Bernie, I can't speak for the Greens, and certainly not anyone in Labor. But your theory about greens is incorrect.

Our current way of life is destroying our life support system. For example, Australia's soil is degrading almost everywhere. How can anyone advocate continuing that? Many big technologies are part of the reason for that. If we want our society and civilisation to survive, we must adjust our way of life so it sustains and improves the world we are totally dependent on. (No mystical beliefs there, no hankering for the past, just simple reality.) Thus my opposition is to certain technologies that are used destructively, or are intrinsically destructive.

GM boosters have a very narrow view. It ignores the ecological context and it is selective in its choice of evidence. Living ecologies are unpredictable because they are so complex. We can never know if there will be an unanticipated "side effect". We have many examples in our history - rabbits, cane toads, etc etc. This means first of all that we are conducting an (another) open experiment on the biosphere and ourselves. If the wrong genes jump to the wrong related wild organisms we could have (another) major problem on our hands.

The industry boosterism that characterises this issue (and most of our politics these days) ignores plenty of evidence, including testimony of farmers and, for example, extensive reports like that of the Institute of Science and Society http://www.i-sis.org.uk/foodFutures.php .
It documents many examples, in developed and developing countries, where GM has failed to deliver, or has caused major problems, both agricultural and social. It also shows that modern natural/organic methods can equal or exceed industrial-ag yields, with fewer problems and with the soil improving instead of degrading.

So I oppose GM because it is destructive and unnecessary. I hanker for a sensible future with appropriate technologies.

This article is quite welcome. There has neve been any substantial evidence against GM crops. If you ask any GM objector what evidence they have you are handed what amounts to an objection to roundup, a chemical used for all crops, and nothing to do with GM specifically. The objection that we don't know what side effects a GM crop may have can be said about almost anything, but when all is said and done GM wheat or whatever is simply another form of wheat. New strains of wheat are always being introduced. The only real difference is that GM wheat has been developed by other means. The case against GM products has always been virtually non-existent.
As for Greens being conservative, they are conservative where technology is involved. They hate technology: hence their objection to GM crops. There is no reason involved.

Farmers in the US are being destroyed. GM is the latest method of transferring profit from farmers to agribusiness.
Here is a video of the Iowan farmers meeting the night before the official anti-trust hearing.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O1axAqJGEXI The stories are heartbreaking. The first farmer tells about a 5 year battle to stop Monsanto patenting wheat. “If anything belongs in the public domain... it’s the crops we grow for food.”
A rice grower talks about being squeezed between the seed companies and the buyers. Input costs high and sale price is low.
A dairy farmer from Wisconsin tells of his parents’ 29th wedding anniversary being a farm foreclosure and their 30th being a Sherriff’s auction on the court house steps. A farmer in NY State shot his 51 cows and then himself.
The last farmer says the problems of big ag is a worldwide issue. That the Mexicans driven north to the US and the Sudanese workers in the packing factory are family farmers being driven out by what is happening.
Phil Howard from Michigan State University has done fantastic work to graphically show what is happening to farming in the US. If you click on the graphics you get more graphics and info. The dots with Monsanto, Dow etc written on them show the consolidation of the seed industry. The bottom right graphic “The Food System” shows in more detail the various technological and input treadmills.
https://www.msu.edu/~howardp/infographics.html
This report was published last year by US farmers to highlight the serious damage being done to them by GM seeds.
http://farmertofarmercampaign.com/Out%20of%20Hand.FullReport.pdf
It details the increased costs of seeds, of the inability to buy non-GM seeds or to buy the best genetics without GM traits being included (which can reduce yield), of small seed companies going out of business, of research into seeds being very limited, farmers being sued and of farmers having to destroy seed that did not have a market for. Usually they would have used it for planting the following year. Because it was patented they could not do that and had to destroy it.

GM is about corporate profits.

Here is the link to the farm graphics that didn't work in the previous post. Hopefully it will in this.
https://www.msu.edu/~howardp/infographics.html
If not copy it and it should work. The data is extremely revealing.

lillian - look back at your own comments. Hardly any of it relates to GM as such but a lot relates to problems in the agricultural sector. Sure farmers are being forced to sell, maybe some of them are blaming GM crops as an alternative to blaming themselves, but farm consolidation is world wide and was happening long before GM crops came along. The consolidation and reduction in farm land involves some sad stories it is true, but to give your case any credence you would have to prove that the process had been speeded up by the adoption of GM crops.
Another point is that you are using essentially a social justice argument to ban or restrict the use of a new form of crop, and that does not make a lot of sense. Farmers are always changing their crop mix - switching certain areas from crops to cows and back again. Or switching their crop mix. They do not have to grow certain types of crops, or can at least reduce their dependence.

Bernie Masters

Those who ignore past mistakes are bound to repeat them. I remind you of the most toxic chemicals ever manufactured – organochlorines and the cover-up of the scientific evidence by governments, industry and its sycophants for some 40 years.

The irrefutable evidence supplied by environmentalists was finally supported by the Stockholm Convention which saw a global ban on the “dirty dozen” including chlorinated chemicals. Furthermore, Australia’s continued use of chlorinated pesticides including Endosulfan is to its shame when over 60 nations (including developing countries) have banned this lethal product.

Since you are “a registered lobbyist with the government of Western Australia,” I would urge you to disclose this information when you write such articles. I also question why you have not informed the reader that all GM crops are dependent on Roundup (Glyphosate) or why the well known scientific evidence on the dangers of Roundup has been concealed by the proponents of GM crops?:

Scientists at the Laboratories for Estrogens and Reproduction Institute of Biology at the University of Caen France advised that they had evaluated the toxicity of four glyphosate (G)-based herbicides in Roundup formulations, from 10(5) times dilutions, on three different human cell types.

“This dilution level is far below agricultural recommendations and corresponds to low levels of residues in food or feed. All R formulations caused total cell death within 24 hours.

“……..This work clearly confirms that the adjuvants in Roundup formulations are not inert. Moreover, the proprietary mixtures available on the market could cause cell damage and even death around residual levels to be expected, especially in food and feed derived from R formulation-treated crops.

When our Cabinet Ministers and those with vested interests endeavour to assure an unwitting public of the "benefits" of GM crops by citing research papers specifically released by Monsanto et al, the general public have very good reason to be alert and alarmed.

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/19105591?ordinalpos=1&itool=EntrezSystem2.PEntrez.Pubmed.Pubmed_ResultsPanel.Pubmed_DefaultReportPanel.Pubmed_RVDocSum