The Great Vegatation Management Acts Debate begins.

G'day Agmates,

Well the debate is off and running - Click here to read part 1 of 16 of Professor Suri Ratnapala's paper that started the debate.

Let me first give a sample of the comments that made Agmates realize that Country & City folk alike aren't aware of the great issue here, that if you do not have secure Property Rights - you have nothing.

The indigenous community is just discovering this with the Federal Government over riding their Native Title to take back their land...to read why Aboriginals can't trust The PM click here to read a published paper by Peter Spencer Thinker, Author, Farmer and head of Commonwealth Property Rights to see the assurances the PM and Ministers gave farmers, (that turned out to be just lies) just the same as he is now doing to the indigenous community.

Below is a copy of just some of the printable comments that Agmates received in response to or article National chop a Tree day.

Thursday 28th June 2007
Anonymous said...
You greedy monsters make me sick.
We have precious little scrub left and if you had your way there would be none...I hope you get nothing..

Agmates Replied......

Thursday, June 28, 2007 10:56:00 AM EST
Agmates said...
Dear Anonymous,
Your comment that there is very little scrub left tells me that you live in the city. It is based on ignorant opinion, let me give you a couple of facts to consider before you verbal Australian farmers again.
QLD is the second largest state in Australia and in area is 1,852,642 square kilometres. Of that 81% or one and a half million square kilometres is covered in Scrub.
Only 10% of the land in the world is cleared for farming.
The house you live in, the street you drive down the suburb you live in was all once scrub.
All the food you eat my friend is produced off "cleared land". The cotton clothing you wear is produced off cleared land, the milk, eggs, bread and cheese you eat is all produced off cleared land. The wine or beer you drink is produced off cleared land.
So my friend have your way and let all of the scrub grow back - just be prepared to live in a forest as a hunter, gatherer living as the Aboriginals or native American Indians did 200 years ago.
Your hatred of the very people who produce the food you eat and the clothing you wear is curious.
Where does that come from - I'd be interested to know?


Thursday, June 28, 2007 12:13:00 PM EST
Anonymous said...
Bullshit mate, about half of the mature tropical forests, between 750 to 800 million hectares of the original 1.5 to 1.6 billion hectares that once covered the planet have been felled. Since about the mid 1800s the Earth is experiencing an unprecedented rate of change of destruction of forests worldwide. Unless significant measures are taken on a world-wide basis to preserve them, by 2030 there will only be ten percent remaining with another ten percent in a degraded condition. 80 percent will have been lost and with them the irreversible loss of hundreds of thousands of species

And another comment, and this one really got me thinking......

Friday, June 29, 2007 1:15:00 PM EST
Anonymous said...
It can take a tree hundreds of years to grow and establish itself in an ecology and in one day you're destroying that. You say you are a farmer or a person fighting for farmers, people of the land, then why harm the land that feeds and supports you?
I beg you, think beyond your self interest to the interest of your children and not your pockets of land. The planet is here to be shared by all, regardless of right or government, so please, don't take part in this childish protest!
I struggle to understand how seemingly well educated businessmen can think that this sort of protest will help them with their cause? All you are doing is making ALOT of people angry and losing their respect. Your "chop a tree" day will not help you...for the sake of your children having trees to climb in and for the sake of our national pride, reconsider your actions or you'll go down in history as one more narrow minded, backwoods hick Australian, just like Pauline Hanson did.
Agmates, you cite many examples of the land "feeding us" various products, but at what cost to the topsoil and native Australian environment? Alot of outdated European farming practices are still all over our land, destroying the topsoil and eroding the small amount of arable land we have here. Please don't cite those examples as justification for destroying even more of our ecology, you look like a hypocrite in my opinion.
I'm no expert, but from the outside looking in, like most of the public, this protest looks driven by self interest at the detriment to the country and environment and you will garner little support and fewer friends by going through with it.
Please reconsider.

Agmates Reply -

Friday, June 29, 2007 1:42:00 PM EST
Agmates said...
Dear Anonymous,
Thank you both for taking the time to respond.

You have to ask yourself why are farmers resorting to cutting down trees as a form of civil disobedience? Because they are redneck, environmental vandals, greedy monsters, infidels who left unchecked will destroy the planet?
Perhaps we should have a Jihad on every Australian farmer.

No they are resorting to "Civil disobedience", because the Vegetation Management Acts in each State of Australia is not only a threat to their lively hoods and way of life but to our (your) very liberal democracy.

Why has this happened? Let me give you both a brief extract of the work of Learned Professor Suri Ratnapala of the University of QLD (UQ)in a paper he wrote (I'll publish this in a full article soon)

"CONSTITUTIONAL VANDALISM UNDER GREEN COVER"
Click on the link the read the full paper which is the core of why farmers are taking this extreme action.

And the reply Agmates got from our anonymous, reasonable and intelligent reader -

Friday, June 29, 2007 7:12:00 PM EST
Anonymous said...
Steve, "Agmates",

The concerns that you quote from that report on how the government are dealing with environmental management seem valid and on that front, I agree. You are not alone of course, how the government regulates mental health, regional services, mens health issues vs female health issues, domestic violence and more recently aboriginal affairs, are done with sweeping generalisations that will be to the detriment of many. Hopefully not the majority, but to many, regardless.
So what are you trying to achieve with your chop a tree day?
You have problems with the way the government is regulating environmental concerns...so you can:
a) highlight your concerns through mass media
b) show clear examples of how the regulations are unfair or...
c) clear old growth, protected trees and get the vast majority of the Australian public angry at farmers....

hmmm...

okok, thats an oversimplification, but as I have stated already, for your own sake, please reconsider your goals and how you are trying to achieve them...this protest will not help you get the public on side It will not make environmental legislation a topic for the next election, and the government will not cave because you chop a few trees...
Bring these poorly provisioned legislation's to the public, woo them to your cause and fight for better policy after the next election. You wont make any friends by cutting down protected trees unless you give more information to the public about what you are trying to achieve, and the mass media are more interested in sensationalising what you are doing than reporting the facts...surprise surprise...

Please, reconsider...This illegal felling of protected trees (as opposed to "civil disobedience" as you put it) will not help the plight of your farmers!

Agmates response
Sunday, July 1, 2007 1:11:00 PM EST

Dear Anonymous -

Thank you for you thoughtful reply. You are right on the money with your comments and here's why:

Anonymous -"Bring these poorly provisioned legislation's to the public,"
Agmates - Exactly what we are trying to do, we want people to know how dangerous this piece of legislation is to ALL AUSTRALIANS not just Farmers, Aboriginals are now just finding out that if Fee Simple does not exist then any other form of title (Native Title) has no security at all.

Anonymous - "woo them to your cause and fight for better policy after the next election".
Agmates - Farmers believe in looking after their environment (their future and families future depends on it), but the Vegetation Management Act's don't achieve that outcome - farmers want them removed and replaced with a sustainable and workable Legislation - BUT we cannot wait until after the election - If Kevin Rudd and his Labour team would come out with a policy to scrap the VMA's and start a fresh he'd get every rural vote in Australia.

Anonymous - "You wont make any friends by cutting down protected trees unless you give more information to the public about what you are trying to achieve",
Agmates - We agree with you 100% - We want to inform the entire population of Australia about how unjust and dangerous the VMA legislation is.

Please stay with us as we discuss Suri Ratnapala's paper "Constitutional Vandalism under Green Cover" over the coming weeks. This paper although not the only paper on the threat of the VMA legislation, it is perhaps the most succinct.

We have 1,000's of farmers across Australia watching this discussion, We are inviting anyone to participate including Professor Ratnapala, The Australian Institutes Dr Clive Hamilton, former CSIRO top scientist Don Burrows, NSW Minister for Climate Change and the Environment Phillip Koperberg, QLD & NSW Premiers Beattie & Iemma, Environment Minister Malcolm Turnbull, Labours Shadow Environment Minister Peter Garrett, the indigenous Land Councils Noel Pearson, Aboriginal Housing's Mick Mundine, WWF's Reece Turner and CPPA's Peter Spencer as well as farmers, conservationists and urban dwellers.

Anonymous - "and the mass media are more interested in sensationalising what you are doing than reporting the facts...surprise surprise..."
Agmates - You are spot on the money here. Unfortunately that is how the system works - Unless the mainstream media find something sensational that sells newspapers, they are just not interested. Farmers battle to have the mainstream Rural Media report on their issues. Farmers have been trying for 10 years to get the mainstream media to cover this issue, but they are only interested in reporting the Green side of the argument. The Green lobby is amazingly well funded and resourced.

But now we have this amazing medium of the Internet and true freedom of speech, we no longer can be "stone walled" by the popular press.

Thanks for your contribution and Welcome to the debate

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Your Agmate - Steve
Agmates - 100% Pro Australin farmers.