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ISSUE 3 2008WWW.NSW.GREENS.ORG.AU

THE OLYMPICS, HUMAN RIGHTS AND GLOBAL WARMING p7

THE REAL IMPACTS OF RISING SEA LEVELS IN SYDNEY p10

Frank Sartor is the most power-ful Planning Minister in NSW his-tory. The state Labor government has re-written the state’s planning laws to take most development decisions out of the hands of your local council and put them into the hands of the Planning Minis-ter, Mr Sartor.

Over the past five years NSW Labor has also taken $9.9 million in political dona-tions from property developers, raising questions as to whether this power grab is payback for funding that helped Labor win the last state election.

Under the new laws, Minister Sartor can now ‘call-in’ most development applica-tions, which means he takes the decision away from local councils and gives himself the power to approve developments.

The Minister can ignore existing environment or heritage protections, does not have to take into ac-count the views of the lo-cal community, and can even dismiss the recom-mendations of indepen-dent planning panels and his own department.

In recent years, Mr Sar-tor has done all of these things. When decisions were overturned by a Court he has simply changed the regula-tions to allow developments to proceed de-spite the legal ruling.

Why has Labor given so much power to one man? The new planning laws are what property development industry wanted. $9.9 million buys a lot of electoral advertising for the Labor Party, substantially more than the

NSW Liberal Party who took $5.8 million in dona-tions from developer over the same five year period and voted for some of the bad planning laws.

Many communities are alarmed at this use of these extreme planning powers. Mr Sartor has approved major devel-opments that would not

have gained approval under existing envi-ronment and heritage protections. Major property developers donated over $2 mil-lion to the NSW Labor Party while the Minister was making decisions about their development applications. Not surprising-ly, these developments were all approved.

On multiple occasions Mr Sartor has over-ruled recommendations from an indepen-dent inquiry or his own department to

approve applications from Labor Party donors.

State Labor MP Jodi Mackay failed to dis-close that over $50,000 worth of her cam-paign expenditure during the last state elec-tion was paid for by the property developer Buildev, which was awaiting approval from Mr Sartor for a major residential project.

What’s to be done? The Greens do not accept donations from property developers on principle. By vot-ing Green at the September 13 local gov-ernment elections you will help break the corrupting influence of political donations by developers.

The Greens will work to return decision-making power to the community. The more Greens on council, the stronger the community’s voice against developments that damage our environment and our community.

ELECTION ISSUE! LOCAL COUNCIL ELECTIONS ON SEPTEMBER 13

GREENS WORKING ON COUNCILS AROUND NSW

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Development by Dictatorship

The Greens have helped establish and extend a net-work of cycleways linking to neighbouring Councils and Mora during her May-oral term hosted a family bike day at Bondi Beach and travelled around the municipality on her May-oral bike. The council has also started Regular E-waste recycling.

The Greens on Council have consistently voted against overdevelopment and for consistent ap-plication of planning in-struments, to ensure that modern built form is com-patible with existing village character and respectful of heritage values.

Mora was the first green Mayor in Waverley and Dominic Wy Kanak is cur-rently the first indigenous deputy Mayor of Waverley.

independent councillors) and insisting that the concerns of local residents are heard when a major development is proposed.

Greens councillors have supported a more transparent process for councils to decide development applications. We sup-port developments that meet agreed local planning and sustainability requirements and do not threaten our environment, heritage or amenity.

The Greens have taken the lead in showing that our communities are multicultural, di-verse and tolerant, with initiatives like the asylum seeker program, refugee support programs, and the establishment of aborig-inal consultative positions on councils.

Greens councillors are committed to working hard to make our local councils cleaner, fairer and more responsive to what residents want and need to make our communities better places to live for our friends, our families and ourselves.

When you vote for your local council this September, don’t forget that a healthy Council needs its Greens.

GreenVoice is published by The Greens NSW.The Greens NSW, GPO Box 1220, Sydney 2001 p 02 / 9519 0877 • f 02 / 9519 2177 • e office@nsw.greens.org.au • www.nsw.greens.org.au

All copyright remains with the authors. An opinion expressed in GreenVoice is not necessarily the opinon of The Greens NSW unless specifically stated. To enquire about writing for or contributing to GreenVoice contact the Greens.

Authorised by James Diack, 19 Eve St, Erskineville 2042. Designed by Elisabeth Bischofer at direttissima. Printed by Torch Publishing, 47 Allingham St, Condell Park on 100% recycled paper.

At the last local government elections the people of NSW more than doubled the number of elected Greens councillors. Over 60 Greens were elected as coun-cillors, to more than 30 councils. Those Greens councillors have succeeded in bringing forward new ideas about how to strengthen our local communities by making them cleaner, fairer, stronger and more sustainable.

Greens councillors have led the way by ini-tiating and supporting programs aimed at improving energy and water efficiency, bet-ter protecting our open spaces, bushlands, coastal zones and waterways, improving access to public transport and cycleways and providing better childcare centres, li-braries and other community services.

The Greens have led the way in opposing inappropriate development of our towns and suburbs by refusing to accept political donations from property developers (un-like Liberal, Labor, National, and many

Greens Local Councillors Making our communities better places to live

He and only he decides whether you should have a coal mine next to you, a fifteen-storey office block, or maybe a shopping centre instead of your local park – or why not a concrete parking station! Oh and yes, that Heritage listed building will have to go, because some de-veloper has better ideas.Meet Mr Sartor. He has become the virtu-al dictator of what happens in your region.Don’t councils decide things like this?

No, Frank does. Frank knows best. NSW Labor knows best. Trust us. By the way, we’ve also introduced private certifiers to legitimise Frank’s decisions. Who ap-points these certification experts? Frank does of course. He is the ref, the umpire, the judge and the jury. So Frank is very busy, but he’s coping quite well because he has a very important piece of legislation to back up every deci-sion he makes on your behalf. It’s called Part 3A: The Environmental Planning and Assessment Act. Only the Greens opposed it. Marrickville Greens councillor Fiona Burns and a local resident having a chat over the fence.

Bulldozing your neighbourhood soon: Sartor and the Labor Party donors from the big end of town.

Greens councillors have been on Waverley Coun-cil for 13 years and have been in a share of govern-ment for the last 9. Coun-cillors Dominic Wy Ka-nak, George Copeland and Mora Main have had many achievements including the first on-street car-share

program in Sydney and initiating heritage listing for Bondi Beach Park and Pavilion. They have intro-duced an ethical investment program and sustainability in Waverley’s management plan as well as a Council Sustainability Committee.

Waverley Greens councillors Mora Main and Dominc Wy Kanak.

Waverley’s Green heritage

www.democracy4sale.orgFind out all the real figures about donations to all political parties

WHO GIVES WHAT?

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High-tech bicycle sha-ring schemes that have been a success in Eu-rope are being touted as part of the answer to high petrol prices, cli-mate change and Syd-ney’s transport crisis.

Over the past year, Paris has rolled out a bicycle sharing program consisting of 16,000 bicycles at 1,200 bicycle stations every hun-dred metres throughout the city. This has resulted in a 5% drop in motor vehicle traffic, with 190,000 users and 26 million bicycle trips taken in the first year.

Bicycle sharing was pio-neered on a smaller scale in other cities, such as Lyon, Barcelona, Copenhagen and Vienna.

Users of the bicycle shar-ing system buy a smart card and then swipe this at a docking station to release a bike. The bicycles have electronic tagging technolo-gy that allows the system to keep track of each bicycle and even know when they need repair. Users who fail to return a bicycle forfeit a $200 deposit and may not use the system again.

The Average trip of the Paris Velib bicycle shar-ing system is 18 minutes. Many Parisians use it to commute to work, make short shopping trips or to visit friends. It is also a hit with the tourists.

There is a growing recog-nition that too many cars spoil urban life. Together with the obesity epidemic, sky-rocketing oil prices and climate change this means cities all over the world are looking for transport alternatives. Mayors from

around the world have vis-ited Paris with an eye to replicating the system.

Washington DC is the first North American city to roll out bicycle sharing. Mon-treal will have 2,400 bikes at 300 stations by 2009, and many other cities, includ-ing New York and hilly San Francisco are investigating the schemes.

“Sydney should seriously investigate in a Paris style bicycle sharing program to reduce car use and improve urban life,” says Max Phil-lips, a Greens candidate for Marrickville Council.

“Bicycle sharing is not for every area, but should suit the City of Sydney and dense inner suburbs”.

“Councils and governments need to reduce their infatu-ation with building more roads and invest in better cycleways and paths, bicy-cle parking areas and end-of-trip facilities,” he said.

Bicycle trips are up 70% in a single year in Paris. Statistics show that more cyclists on the road means less accidents as motorists become more aware and infrastructure improves.

“The Greens hope that one day soon Sydney cyclists will reach a critical mass that not only improves the environment, but also helps people become healthier and improves quality of life,” said Mr Phillips.

The Velib bicycle sharing scheme in Paris is run by French company JC De-caux, who already do much of Sydney’s street furniture, bus stops and advertising boards. It built and main-tains the Velib system with about 350 workers, in re-turn for advertising rights on street furniture.

High-Tech Bicycle Sharing

One million cases of food poisoning each year in NSW are not enough to get the Iemma government to adopt world’s best ‘name and shame’ res-taurant laws. Instead of taking a lead from California, New York and the UK, where the results of the lat-est hygiene inspection are posted on the food

outlet door and on the internet, NSW Food Minister Ian Macdon-ald caved in to indus-try pressure.

Diners in this state will have to check a website to find out if their chosen ven-ue has been issued with a penalty notice. Just because an outlet is absent from the penalty page does not mean it is safe. Many restaurants have not been inspected for years, if ever.

NSW gets second rate restaurant lawsIemma government refuses to adopt world’s best practise

Greens NSW MP John Kaye said:

“Minister Macdonald has given this state second rate laws that leave diners un-protected from restaurants that have not been recently inspected.”

Food Authority website: www.foodauthority.nsw.gov.au/penalty-notices

To find out more:

www.john.greens.org.au/safe-food

A Velib bicycle sharing station. There are four times as many bicycle stations than Metro train stops in Paris.

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inspiring protests I’d been to for a long time. Now, that was a real World Youth Day.

Dale Mills is a volunteer with Human Rights Monitors.

To find out more about them, go to:www.humanrightsmonitors.org

the following evening protest or-ganisers told the police that they were going ahead with a peace-ful protest, handing out leaflets of their choosing with no promises given as to censorship. The police backed down, perhaps having re-ceived their own legal advice.

The protest was held on a sunny

by Dale Mills

On Tuesday the 15th July, the Federal Court deliv-ered its judgement on the legality of a special Min-isterial regulation that would forbid “annoying Catholic pilgrims”. The World Youth Day Act, which passed with little public-ity in the Government Gazette a week or so before the Pope ar-rived, was essentially intended to provide commercial protec-tion for the profits of Catholic merchandise.

The Ministerial regulations re-sulting from the Act were chal-lenged by two activists in the No To Pope coalition. Lawyers for the two argued that taking away basic rights could be done by Parliament, but the intention of the law had to be clear and ‘an-noying’ was not clear enough to be enforceable. The Court agreed unanimously and the annoying regulation was ruled invalid.

To add insult to victory, a day after the Federal Court decision the No To Pope organiser Rachel Evans received a letter from the NSW Police imposing a number of “conditions” on the protest. This defined what sort of leaflets could be handed out, what plac-ards and posters could be used, and other restrictions.

Legal advice was that the po-lice did not have the power to insist on such “conditions” and

Court backs Right to Dissent Annoying Legislation defeated in Federal Court

The Southern Highlands Greens first ran a candidate for Wingecarribee Council in 2004 and got Jim Clark elected.

Whilst he found himself in a minority position on many issues, with the help of other progressive councilors, Jim has been able to put forward

Wingecarribee shifts towards sustainability

many positive motions and influenced policy direction. Some of the group’s most notable efforts have includ-ed opposition to the sale of council parks and reserves where they were successful in having the majority of parks removed from the sale list. They were also actively involved in the campaign to prevent local ground water being extracted to pipe to the city.

The role the Greens play in provoking discussion and debate on issues is vital to the council at large.

The traditional conserva-tive position in Wingecarri-bee has been challenged by Jim and other like-minded candidates and they have witnessed the shifting sup-port of other councilors to-wards environmental sus-tainability and appropriate development.

Greens Councillor Jim Clark

TODAY COAL

TOMORROW SOLAR

HELP DECIDE OUR CLIMATE FUTURE

Saturday afternoon at Sydney’s Taylor Square in Oxford Street.People were very inventive, pro-ducing their own slogans for home-made t-shirts.

Human Rights Monitors, who col-lect evidence of police misbehav-iour at protests, noted the “usual problems”. There was massive

over-policing, the use of horses who sometimes got worryingly close to people’s feet, a buzzing overhead helicopter, and many police officers refusing to wear their identification badges.

Despite the police special pow-ers and the over-policing at Tay-lor Square, it was one of the most

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A sustainable home doesn’t have to cost a million bucks

I’m telling you this simply to let you know that if I can do it, anybody can do it. While there remains more to be done, Leilani is now far more comfortable and I’ve reduced the daily average energy use from around 13kWh to just 3. And my partner and I have most of the “mod cons” in this very normal home. I now sell the “green” power I generate from the solar panels back to my supplier, Energy Australia, and they buy it back at the same rate I pay them for the power I draw from the grid. It’s worked pretty well over the years and my last elec-tricity bill was just $40 for the quarter.

In summer, Energy Australia sometimes owes me money... Wouldn’t you like that! Last year I had to renegotiate my arrange-ment and they eventually agreed to contin-ue the previous agreement. At the conclu-sion, the representative said: “Mr Meloy, if everyone was like you, we’d go broke.” I’d rather break an energy company than an ice cap. Wouldn’t you?

Zero Emission Homes“Within 10 years, every new home will be a zero-carbon home and we will be the first country ever to make this commitment.” Unfortunately this state-ment was not made by Kevin Rudd in 2008 but by British Prime Minister Gordon Brown in 2006.

The UK Government has intro-duced a ‘Code for Sustainable Homes’ that legislates binding regulations for energy reduction with staggered targets: 25 per cent more efficient by 2010, 44 per cent by 2013, and 100 per cent (or zero emissions) by 2016.

The California Public Utilities Commission is also pushing for new housing developments to be “zero net energy” by 2020. Commissioner Dian Grueneich said the goals are attainable. “I wouldn’t have put this out there if I didn’t think it was possible,” she said. “A lot of the technology already exists.”

Even in the face of the climate crisis, Australian governments have been too timid to set such goals. In NSW, Local Councils are actively prevented from man-dating energy efficiency regula-tions beyond the state govern-ment BASIX standards.

What does a zero-emission house look like?Making use of the sun and shade are very important. The correct orientation to the North makes the most out of the sun in winter,

with awnings, pagodas and decid-uous trees or creepers to provide shade in summer.

Insulation and the thermal mass of the house help regulate temperature. New buildings will not only feature internal insulation, but will be insulated from the ground as well. Triple glazed, well sealed windows help retain heat. Drafts and air leaks are minimised.

Fresh air is brought in via a ‘thermal bridge’ to ensure no heat loss or gain. A mechani-cal system sucks moist, stale air out of the rooms through dis-creet vents, passes it over cool, fresh air from outside in order to maintain most of the heat, and then pumps the clean, warm air, back into the house.

Solar hot water systems are a proven technology that can save 30% of household energy use. Smart meters are a digital dis-play on the wall that allows you to monitor energy use in real time and change consumption patterns. It also allows remote control of certain appliances. These have already been rolled out to every house in Italy. Solar photo voltaic panels can provide electricity. Surplus energy can be fed into the grid or stored by battery or fuel cell.

Small wind turbines can be an option for certain rural areas, but urban landscapes tend to baffle the air flow too much.

If cold and wet Britain is aim-ing for zero emission houses, shouldn’t Australia do the same?

Some scientists are speculating that the summer Arctic ice cap may completely disappear this year for the first time in over a million years, and many decades sooner than the worst scenarios predicted by climate models.

So what’s this got to do with my house, you ask? Well, not much really. To be honest, I’d be really disappointed if it did, given that I’ve spent the last 9 years gradually turning Leilani into a “sustainable” house so it is not responsible for CO2 emissions contributing to rapid climate change.

1999 was a memorable year for me. From my vantage point as a local government en-vironmental planner, after years of seeing all three levels of government completely unwilling to address climate change and global warming, I joined the Greens and decided to become politically active. And I bought “Leilani”.

Leilani is no modern, architect-designed, million-dollar solar passive house. If it were, I wouldn’t have been able to afford to buy it. It is also no “McMansion”. If it were, I wouldn’t have chosen to buy it. The day I moved in I decided that if I was going to start telling people there were real alter-

natives to how most of us were currently (unsustainably) living then I’d better make sure that I actually lived those “real al-ternatives”, and that what I professed was both practical and attainable for “ordi-nary” people on “ordinary” incomes living in “ordinary” homes.

Leilani was built in the 1950s, extended in the 1980s, and, like homes of that time, was not energy efficient. Leilani’s thermal performance was also pretty average. By that I mean that it was bloody hot in sum-mer and bloody freezing in winter. Pretty average! In the intervening 9 years Leilani has had a makeover but like no makeover that you’ll ever see on commercial TV. It features 100% ’green power’, solar panels, solar hot water, insulation, ceiling fans, closable grilles, weather stripping, draft excluders, window shutters, reflective win-dow films, solar tubes, solar dehumidifier, efficient lighting and more.

“Leilani” is now a fully sustainable house.

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Local Government wants to do more – however, it has been hamstring by the State Government in its efforts to provide more affordable housing. It is forbidden in NSW for councils to man-date a levy on developers for affordable housing – known as ‘inclusionary zoning’. Wa-verley Council intended to put some affordable housing in its new Bondi Junction town centre plan, however it received a curt letter back from Planning NSW insist-ing that the affordable hous-ing provisions be taken out of the plan.

The Greens have written an Affordable Housing Bill, which is yet to be debated in the NSW Parliament.

We will continue to argue for planning powers so local governments can do more.

by Irene Doutney

In July 2005 the NSW govern-ment introduced the Building Sustainability Index, or BASIX. This initiative was designed to re-duce energy consumption in new residential homes by 25% and wa-ter consumption by 40%. At the time, it was applauded as a move to rein in new residental subdi-visons where most houses were designed with little regard for energy and water consumption.

BASIX could be used as a tool to en-sure that Environmentally Sustainable Designed houses are the standard for future development and that a program of retrofitting could be encouraged for pre- existing housing. BASIX encourages the use of major energy and water sav-ing materials and devices in building construction. Sustainable features in-clude rainwater tanks, efficient shower-heads, taps and plumbing, solar panels, window glazing, insulation, efficient building materials, and passive air con-ditioning measures.

In a time of climate change and dwin-dling resources, using BASIX targets makes sense. They are the building blocks for creating sustainable develop-ment and can set a guide for the future. What we need to do now is push beyond BASIX and legislate for further increas-es in the targets and transparent assess-ment procedures.

There are, however, two major problems with BASIX as it now stands. The first is the fact that any sort of promises can be made to get the online certificate, but there is no way of assessing whether the applicant has complied with these mea-sures. With Development Applications and Certification now going to private certifiers there is no guarantee that the standards will actually be met.

The second is that the 40% efficiency targets do not apply to apartment and commercial high-rise developments over 6 storeys which only have to meet the lower 25% target. Apartments will make up two thirds of new dwellings in Sydney over the next 25 years, yet they are allowed to meet a much lower target. BASIX needs to be strengthened and ex-tended to all homes, not watered down.

Greens spokesperson on Planning, Sylvia Hale MP said: “With the government planning major new residential developments throughout Sydney in the coming decade it needs to increase the targets for water and energy efficiency to ensure Sydney’s population has enough water and that our homes do as little damage to the climate as pos-sible. The government needs to increase the target for high rise developments to 40% and to phase in further increases in the targets for all dwellings. The cur-rent target of an average 36% decrease in greenhouse emissions from dwellings is not enough. We need to be aiming to double that over the next few years”.

Beyond BASIX

Housing Locally:What Councils can do to create affordable housing

By Hazel Blunden

Cities and towns should be both equitable, main-taining population di-versity, and functional, housing workers fairly close to their workplace. That means ensuring housing is affordable.Although local councils’ main work is often seen as ‘roads, rates and rubbish’, many councils are interest-ed in providing affordable housing. In fact, you might not have noticed it, but some of NSW’s affordable housing is already council-owned.

The councils that do offer some affordable housing are Waverley, North Sydney, Wil-loughby, and Canada Bay. Sydney, Byron Shire and Par-

ramatta Councils have proj-ects in the pipeline.

Given councils don’t have huge budgets, how have they managed it? These councils have used a combination of joint projects (some with part-government funding), using their own land, and levies on developers where possible. The housing is then let. Eligibility criteria is re-lated to household income, and connection to the area (whether through personal history or work).

Another way councils can help is by allowing new eco-logically sustainable ‘inten-tional communities’ to flour-ish. There are hundreds of rural-based communities in Australia that offer afford-able housing and the benefits of joint ownership of infra-structure, such as the new

Bega Eco-Neighbourhood Development (or BEND) Eco-Village in Bega. BEND is selling housing/land, and has partnered with not-for-profit housing group Com-munity Housing Limited, to include a component of af-fordable housing for low-in-come people.

Some regional councils are looking at assisting people, such as retirees, who can no longer afford increasingly expensive caravan and manu-factured home parks, to take control of their own housing.

Cr Terri Latella of Gosford said: “The Government needs to provide funding for families and older people. I have given support to leasing council land for a group of residents who do want to set up their own cooperatively owned af-fordable residential park.”

The Greens in Auburn have overcome an ALP / Liberal voting majority. With Residents Action Group, a good indepen-dent, and Unity we have a uni-fied voting block. The ALP’s record in the Auburn area is

Auburn Greens councillor Malikeh Michels

questionable. We have had front page news twice in the Sydney Morning Herald with a local ALP donation scandal.

A major shopping centre in the area, Auburn central, which has been deemed seriously non-fire compliant, is currently under investigation by the Depart-ment of Local Government.

The ALP passed a motion to sell the land off for $1.8 mil-lion instead of the $5-7 million it was valued at. The developer made political donations total-ing over a hundred thousand dollars to the Labor Party, in-cluding payments to Frank Sartor’s campaign and that of state member Barbara Perry, who was on the council when the land for Auburn central was sold off.

The Greens are working to get accountability back on council.

Auburn Greens for an accountable council

Some of the areas that Greens Councillor Gavin Smithers has been involved with include Council’s Yandaarra Aborigi-nal Consultative Committee and the Multicultural Commit-tee. The Yandaarra Committee

Coffs Harbour Greens councillor Gavin Smithers

has been running successfully for over ten years. The multicul-tural Committee is fairly recent and reflects Coffs Harbour’s status as a refugee resettlement area, as well as the area’s diverse cultural makeup. He has also enjoyed serving on Arts Mid North Coast, a regional Board dedicated to promoting cultural activities and industries.

Coffs Harbour shares many issues with other fast grow-ing coastal centres. Some of the planning and management initiatives he has supported include Strategies to adapt to climate change, to peak oil, and a sustainable food strat-egy. On a practical level he has been a keen supporter of the acquisition of computer- based asset management systems, to help deal with the huge main-tenance task faced by all re-gional Councils.

Greens support Multi- cultural Coffs Harbour

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As the Beijing Olympic Games are upon us, it is time for govern-ments all over the world to con-sider the true nature of the gov-ernment in China. As much as we would like to ignore human rights abuses, the coming Olympics of-fer a perfect opportunity for our Mandarin-speaking Prime Min-ister to more strenuously address such fundamental issues.From Beijing to Tibet instances of state-sponsored injustice, torture and murder are common. Minorities like the Tibet-ans, Falun Gong and other religious mi-norities, ethnic nomads, unionists and political dissidents face extreme punish-ments and the death penalty. In Tibet there is also a slow genocide as medical practices such as abortion and sterilisa-tion are used to enforce population con-

trol while the country is being overrun with Han Chinese migrants. 50% of the popula-tion in Tibet is now Chinese, and there is one soldier to every 20 civilians.

In the lead up to the Olympics there has been a massive crackdown on minorities, and many famous dissidents, such as Hu Jai, are now in jail or experiencing oppressive restrictions to their movements. Nomadic peoples and other ethnic groups are being settled in isolated camps without work or support. Activists are vanishing, while in Tibet the Red Army and secret police re-press all support for the Dalai Lama.

100,000 riot police will be used during the Olympics, and there were many attacks on human rights taking place in the lead up to the games that few in the West were aware of. For example, it is estimated that 1 mil-lion people have been evicted from their homes in the city for reasons as pathetic as making way for flower-beds. Outside the city, residents are brutally removed to

make way for high-rise developments, with those who protest being beaten and hospi-talised and many just disappearing.

Over 8,000 people are executed in China each year. Censorship is completely nor-mal and the internet is blocked by “the great firewall“ that monitors and blocks individual traffic. Companies in cities like Shenzhen are preparing the most sophisti-cated surveillance equipment in the world. They are creating a system called “The Golden Shield” which will be able to track every person in the country with sophisti-cated facial tracking technology. The Chi-nese will soon become the most watched people in the world and their technology will be exported to countries in the West.

The great construction boom modernis-ing Beijing is being built by migrant work-ers from the surrounding countryside who live in terrible conditions and are often left unpaid at the end of construction –

The Greens gave a refund of 10 cents for every recy-clable drink container re-turned to a Newtown stall on Saturday July 19 to high-light the need for container deposit legislation in NSW. Over 2,300 cans and bottles were returned. This includ-ed one man who brought a trolley load of 371 contain-ers and a family who re-turned over 600 containers. They plan to donate the money to their school.

Container deposit legisla-tion is a simple law that adds a deposit to the price of a drink, providing an in-centive for people to recy-cle the container in order to

get their deposit refunded.

“Australians use five bil-lion drink containers every year, which is a lot of alu-minum, glass and plastic. Much of this ends up in landfill or as litter on our streets,” said Max Phil-lips, a Greens candidate for Marrickville Council. “The Greens want container de-posit laws introduced in NSW to provide a financial incentive for recycling and to reduce litter.”

“All the best recyclers in the world have container depos-it laws,” Philips continued. “South Australia has had it for years and it makes a big difference to recycling

Greens push for container deposit lawsand the amount of litter. In South Australia, the total recovery rate of recyclables is 80%, compared to less than 40% in other states. These laws clearly work, it is a ‘no brainer’.”

Polls of the public show 83% of people support for container deposit laws. “It is time that the state govern-ment listened to what peo-ple want instead of caving in to the big beverage corpora-tions,” said Mr Phillips.

Greens MLC Ian Cohen in-troduced a private members bill for container deposit legislation into state parlia-ment on the 10th of April this year. Greens members at the Newtown stall on Saturday, July 19.

just as they may well be during the hia-tus in construction over the course of the Olympics to try and improve the city’s air quality. These workers, who number over 150 million, are usually regional peasants who have lost their lands.

It is also important that pressure is put on the Chinese government to maintain and extend the measures taken to control carbon emissions. As one of the highest polluters in the world – though of course per-capita far below the USA or Aus-tralia – it is essential that any reductions made for the Olympics are not just cos-metic, but part of a long-term strategy. Surely now is the perfect time to put such pressure on our major economic partner. If there is a rationale for supporting these Olympics, surely it is to encourage de-mocracy and human rights through sport and diplomacy. If ever there was a time for the Prime Minister to use his linguis-tic and diplomatic skills, it is now.

An aerial view of Beijing, a mix of shanties and high density apartments in Hefei, the brand new Wangfu Jing shopping center in Beijing, and a half demolished shanty town in the Hefei suburbs.

Olympics, Pollution, Human Rights

8

Good Planning Can Mean Good Living

By Sylvia HaleNSW Greens MP andPlanning Spokesperson

In June this year the parliament passed, by one vote, a controver-sial rewriting of the planning laws of NSW. Planning Minister Frank Sartor made it clear that, in his view, the role of the planning sys-tem is “to facilitate growth.”

The state government’s planning strate-gies presume more than 1 million ad-ditional people will be living in NSW in twenty years time and the planning sys-tem’s role is to facilitate the growth of residential and industrial developments to meet the extra demand. That means speeding up development approvals, overriding environmental and heritage controls and taking away the opportunity for local residents to have any genuine say in what is happening to their community.

The Greens have an alternative vision of the role of the planning system. Ironi-cally, it is similar to the view held by the Labor Party when it introduced the En-vironmental Planning and Assessment (EP&A) Act in 1979, in the years before

it sourced so much of its election cam-paign funds from the property develop-ment industry.

In 1979 the Wran Labor Government made a major commitment to public par-ticipation in the planning process and to transparency. The EP&A Act emerged from overwhelming public concern about the way unregulated development was de-facing the city.

Over the past few years a very different La-bor Government has gutted those ground-breaking 1979 reforms. Labor is no longer committed to giving the public a say in de-velopments. Its objective now is exactly the opposite. Recent ‘reforms’ by the govern-ment have been about removing the public from the planning process.

This is where the Greens have a fundamen-tal difference with Labor. Our vision for the planning system involves more com-munity involvement, not less. We say the role of the planning system is to make our communities better places to live, to raise our families, to socialise with our friends.

Some growth in population is inevitable. Sydney will continue to attract people searching for opportunities. But if we are to have strong and sustainable communi-ties, that growth must be undertaken with

the consent and support of those commu-nities, not imposed on them by an all pow-erful Planning Minister operating on be-half of a development industry committed to maximising returns on investment.

Public faith in the integrity of the planning system has been fatally undermined. Faced with planning laws that stopped the devel-opment free-for-all of the 1970s, the devel-opment industry found a new way around those laws. It simply pays enough in politi-cal donations and gets the laws changed to suit it. To their shame, the major parties have allowed this to happen.

Electoral Office figures reveal that the property industry has contributed over $9.9 million to the Labor Party in the past 5 years and around $5.8 million to the Lib-eral and National parties.

The NSW Greens have never accepted donations from the property development industry, nor any other industry, because we don’t believe that any political party can accept that level of largesse from a sectional interest group and not have its policy compromised.

Planning in NSW has been largely reactive in recent years – responding to immedi-ate problems such as road congestion and poor housing accessibility, with unsustain-

able ‘solutions’ like new freeways, desali-nation plants and new land releases. The result is that urban areas are becoming more congested, more polluted, less af-fordable and less sustainable.

The focus for planning needs to be on making our cities and regions sustainable. It needs to look at how to put in place effective and reliable public transport, how to provide sustainable jobs close to where people live, how to ensure that there is affordable housing throughout the state, and how to ensure that we do as little damage as possible to our natu-ral and urban environments.

The focus must shift to decentralisation, reduced urban sprawl, maintaining pro-ductive farmland, revolutionising our public transport system, shifting most of our freight off our roads and onto rail and designing our homes and our communi-ties to be less energy and water intensive.

The debate about our planning laws is fiercely contested because billions of dol-lars in potential profits are at stake. But it is a debate about more than profits and opportunities, it is a debate about the fu-ture of the communities within which we all live. This is an issue in which the com-munity has a right to not only have a say but to have control over the outcome.

Good planning includes building sustainable houses and functioning public transport systems, providing work close to where people live, maintaining food production close to urban centers.

CrosswordAcross 5 State of harmony 6 Premier of Victoria or a wild horse 10 Online social networking website 14 Undemocratic president of Zimbabwe 16 Presidential candidate 18 Surname of AFL player who has been practising boxing on field 20 T-shirts that did this were banned during the Pope’s visit 21 The country we helped George Bush invade 23 Shape of the Greens logo 24 Island in Sydney harbour and a bird 25 TV program that embarrassed APEC security 26 Gas primarily responsible for global warming 29 The proper name for the extinct Tasmanian Tiger 32 location of recent council corruption scandal 34 Chicago is in the US state of… 35 Name of the bicycle sharing scheme in Paris 36 Night club were Labor MPs husband and wife had altercation

Down 1 Dirty stuff that is burnt to produce electricity 2 Hybrid car produced by Toyota 3 A clean form of transport 4 Capital of Afghanistan 5 When oil production can no longer keep up with demand 7 Hurdler who has pulled out of the Olympics 8 Climate change is an inconvenient … 9 Brendan Nelson was president of this organisation 11 Biggest problem facing the planet today 12 Energy captured from the sun 13 State flower of New South Wales 15 Piece of paper used for voting 17 Name of chemical compound CH4 19 Acronym for a near neighbour 22 The leader of the Australian Greens 27 Name of the seat John Howard lost at the last federal election 28 Money given to political parties 30 Surname of controversial artist whose work was taken by Police 31 The most famous Australian beach 33 Number of years David Hicks spent in Guantanamo Bay

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Join the good fight.

of Greens members were among those arrested.

The challenge for the Greens is to take this energy and hope into the halls of federal, state and local government, carrying the message that Australia demands real ac-tion on climate change. With the Garnaut draft report and federal Green Paper on Emissions Trad-ing betraying the commitments made by Prime Minister Kevin Rudd before the election (see story on page 10), that message is more important than ever.

A full wrap on the camp and protest actions can be found at www.climatecamp.org.au

For six hours no trains en-tered the worlds largest coal port as people concerned about climate change blocked the tracks to send a message about the mas-sive global emissions from burning coal. The Austra-lian Climate Camp was one of seven camps held around the world in July and early August 2008.On Sunday morning, 13th July, over a thousand people marched peacefully to the Carrington coal terminal in Newcastle to

protest the reckless expansion of the coal industry in an age of cli-mate change.

It was an incredible day. Chil-dren led the march, which mean-dered peacefully along the edge of the coal rail line until we held a 5-minute silent vigil in front of the massive coal stockpiles.

Then, one by one, small groups of people made their way over or under the fence line and onto the tracks. By the end of the day, 57 people had been arrested for non-violently intervening in the coal export process.

We successfully halted all coal trains through the Carrington port

for the entire day – delaying coal deliveries worth 20,000 tonnes of carbon dioxide.

The atmosphere was amazing. When we got back to the camp, you could see huge grins on people’s faces and hear the ex-citement in their voices as they shared stories of the day. Collec-tive action is a beautiful thing.

On Monday morning we awoke to hear that a small group of people from camp had chained themselves to equipment at the Kooragang coal loader, effective-ly halting coal exports for several hours. Later that afternoon, four students spontaneously decided

to shut down the Carrington rail line again, locked onto the track and stopped coal trains for anoth-er few hours.

One hundred people held a rally outside the office of embattled NSW Treasurer and climate change sceptic, Michael Costa, serving notice that Newcastle wants a sustainable energy future.

It was a privilege to be part of this movement of such brave, inspir-ing people who are standing up for our future. Greens NSW MPs Lee Rhiannon and John Kaye and WA Senator Scott Ludlum were proud to support and attend the camp and protests, and a number

Real Action on Climate Change

Blockading the coal line: direct action halting all coal trains through the Carrington port for the day, delaying coal deliveries that release 20,000 tons of carbon dioxide.

Rochelle has made a sig-nificant contribution to the community in her four years at Leichhardt Council. With the support of fellow coun-cilors in both Leichhardt and Ashfield and strong community activists, the M4 East motorway project was successfully shelved. Leichhardt Council is recog-nised as a greenhouse lead-er, due to policies supported by the Greens. One example is the Urban Forest Policy.

Leichhardt Greens councillor Rochelle Porteous

This policy aims at creating a sustainable environment through the protection, res-toration and enhancement of our natural environment and native biodiversity in the urban environment.Rochelle believes that it is through empowering the community that meaningful progress can be made and she will continue to take that approach if successful in the September election.

Leichhardt leads on Green issuesGo to www.nsw.greens.org.au and follow the links to join.

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By John Kaye NSW Greens MP and Energy Spokesperson

The Rudd government’s good intentions to address climate change have suc-cumbed to lobbying by the power industry and aluminium smelters. The emissions trading scheme proposed in the Green Pa-per effectively protects the nation’s biggest polluters from the costs of buying carbon certificates. As has happened in Europe, they will have no reason to re-duce the massive amount of CO2 they produce.

Climate sceptic and NSW Trea-surer Michael Costa succeeded in pushing the federal government into keeping the door open for revenue from carbon trading to be used to compensate the own-ers of the large generators. This was essential if his proposed sell-

off was to have any chance of sur-viving the huge costs of purchas-ing emissions certificates for the state’s power stations.

Kevin Rudd ignored the advice of professor Ross Garnaut who explicitly rejected compensa-tion, explaining that other forms of structural adjustment fund-ing would deliver more jobs and wealth creation.

Emissions intensive, trade-ex-posed industries like aluminium smelting will also be given free permits covering 90% of their emissions. They too will have no incentive to be part of the national effort to control global warming.

The climate sceptics in Canberra, the fossil fuel lobby around Aus-tralia, and the aluminium indus-try have been able to push the Rudd government into taking compensation away from house-holds and giving it to the big pol-luters. This battle is not over yet. Saner heads in Canberra will no doubt be appalled by this out-come and will be working hard to keep the compensation amounts to a minimum.

Coal mines, together with coal-fired power stations, are the state’s biggest polluters. Picture courtesy of Andreas Reinhold.

The Shooters Party in NSW used the trigger of the Win-ter Break in Parlia-ment to push through an amendment, sup-ported by Labor, to change the sensible restrictions on gun ownership in NSW. Why would Labor let itself be target practice for the gun lobby?

BANG! BANG! The gun lobby hits its targetNSW Labor needs the Shooters Party to pass leg-islation in the Upper House of State Parliament. It is another example of a single issue party getting the bal-ance of power on a whole series of bills they never said they had an opinion on before the last election.

Doing such a deal with NSW Labor means the Shooters Party got their way on the one change to the gun laws they really wanted:

More guns in the commu-nity. Less restrictions on their members.

These are the deals La-bor makes to get its bills through parliament.

by Sandra Langtree Port Jackson Greens

The worldwide impacts of global warming prompted local Greens to act in pre-paring for the sea-level rise on Sydney Harbour with a ground breaking policy.In 2006 a massive slab of the Ant-arctic sea ice broke off the Larsen “C” ice shelf, after Larsen “A” and “B” shelves had already disinte-grated by early 2003. While the worlds’ ice caps are melting and retreating with alarming speed, Greenland’s ice sheet is disap-pearing at a rate of approximately 239 cubic kilometers (57.3 cubic miles) per year, according to US Satellite data. Loss of arctic ice and the melting of the Greenland ice shelf could lead to a five-me-tre sea level rise, leading to flood-ing in many of the world’s major cities, including along Australia’s East Coast.

This problem has created desper-ate situations for many commu-nities around the world already. As well as remote Pacific islands, large swathes of Bangladesh are vulnerable, with people repeated-ly having to move their houses to escape the ever-expanding river with its collapsing banks. The fer-tile Nile Delta in Egypt could be swallowed by the seas. Major cit-ies such as Shanghai, New York, London and also parts of Sydney are at risk.

As the Leichhardt municipal-ity has extensive Sydney harbour foreshores, members of the Port Jackson Greens were inspired to take steps to prepare in planning for the future impacts of rising sea levels on Sydney Harbour and on the Balmain Peninsula. They did this by writing a resolution to council for the installation of tidal markers on the ferry wharves on the Balmain Peninsula to monitor sea levels, and to raise awareness in educating local residents on the impacts of climate change, as well as preparing Leichhardt coun-

cil for the impact of rising water levels in planning controls and infrastructure planning. Through the work of Greens councillors Leichardt Council endorsed this resolution, which subsequently gained unanimous support at the NSW Local Government Confer-ence in October 2006.

The conference then called on the NSW Government to install Tidal Markers at points along the NSW coast and for the local and state planning and infrastructure plans to start preparing for a fu-ture of rising tides and decreasing foreshores. The markers shows

Leichhardt Prepares for Rising Sea Levels

the highest local tide levels for the years 1920, 2006 and as pro-jected in 2050, with this future level 400mm higher than that of 2006 – considered a worst case scenario if governments fail to set serious targets in reducing green-house emissions (McInnes et al. 1998, Church et al. 2001).

The markers raise awareness on the importance of halting climate change, and the response from lo-cal residents and ferry commuters has been extremely positive. To read more about the mark-ers and the resolution go to www.lmc.nsw.gov.au

The marker installed at Balmain Wharf and the signage created by Leichhardt Council to raise public awareness of Climate Change.

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In the 1970s, Australians would often incinerate garbage in their back yards. Attitudes to health and the environment have changed since that time, especial-ly with recycling being offered by more and more local councils. In 1996 only about 80 kilgrams of solid waste was recycled per person in Austra-lia. This leapt to 759 kilograms in 2002-03. However, while Australians have adapted to recycling, more can be done.

Electronic waste is a growing problem. According to the Australian Bureau of Statistics, in 2006, there will be around 1.6 million computers disposed of in landfill, in addition to the 5.3 million already gath-ering dust in garages and other storage ar-eas, with half a million recycled. E-waste in Australia is estimated to be growing at more than three times the rate of general municipal waste.

Not only is landfill space a concern, but E-waste contains some toxic materials. E-waste can be recycled and the precious materials reused. Local councils should be informing residents of how to dispose of E-waste and making facilities available to make it easy to recycle.

Ever wondered what happens to your trash after you leave your bins on the kerb?The trucks take your recycling to a ‘mate-rials recovery facility’. These facilities can handle up to 50 tonnes of material a day and the most modern plants can recycle up to 95% of materials fed into the system.

First the contents of the trucks get dumped on a conveyor belt, where workers pick out obvious non-recyclable items such as food

Recycling – Evolving Challenges

waste. Next the conveyor passes under a giant magnet, which picks up any steel ob-jects such as tin cans.

The conveyor then feeds the material into a large rotating cylinder that sorts by size. The bulk of the containers (glass, plastic and aluminum) fall through holes in the cylinder but the lighter paper keeps travel-ing on the conveyor to be reduced to pulp and made into paper again.

The glass, plastic and aluminum pass over a vibrating screen that works like a sieve to remove fine pieces of glass. What remains is optically scanned by a com-puter and small puffs of air flick different materials onto separate conveyor belts.

These materials are then shredded and taken as raw materials to be made into new glass bottles and cans.

Main: Drink containers collected for recycling. Insert: A family standing in front of an average years’ worth of recyclable waste of an Australian household.

I am 10 metres from the train but I won’t make it. I have a disability – it’s called Hannah, Eloise and baby Rowena. Between us and the train is a steep flight of stairs. I cannot run two preschoolers and a pram down those steps. So I no longer use the train.

I have a friend who has a choice of two eateries in the whole of Newtown. It’s not because he’s a vegan or on a gluten-free diet. It’s because he’s in a wheelchair, and almost every place in Newtown has one step into their establish-ment. One step makes him dis-abled, not his wheelchair. No lift at a train station makes me dis-abled, not my kids.

Local councils have a significant role to play in removing impedi-ments to full participation in community life. It can make a huge difference in enabling all residents, by ensuring equity of access. Start with the Access committee – a place where resi-dents can tell the council what the issues are and how to prior-itise them, a place where council can get input and feedback on its projects and policies.

We also need to ensure that the council’s footpath ramps comply with the Australian Standards, and that the footpath upgrades are prioritized according to how they link essential services such as shopping precincts, transport and medical services.

There is a need to educate busi-ness and property owners about the benefits to fully accessible developments. In Marrickville, we have the ‘Missed Business Guide’ which highlights to busi-ness owners the increase in trade that can be achieved with a more open and accessible shopfront. The local council also distributes the Human Rights and Equal Opportunity Commission’s new DVD ‘The Good, the Bad and the Ugly’ to prospective devel-opers, as well as architects and planners in the area, so they have guidance when making new prop-erties compliant with the Austra-lian Standards for accessibility.

Most of all, councils can advo-cate for their residents and lobby State and Federal governments to move more quickly towards a fully accessible, and therefore fully inclusive, environment. This would lead to a fully inclusive community – one where nobody is dis-abled.

Accessibility and the role of councils

On September 13, help your local council remain independent from developers’ greed.

Vote 1 The Greens.

Chris Harris is the first Green councillor on the City of Sydney, one out of ten.

A car share trial using on-street dedicated parking spots moved by Chris was supported by all coun-cillors - resulting in more than 50 spaces to be allocated by the end of 2008.

Greens motions have led to cre-ation of a disability access com-mittee and a full time disability access officer.

A requirement that the City go to 100% accredited Green energy

City of Sydney Greens councillor Chris Harris

Greens sustain City of Sydneywas implemented in July 2008.

With massive overdevelopment planned for the large CUB brew-ery site in Chippendale, Chris organised a litigant, community support and fundraising fund for action against the Minister for Planning. The campaign raised $6,000 and embarrassed the coun-cil into making a grant of $20,000.

The result was a 6 green star pre-cinct development with tri-gener-ation, water capture, black water and grey water recycling and less parking spaces.

Manly Council sees the long termGreens Councillors in Manly have achieved key progress in 2004-08:

Protecting Manly’s coastline- Securing ‘No Take’ Aquatic Re-serve status for Cabbage Tree Bay and implementing Management Plans for it.

- Working with staff, community members & government agencies to prepare Management Plans for all sections of Manly’s coastline, so Manly can gain funding from Governments to manage the chal-lenges created by climate change.

- Through the Sydney Coastal Councils Group, having Manly become part of scientific studies

on the impacts of climate change.

Establishing a North Head Sanctuary- Working towards a sanctuary across North Head and having it recognised as a place of National Heritage significance. Protecting the area’s endagered little pen-guins and long-nosed bandicoots.

Maintaining Manly Council’s commitment to sustainable living

- Overseeing 4-yearly reviews of Manly’s Sustainability Strategy, which has now become a roadmap guiding Council’s annual Manage-ment Plan.

- Helping to implement Manly Council’s Social Plan, so we can take proper account of the needs of those who are less able.

- Helping local Aboriginal leaders establish the annual Guringai Fes-tival, expanding it from a Manly event to a whole of Northern Syd-ney event.

Cycleways and walking tracks- Improving the safe routes and cycle facilities for family, commut-er and other cyclists.

- Assisting the Sydney Walking Volunteers establish a walking route from Palm Beach to Cronul-la via Manly and North Head.

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Want to know more?Visit our website on www.nsw.greens.org.au

The Greens are committed to spreading the message of Peace, Sustainability and Social Justice. We have press releases, full policy information, local contact details and much more available.

Subscribe to an electronic version of GreenVoice by sending your email address to office@nsw.greens.org.au

The Greens don’t take money from developers, mining companies or the big end of town. We are dependent on small donations and volunteers, your contribution can make all the difference. Visit our website at www.nsw.greens.org.au to Volunteer or Donate.

Join The Greens by following the links on www.nsw.greens.org.au and help us campaign for a just, sustainable and democratic Australia.

There is no doubt that the race is on to develop a meaningful and effective plan to respond to climate change. But while nation-al and state policy makers grapple with carbon trad-ing, emissions targets, and renewable energy, it is often through the energy and efforts of local coun-cilors and close attention to community sentiment that meaningful steps to-wards a sustainable fu-ture are made.The local Kiama community is acutely aware that they have the stewardship of an increasingly valuable commodity: agricul-tural lands, with good soils and significant rainfall close to major population centres.

As inland drought and rising transport costs put at risk Aus-tralia’s ability to meet its own food needs, Kiama residents rec-ognize the effective use of fertile land as a key part of the coun-try’s climate change response.

It has been a passion of local Greens councilors in Kiama to ensure that the value of these resources are recognized and protected, in contrast to the historical consumption of qual-

ity agricultural land by sprawling suburbs.

In May 2004 Councilor Howard Jones proposed that Kiama make the protection of agricultural land a key issue in the Local Environ-ment Plan review, and gained the support of his fellow councilors.

As part of community consulta-tion for the LEP review, the pro-posal was also put to the Kiama Community Panel. The panel, a group of 16 randomly selected local residents, was briefed by ag-ricultural, planning and housing experts and asked to write a re-port about what direction Council should take. The panel was unani-mous in its support for the reten-tion of agricultural land for agri-cultural use and not urban sprawl.

The advocacy of Greens coun-cilors and effective engagement with the community has enabled Kiama Council to go out and do the detailed planning work to en-sure that local agricultural land is retained to produce food in the long term. This position has been subsequently reinforced with the Illawarra Regional Strategy now acknowledging the importance of Kiama’s agricultural lands in the wider region.

Cr Jones sites this success as a clas-sic example of engaging with local residents at the grassroots level to inform council policy making.

We All Need to EatWith food prices predicted to continue rising for years to come The Greens are taking local action to preserve our food supply

Kiama Greens Councillor Howard Jones is passionate about saving prime agricultural land for food production