Cumberland Plains Woodland has been listed as Critically Endangered Ecological Communities. It is believed that the basis for the Critically Endangered Listing was that CPW had been reduced in area by some 400 hectares. About 400 ha has been lost since CPW was first listed as endangered in 1997/98 and that amount lost has justified the next listing as critically endangered. Yet PM Howard gave Delfin permission to clear practically all the remaining 400 ha at the site in question. The Western Sydney Conservation Alliance is asking Garrett to reverse this terrible decision. Inside: Letter to Peter Garrett.

And the new message from the growth lobby is ..... "Yes, we hear your pain and we understand absolutely. No we don't intend to take any notice of your protests." Analysis of ex-ANZ bank economist, Saul Eslake's article, "Populate and Stagnate." in the Fairfax Press (The Age)

The TRUTH comes out of Maddens office. Consultation is faked. This is what we have all know for a long time as we spend hours of our time working away putting in submissions.
Well it is official; they just tick the boxes, as in: "Consulted with the community - tick."
And this is Madden who wants to be Premier?

Originally published on 25 Feb 10. Updated on 28 Feb 10 with embedded videos (thanks to Marvellous Melbourne) showing Madden being grilled by the newsmedia.
See also: "Government email reveals plans to deceive" of 25 Feb 10 by Ryan Sheales on ABC Online, "Consultation with community a sham" of 27 Feb 10 on Marvellous Melbourne.

At the Sustainable Living Festival, Greg Hunt says he will work 'in a bipartisan way' with Kelvin Thomson on population numbers. Kelvin Thomson advises, "Say 'no' to new suburbs and 'no' to new high rise and infill."

"Save our Bush" Rally
Wednesday 24 February from 12-2pm
on Parliament House steps

Against repeated previous promises, the Victorian Government of John Brumby is trampling over community and local govenment opposition to turn Melbourne into a junior version of Los Angeles without a proper cost-benefit analysis.

Article by Kenneth Davidson, a co-editor of Dissent Magazine, originally published as "Projects built at expense of community" in the Melbourne Age of 15 Feb 10.

Michael Danby, chairman of Federal Parliament's joint committee on migration, in recent newspaper articles, expresses support for Australia having a population of 35 million by 2050.

See also: "It's better for us to sustain skilled migration" by Michael Danby in The Australian of 8 Feb 10, "Refugee lobby's 10 commandments" by Paul Sheehan in The Age of 16 Oct 09, "More people does not equal trashing our environment" by Michael Danby in The Age of 14 Jan 10, "Rudd's policies make us a soft target" by Paul Sheehan in The Age of 14 Oct 09, "Greens want immigration cut" by Cathy Alexander in The Age of 1 Feb 10.

Wednesday 24 February from 12-2pm
on Parliament House steps, Melbourne

The sector in Australia that has the most costly dependency ratio must be the property sector, since it costs all Australians an enormous and unreasonable amount just to cover the cost of land for housing, business and agriculture. Most of the very high costs involved are completely unnecessary, except in the eyes of greedy developers and their hangers-on. The only reason that the costs are so high is that the industry wants it that way and our state and federal governments are in cahoots with it.

Both the NSW and Australian Government have upgraded Cumberland Plain Woodland from Endangered to Critically Endangered. You would assume any development that proposed to clear over 200 ha of critically endangered bushland would be struggling to get approval. We can assume nothing these days in Australia. Here is another focus where Australians need to unite to help each other get back democracy and protect fauna and flora from the growth lobby. The community has fought to save this area for nearly 20 years.See also related articles.

The Australian has run yet another beat-up by KPMG corporate partner, Bernard Salt, trying desperately to justify continued high immigration. Mark O'Connor, author of Overloading Australia comments.

On ABC TV Jan 28th 7.30 report the Australian PM appears to have backtracked on the idea of a "Big Australia" for which he said previously that he would make "no apology"

Are stages of governmental and media spin and treatment of forced population growth akin to the stages of grief-predictable and identifiable?

See also: "Rudd facing a Queensland backlash" by Bill Hoffman in the Sunshine Coast Daily of 30 Jan 10, "Rudd cools on a 'big Australia'" in the Age of 29 Jan 10, "Rudd on a 'big Australia'" on the 7.30 Report of 28 Jan 10, "Future Australians could face starvation: Dick Smith" on ABC online of 25 Jan 10, "Population debate needed: opposition" in the Mackay Daily Mercury of 25 Jan 10 (also published in the Shepparton News), "Poll shows Australians do not share rudd's vision for 'Big Australia'" of 10 Nov 09 by Bruce Billson MP, (former) Shadow Minister for Sustainable Development and Cities, "Population to now hit 35 million by 2049" in the Australian of 18 Sep 09.

Labor Holdings, Labor Resources, Labor Inc, Rudd, Swann and the States: Is the Australian government and are the Australian state governments acting in our best interests or someone else's? Indeed, can they still be called 'governments' or are they becoming something else, to which citizens owe no allegiance?

See also: other articles about Labor Holdings

Queensland Infrastructure and planning minister, and former Property Council advisor, Stirling Hinchliffe has been given unprecedented power under Queensland’s new and deceptively named Sustainable Planning Act to ride roughshod over local government planning. (Hoffman, Opinion, Courier Mail, 6-1-2010) Hoffman also says, "There is little, the electorate can do about this having voted Labor back in..." Not true. People can do something. They can sign this petition calling for the government to resign

The Growth Lobby seemed to have gone to some trouble to justify encouraging more immigration to Australia by making a detailed case on Wikipedia under the search heading: "Immigration_to_Australia"

Typically the arguments are the same old tired justifications that rely on historic success and links to economic growth, but they are shallow, unsupported and rely on claims by the biased Productivity Commission.

See also: "How the Growth Lobby threatens Australia's future" of 24 Jan 09.

The growth lobby appears in new guises every day, constantly trying to make itself out to be the good guy. Now a new alliance of religious groups pretends we can go on growing indefinitely, the same way that the Citizens Electoral Lobby, the Australian Property Council, and the Prime Minister of Australia do. But Tim Murray asks, "If each one of God’s 214,000 miracles born each day is precious, what of the tens or hundreds of thousands of non human life forms that are murdered that day by our expansion? Yes, 100 species are lost each day. But many more life forms are killed than that each day. How many? Who knows? Each and every day we are breeding our life support system into the ground."

The author responds to news of some so-called 'Green groups' preventing discussion of population numbers as a factor in carbon emissions. "Women should have the right not to have children. But they have no right, in the context of overshoot, to have as many children as they or their husbands want. The “right to choose” cannot be the right to abuse. Even the most jealously guarded right must be measured against equally fundamental rights, most especially the right of our species, and others, to live."

Nicolas Howe has been watching how the Fairfax, Murdoch and ABC media are treating alternatives to the population growth scenario of 35m plus. He finds that they are not giving them due representation and therefore biasing the debate. Letters not published. Rights of reply not balanced. His article confirms others on candobetter.org which have found this to be a consistent pattern with Australia's commercial mainstream media. They publish material to normalise population growth. They belong to the growth lobby. They have vested interest in population growth. As for the public media, the ABC - as has been pointed out before, it employs a number of ex-Murdoch journalists and allows professional property developers and other members of the growth lobby to dominate debate. Propaganda Watch Growth Lobby

For a minister who says he wants certainty for developers (but gives not two hoots for making everyone else miserably insecure) Mr Madden must be driving them mad as well. The GAIC tax is subject to endless jerky permutations and increasing secrecy surrounds it. The horror of it all is that this farce is what passes for serious business in Melbourne these days. It is like some faintly similar town, but colonised by alien planners and parliamentarians with agendas that have nothing to do with representative government. Perhaps if we knew what was really going on - something to do with finances perhaps - it would not all be so hard to read.

For 2008-09 natural increase was 157,000, and net overseas migration 283,300. This constitutes an invasion, especially viewed in its cumulative effect. It is the result of government advertising and other policies. We were not asked. No matter how you measure it, net migration has never been so high. According to the ABS, Australia now outstrips Canada in having the developed world's highest immigration and population-growth rates. Ever wonder how Mexico, the Philippines, and Africa became third world overpopulated countries? Just watch what is happening to Australia and ask yourself, if you aren't trying to stop this, why not?

This comment, by Canadian Tim Murray, was originally posted to the ABC Background Briefing program, 'Housing for Millions'. In response to statements by a planner which implied that the doubling of Vancouver's population in 15 years had been accomplished without pain, he writes, "Vancouver is a success story only if compared to other major urban failures."

"My concern is that a DAC is being treated almost like a court, judging from the answers the minister has given -- that is, somehow one can show contempt towards the DAC and this is referred to as 'detriment'. Clearly the DAC is not a court. I would like the minister to elaborate on this point: what constitutes detriment, who makes this decision and will there be guidelines?" (Mrs PEULICH (South Eastern Metropolitan) [Hansard] )
The Libs may defeat the urban growth boundary legislation in the upper house, but the passing of the Development Assessment Committee (DAC) legislation and the introduction of the "New Residential Zones" and the Review of the Planning Act, and the Transport Bill, are bad news for democracy and our quality of life: The Planning department will have almost total control and there residents or councils will have almost no say or rights.

A history of pronatalist policy in Australia from 1945-2000 reveals the seeds of today's push for bigger families. This is an interesting supplement to the drive for high immigration and a huge population in Australia. It also gives an account of the role played by The Movement (B.A. Santamaria) in the Australian Labor Party's long exile from government before Whitlam. Some interesting background on Labor Party figures currently in government or recently in opposition.

"Mr Rudd should set aside his ego and self interest in spruiking a ‘big Australia’, simply to make himself a ‘bigger diplomatic deal’ and focus on the national interest of tackling the challenges presented by a population explosion on settling and supporting an extra 13 million people in the coming decades in a sustainable way." (Bruce Bilson, Federal Member for Dunkley) But why is Mr Bilson still supporting an extra 13 million if he knows it is against the will of Australian citizens? A case of the opposition having its cake from the developer lobby whilst making the ALP pay the price? The ALP deserves all the stick it gets on this, but the people deserve far better than the ALP or a Marie-Antoinette Liberal party policy. We need new political parties and independent representatives.

Australia Talks promotion for the program starts by saying that "by 2049 Australia's population will [sic] rise by 60 per cent to 35 million people." But, as Quark writes, Melbourne's population alone, on these trends, will be 34 million people by 2109. So what will Australia's total population be then? It is pure propaganda for the ABC to promote politically induced trends as if they were democratically irresistable. Why isn't it looking beyond the government's rhetoric to the fact that if we allow these trends to continue, the population of this country will massively exceed 34 million just as Melbourne will exceed 5 million and 7 million etc.? Listen on line live: http://www.radioaustralia.net.au/flash/listen/default.htm. More information: http://www.abc.net.au/rn/
Podcast: http://www.abc.net.au/rn/australiatalks/ See also public forum tomorrow (11 Nov) on Melbourne's skyrocketing population: Kelvin Thomson speaks out in Melbourne November 11

The Development Assessment Committees (DACs) Bill will be represented in Parliament on 10 November. It is therefore a good time to publish a belated response to an article by Jennifer Cunich of the Australian Property Council, canning the community for standing up for their rights against these attempts to pass the undemocratic DACs laws against their property and freedom.

See also: Vic Planning Legislative Bill enslaves Victorians to Growth LobbyNew Vic Planning Legislation Bill "a blatant, naked grab for power

Response to Planning Minister Justin Madden's undemocratic and destructive goals and values in his Draft Planning and Environment Amendment (GAIC) Bill by one of Australia's oldest organisations dedicated to native animals.

Australian Greens Leader Bob Brown says Prime Minister Rudd should explain what the end effect of population growth to affect economic prosperity will be. "No world leader can ignore the planet's population burden. There were 3 billion people when Kevin Rudd was born. There are 6.8 billion now. There will be 9 billion by mid-century. This population boom is not economic wisdom, it is a recipe for planetary exhaustion and great human tragedy."
"We need the wisdom to have economic growth with a steady-state population at most - this is the new common sense," Senator Brown said. See also inside full text of Matters of Public importance speech by Senator Brown on population numbers.

Poaching skilled workers and removing political activists; dividing and conquering; restructuring communities to remove democratic organisation, multiculturalism as a cover for big business links with politicians

These potentially crucial forums have been very poorly publicised by the Victorian Government.
For enquiries -
Nicola McCracken, Communications and Administration Officer
spatialanalysis.research[AT]dpcd.vic.gov.au
Department of Planning and Community Development
Telephone 9208 3699 Fax 9208 3335 (during business hours)