Not the wrong thread at all 'Humanity' Bob will soon be in a position to use his influence to change all this, and he can act to save the forests and whatever else he sets his heart on.
Of course he might risk a double dissolution if he does.

Which way will he go?

I must agree Pelican that the Labor Party has lost it's way on the environment.
The Liberal National parties, have always been a disgrace, when it comes to the
preservation of wilderness.

The Tarkine is obviously of more national (even world) importance, than the jobs of people employed by interests
wishing too mine or deforest the area for pulp.

A Carbon tax maybe not be the right solution , but is at least a beginning, as I have said in other posts, it will take the courage of a Gov't that makes polluters pay , but in the context of this post, it will also take the courage of a Gov't to preserve remaining wilderness area's regardless of whether people are allowed to go there or not.

The Labor party has lost it's way or lost it's bottle for the harder more important things to mean much anymore. It's still the best of two evils Pelican, with the Opposition lurking, decrepit and self interested, just wishing for an opportunity to deny climate change or fail to understand the intrinsic value of wilderness, in favour of their friends Big Business, just as here in Victoria, where the new State Gov't demonstrates their cred by wanting to plonk some 5 star hotels on the pristine Wilson,s Promontory.

Where too from here ?, that is the question Pelican.

pelican:>>SOG So you think the heritage protection should be removed?<<

Absolutely not, how you could discern that from my post is a mystery to me.

>> The Greens may be too big for their boots but no more than any other political party who thinks they have a mandate.<<

Unfortunately pelican I can see no merit in any of the current left or green ecology policies, they are dancing to the music arranged by the polluters surely, as they mirror the Club of Rome’s strategy to move the burden of the cost of cleaning the environment from the manufacturers to the end users. If you do not understand this, you are only regurgitating an absorbed ideology, no offence.

I would really love to take all these greenies 5 kilometers int some real wilderness, & leave them there.

If any of them ever got out, they would be wilderness haters for the rest of their lives.

I spent quite a bit of time exploring WW11 sights in the tropic islands in the Pacific. People who talk about fragile wilderness are talking through their hats. It's the buildings of man that are fragile.

If I had not had some locals to guide me I would not have been able to find, [& recognise] the remains of some major bases, which had large engineering capacity, during the war. That was only 30 years after the war.

But I'm sure that you can see the point of my question, pelican.

>>Pericles It became not alright when the rate of destruction grew exponentially with greater pressures on resources through industrialisation and population growth.<<

But when exactly was that?

And according to whom?

Whichever way you cut it, the point at which it became (or will become) "not all right" is entirely a matter of personal opinion, is it not?

>>Of course there are less forests now than in the early 1900s. There was no need for a cause. People don't protest where there is nothing to protest is the simplest way I can put it.<<

So at what point did the number of forests cause them to become a cause?

>>To argue there is no line where the rate of destruction works against human interest rather than for it is just plain wrong. Perhaps we just disgree that NOW is the line in the sand.<<

Well yes. Almost.

If you are not able to argue that enough is indeed enough, it is almost certainly because you have defined the problem too loosely to measure it.

Which is the one and only point I am trying to make. Unless you are able to establish with clarity a measurement that everyone can look at and say "ah yes, now I understand", you will continue to operate on the fringes, and be nothing but a nagging voice in the background.

And the sad fact is that nagging voices tend to blur into an annoying background drone after a while.

You cannot, unfortunately, simply keep chanting the same old "woe is me, woe is us" routine, and expect everyone to suddenly fall in line and agree with you. It is necessary to make it important to them too.

That's how we human beings operate.

There is a tendency to align any discussion about forest preservation with radicalism. It is only 'radical' because the status quo has been to put economic interests over sustainability and population health.

The Government proposes a tax and with the same stroke of a pen removes the protection from the Tarkine. Parts of the Tarkine and areas around it are already home to some mining interests. I reckon the mix is already a bridge too far.

Removing protection from the rest of the park will only exacerbate a global forest problem.

Forests absorb carbon dioxide and measures to reduce carbon do not have to sit entirely with economic mechanisms and the emissions end. What about the absorption aspect?

"Africa, which accounts for about 16 per cent of the world's forests, lost more than 9 per cent of its trees between 1990 and 2005... In Latin America and the Caribbean, home to nearly half of the world's forests, 0.5 per cent of the forests were lost every year between 2000 and 2005 - up from an annual net rate of 0.46 per cent in the 1990s."

http://www.independent.co.uk/environment/destruction-of-forests-in-developing-world-out-of-control-440122.html

While there has been some plantings in the form of plantation timber, this is not long term and there are different merits in old growth as opposed to new growth forests in terms of biodiversity.

The pressures on forest due to farming, oil and other mining or timber production need to be addressed. Apparently the North end of the Tarkine is being reserved for logging. The trend is to go into these forests and take out mixed species but then to replant with only one species.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2008/jul/01/forests.conservation
http://www.reuters.com/article/2008/09/24/us-climate-deforestation-un-enviro-idUSTRE48N91C20080924

The rate of destruction according to a UN report has declined but still continues at a rate not considered sustainable.

http://www.un.org/apps/news/story.asp?NewsID=34195

Hasbeen
The whole point of preserving jungles and forests is not to encourage people to live in them. They are harsh places, home to many animal species, humans do not have to be ever-present in all habitats.

Humans benefit long term from retention of forests and greater biodiversity.

More about the Tarkine.

http://tarkine.com.au/