments published in an article in the Noosa News, Friday, 13 August 2010
Posted by Jim on August 11, 2010
The Liberal Party, or some sneak who thinks they are doing them a favour, has attempted to sabotage my online campaign by buying my name from Google advertisements so that when a voter does a Google search on my name, it includes my name and Liberal National Party propaganda. You can see this in the following screenshot:
At the top of the results page for Jim mcDonald you can see an advertisement, which I have not authorised, and a paid result that links in with a Liberal Party webpage
There’s no other description of this dirty tactic: it is dishonest. I’ve submitted a complaint to Google, and am considering my further options. This is the party who wants voters to take their campaign seriously and to run the country?
What are you going to do about it Warren Truss and Tony Abbott?
Jim McDonald
Greens Candidate
Wide Bay
Posted by Jim on August 4, 2010
There will be two meet-the-candidates sessions in the southern part of the electorate next week on Tuesday 10 August and Thursday 12 August. The first, organised by the Cooroy Chamber of Commerce, will be held at the Cooroy Hotel as follows:
Meet the Candidates evening
5.30pm for a 6.00pm start
Tuesday 10 August 2010
Cooroy Chamber of Commerce
Cooroy Hotel
38 Maple Street, Cooroy
Entry is free
The second occasion where voters can meet the candidates is organised by the Noosa Residents and Ratepayers Association. This event will be held at the Noosa Heads Bowls Club in Lanyana Way Noosa Heads.
Meet the candidates
6.45pm
Thursday 12 August 2010
Noosa Residents and Ratepayers Association
Noosa Heads Bowls Club,
Lanyana Way,
Noosa Heads
So far, there are no arrangements for similar opportunities for voters in the other major towns of Wide Bay. This is unfortunate as the 2010 election is one of the most important in recent times.
Jim McDonald, Greens Candidate for Wide Bay, 4 August 2010
Posted by Jim on August 1, 2010
The Federal member, Mr Truss, has so far failed to voice his considered opinion on a range of issues that would impact on the economy, the social fabric, the environmental health, and the lifestyle of the population in the Wide Bay electorate.
Central to all of these concerns is the health of the Mary River. The Mary River is an iconic artery that runs through the electorate and there are many issues that could have detrimental impacts on river flows, the estuarine areas, and the Great Sandy Straits. The flow of the Mary River is integral to the health of the seagrass fields in the heritage protected Great Sandy wetlands.
Just as the region is recovering from the Traveston Dam debacle, the Mary River faces threats from three massive open-cut coal mines alongside the Susan River tributary near Aldershot, at Tiaro, and Munna Creek. In addition, the State Government proposes to divert water from the Mary River.
Munna Creek in Wide Bay electorate flows into Mary River Photo: Jim McDonald
Would Mr Truss support the Federal Government rejecting State Government plans to transfer water from the Mary River to Brisbane by applying the Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act in a Coalition Government?
When is he going to stand up for the residents of Aldershot, and come out in opposition to plans to discharge coalmine waste-water into the river system, which might affect fisheries and the Great Sandy Strait?
Mr Truss has had a lot to say about bridges in the lead-up to the election, but we are yet to hear his views on the risks to the river of proposed bridges over the Mary River at Traveston Crossing, which is planned to follow the approximate line of the former proposed dam wall, and Coles Creek?
It is incontestable that waste water from coalmines, the groundwater effects on the Susan River of the Colton Coal Mine, and State Government water diversion will harm the environmental flows in the Mary River, affecting the marine environment in Hervey Bay and the Sandy Straits, and the tourist and fishing industries. The health of the Mary River is not something a responsible Member could remain silent about.
Letter published Gympie Times, Saturday, 31 July 2010
Posted by Jim on July 19, 2010
The Coalition is just not believable on industrial relations, The Greens candidate for Wide Bay, Jim McDonald, said today.
“Until we hear statements from key Coalition figures, including the Leader of the Nationals, that they will promote collective bargaining in the workplace there will always be a fear that an Abbott Government will reintroduce their oppressive workplace laws.
“Tony Abbott had hardly finished telling the electorate that the Coalition’s policy on workplace relations was dead when Senator Eric Abetz said the Coalition will tinker with Labor’s Fair Work laws.”
He said the central plank of The Greens’ policy on workplace relations is for a fair and equitable industrial relations system for all workers.
“Our policy on employment and industrial relations states that Australia’s future workforce must be highly skilled, highly trained and well paid. The existence of a safety net and the right to collectively bargain are essential to achieving these aims.
“The prosperity of the region is dependent on families whose wage earners have secure employment and decent working conditions.
“But the Coalition have always promoted individual contracts as a central plank of their workplace ideology. In putting Workchoices in place they took away many of the rights workers should enjoy under international labour conventions. Tony Abbott and Eric Abetz were key Coalition Ministers driving that policy.
“One of those rights was workers’ access to collective bargaining. And the current member for Wide Bay actively supported isolating workers in individual contracts.
“But the Coalition adopted double standards on collective bargaining,” he said.
“As the Agriculture Minister in the Howard Government, Mr Truss supported legislation to give farmers and small businesses some clout in negotiation against the large retailers.
“These are exactly the same arguments supporting collective bargaining for workers in the workplace. But in supporting Workchoices, he denied workers easy access to that same right.
“What every worker in Wide Bay is entitled to know is whether Mr Truss now recognises the benefits of collective bargaining for workers as well as small businesses.”
Dr McDonald said that for years research in Australia and around the world had been available that demonstrated that collective bargaining systems produced a more productive workforce.
“Despite that evidence, the Howard Government ignored the benefits of collective bargaining for ideological reasons, putting up slippery ‘choices’ for the average worker under Workchoices.”
Posted by Jim on June 29, 2010
Tiaro Coal Limited is focussing on the development of a coal mine at Munna Creek.
Munna Creek flows into Mary River Photo Jim McDonald
Munna Creek has a catchment area of 1475 square kilometres. There are problems with weeds infesting wetlands along its course. But, this Mary River tributary faces its greatest threat: the development of open cut coalmines.
The Greens oppose coal mines in the Wide Bay electorate. What’s your position, Mr Truss?
Comment: Jim McDonald, Greens Candidate for Wide Bay, 29 June 2010
We acknowledge and respect the traditional owners of this country and the land on which we stand