Senate inquiry to grill Great Barrier Reef Foundation chairman over $444m grant

The chairman of the Great Barrier Reef Foundation and two more board members have agreed to appear at a Senate inquiry examining a $443.8m government grant to the not-for-profit.

The government has been under pressure to explain the process
 behind the awarding of the grant to the Great Barrier Reef Foundation.

John Schubert, who attended a meeting with the prime minister, Malcolm Turnbull, and the environment and energy minister, Josh Frydenberg, on 9 April that led to the awarding of the grant, will appear before the Senate committee for questioning at a second hearing on 18 September.

Stephen Fitzgerald, a former chairman of Goldman Sachs, and Grant King, president of the Business Council of Australia, have also agreed to give evidence.

“The committee is also seeking the attendance of another member of the board and agreed to consider summoning this member of the board if necessary,” committee chair Peter Whish-Wilson said on Wednesday.

Read the story from The Guardian by Lisa Cox - “Senate inquiry to grill Great Barrier Reef Foundation chairman over $444m grant.”

All single-use plastics should be banned by 2023 Senate inquiry recommends

A Senate inquiry into Australia’s recycling crisis has recommended that all single-use plastics – which could potentially include takeaway containers, chip packets and coffee cups with plastic linings – be banned by 2023.

All single-use plastic should be banned by 2023 - Senate inquiry.

The wide-ranging report also recommends the establishment of a national container deposit scheme as a response to an unfolding crisis in Australian recycling that forced some councils to tip their recycling into landfill.

The report sets out a blueprint to create a “circular economy” – where all materials used in Australia are then recovered and reused domestically. 

Read the story by Naaman Zhou from The Guardian - “All single-use plastics should be banned by 2023 Senate inquiry recommends.”

CSG feeds our voracious appetite; and kills people and animals

(Our voracious appetite for energy, until recent times energy generated almost entirely by fossil fuels, and the resultant economic infrastructure built around those fuels, has led humanity down a technological path that leads to increasingly difficult times.

An example of that inevitable conclusion is discussed by Tim Barlass in today’s Melbourne Age, explaining how the deaths, human, and animal, can result from our rush to exploit the coal seam gas industry.

It’s another example of how human initiative and our inquisitive nature surges ahead of regulation, making up the rules as we go.

However, we have it backwards as illustrated by the suicide last October of Queensland farmer, George Bender, and the death of hundreds of farms animals.

What is happening, and has happened, on the Chinchilla farm is simply another example o how we put our wants ahead of our needs, we need to reverse that and in doing so preserve the likes of George Bender – Robert McLean.)

Chinchilla's George Bender - he suicided over his
frustrations with the coal seem gas industry.

The death of up to 1000 pigs has been blamed on pollution associated with controversial gas mining, in a submission to a Senate inquiry into regulation of the coal seam gas industry.

The claims, backed by graphic photographs, were made as part of a 90-page submission by the family of George Bender, who committed suicide in October after years of battling gas mining on and adjacent to his property.

Deaths occurred at the property Valencia in Chinchilla, 300 kilometres west of Brisbane, at the piggery established in the 1940s and run by Mr Bender for decades. He won numerous awards for his prize pigs at local and state competitions.

Read Tim Barlass’s story in today’s Melbourne Age - “1000 pigs dead due to gas mining pollution, says submission to Senate inquiry.”