CJ, thanks for the Lavartus Prodeo link. I haven’t read all 327 comments, but I think I’ve got a good handle on the subject. I must say, I haven’t really learnt anything new compared to what I understood previously.

Firstly, regarding Peter Spencer’s involvement with National Chop Down a Tree Day, I don’t agree that freehold landowners should have exclusive rights to manage their vegetation. But I do appreciate his concerns about the overriding of freehold principles and about the government acting in a manner that is not in keeping with our constitution. I support him when it comes to the rule of law being upheld. So I don’t think it is as bad as you apparently do.

From the Lavartus Prodeo article: ‘Tower of hope or vale of tears’ by Brian2:

<< So the burden does not fall equally and in some cases threatens viability. Peter Spencer’s experience appears to be one such case. >>

YES, absolutely! There absolutely must be compensation to at least try and even up the burden a bit and not lump some people with critical consequences while others don’t get affected at all.

<< …wherever there is a cost incurred in the public interest, the public, as the beneficiary, should logically bear it. >>

YES! So the taxpayer should have to fork out for compensation!

<< [former Justice Ian ] Callinan points out that people may be rewarded financially for planting trees, but apparently not for being required by law to let them grow.

Callinan sees the fair and equitable sharing of expense from environmental and planning law “as a real challenge to the legislatures and the courts, including the High Court as the constitutional court, for 2008 and beyond. >>

Sure, it is a challenge. But whatever attempts are made, it has surely GOT to be better than just locking up peoples’ livelihoods and saying, ‘no, you'll get nothing for your loss’!

That is just rotten. It is communistic and totally antidemocratic!

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<< Joyce says the farmers should be compensated. Tanner says compensation would be massive. Joyce says that just goes to show how much has been taken from farmers. >>

Very good point Barnaby!

Yes, full compensation would be very expensive. So how about a middle-ground solution – half compensation?

From the 3rd post, by PeterJ:

<< First, the real scam in this is that much of the land that has been locked up would probably never have been cleared and certainly not “clear felled”. So our dishonest politicians used carbon that was never going to enter the system to offset what the coal industry (as an example) is putting out. >>

Absabloodylootely! In fact, this is a scam upon a scam! Firstly, the whole land-clearing connection to carbon emissions reductions is being grossly abused by Rudd, because it is simply allowing other enormous sections of the emissions picture to just go on unabated. That is, to go on EXPANDING unabated - coal mining, big industry, Rudd’s massively continuous increase in the number of fossil fuel consumers and polluters in this country, etc.

While it is good to bring an end to broadacre clearing for environmental reasons, it is atrocious that our leader can see fit to use this as an excuse to allow the other enormous polluters to continue with business as usual.

Jesus F Christ, this is disgusting!

<< Second, on Peter Spencer’s situation specifically, he didn’t want to clear fell his land. As I understand it, he wanted to thin regrowth and restore the previously pastured areas. In other words, he wanted to restore it to much the same condition that the aborigines had maintained it in. >>

Whether or not he wanted to restore it to pre-European vegetation is irrelevant. He wanted to restore it to its former productive state, at least in part, as was his right at the time he purchased the place.

While I support tree-clearing legislation in principle, he should have been able to do that, or otherwise be duly compensated.

Ludwig I am no Christian.
But find your needless use of that term as offensive as the American one referring to sex with ones mother.
I have ALWAYS seen you as a bright person, never once thought you had problems understanding issues.
But bloke you very much do.
In your blind dislike of Rudd and labor you mount the horse back wards.
Did you from that thread see dates? did you understand Howard had much more to do with it than labor and Rudd very little.
And states involvement LONG BEFORE federal Labor came to power?
Do you understand Joyce got more flack from his side than Tanner? or that he retracted it/
Bloke I need not speak of how wrong you are on this issue, now even more than raw mustard you show it here.
And last how long has understanding an issue not been needed before commenting on it?
Sorry bloke yet again I find the thread funny and sad re read it Worth it I promise end on the Australians story last Friday, enjoy.

Ludwig, Belly's quite correct that your hatred of Rudd seems to be colouring your judgement. It was the Howard government that first factored anti-land clearing laws into quasi-Kyoto calculations, not Rudd. And as you acknowledge, the laws were enacted well prior to Kyoto, so the nonsense about Spencer and others having had something 'stolen' from them because of AGW is shown to be just that.

Frankly, I'm surprised at your attitude as an environmentalist to the execrable 'National Chop Down a Tree Day'. I can think of few nastier symbolic and actual actions by the rednecks towards the environment than that occasion. It was pure evironmental vandalism, whether or not you sympathise with the misguided vandals who participated.

I note that you have much to say about compensating farmers, but you ignore my point about their liability for the environmental damage they cause. The sorry mess that is the Murray-Darling Basin is clearly the result of unsustainable agricultural practices, and we taxpayers will be footing the bill for remediation for decades. Ditto for GBR. You want us to pay to repair the damage that agriculturalists are responsible for, and also to compensate them for not wrecking the environment.

There is a relatively simple answer to the problems of landowners who want compensation for not clearing native vegetation and regrowth - and it's an Emissions Trading Scheme. Farmers could be granted a one-off initial credit for such lands, that they could sell to emitters like power stations, refineries etc. Of course, the corollary to that is that agricultural emissions could not be exempt.

Funny, nobody seems to want talk about that solution.

Ludwig I do hope you return and address my claims, ignoring the fact you may have got it wrong is not hiding the truth.
I am reminded of a workmate of many years.
He had the back out of his favorite overalls.
A photo was taken after months of seeing too much, his remark?
you are only trying to embarrass me!
He for too long did not share the sight we saw.
Theda talks about starving? how long have just we talked about this bloke, near death.
Take the short odds the bloke has food up there.

CJ, I do indeed have a depth of feeling about Rudd that could be described as hatred. But it is totally justified. I’ve also consistently said that the Libs and Labs are peas in a pod. They are just as bad as each other. But Rudd pulls the strings that are leading us so strongly in the opposite direction to a sustainable and healthy future. So he rightly deserves the highest level of lambastery.

I note that you have levelled this criticism at me without offering any response to my comments in relation to Rudd, as presented in my last post.

Yes it was Howard who first factored anti-land clearing laws into quasi-Kyoto calculations. But so what? Rudd is now in control.

<< …so the nonsense about Spencer …having had something 'stolen' from them because of AGW is shown to be just that. >>

No it isn’t. Just because the original motivation in preventing the clearing of regrowth was not climate change related, doesn’t mean that it isn’t now. Rudd, in upholding the theft conducted under Howard, or NSW Premier Bob Carr, whichever the case may have been in relation to Spencer, is just as bad… or rather, he is worse, as it is beholden on him to address things like this that are so obviously disgraceful.

My views on Peter Spencer are not black and white. I don’t totally support him. I certainly do sympathise with his concerns about the government essentially taking his livelihood and offering no compensation, and about the constitutional conflict and basic principle-of-law violation therein, but I think that the ‘national chop down a tree’ approach to protesting about this is a most unfortunate way of addressing the issue. I don’t like it, but I’m not willing to label it as << pure environmental vandalism >>.

I don’t agree with him that freehold landowners should have total rights to their vegetation management, but neither should they be prevented from viably managing a property, or clearing near buildings in order to prevent wildfire from destroying everything, which is one of Peter’s gripes.

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