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February 2009 Victorian Bushfire – Latte Environmentalism – Why Labor, Liberal And The Australian Greens Aren’t Thinking And Won’t Talk
Popularity is the life blood of any political party. Logically, without supporters you cant get elected. For the machines of most political parties this is the paramount consideration. Sadly this is exactly why unpopular realities are usually ignored. If acted upon, it is in a way opposite to the principles of decency, safety and logic.
One could argue the Brumby Labor government is acting in direct response to the horror we all witnessed on February 7th 2009, Black Saturday.
Giving A Disaster A Cool Name And A Royal Commission Isn’t First Aid
We are quick to stick a brand name on sorry events. It makes it easy for the media to discuss it; it looks sharp. It’s easy to erect a Royal Commission to palliate community horror and indeed outrage.
But a bandaid is not going to resolve the issues that led to this fire. No, I dont mean the drought or climate change. I refer to something entirely in our hands: sensible forest management and fuel reduction.
Two conflicting intents paralyse our emergency services and government departments in relation to the whole forestry management and fuel reduction issue. As a society of decent, humane people we have a serious obligation to think the matter through and decide. Let me be clear – without either a genuine fuel reduction program or the complete evacuation of all civilians from the fire-prone areas, more innocent people will die in the next fire season.
We got to this point by pandering to simple-minded green politics for the sake of votes.
Note: at no time am I referring to the brave volunteers on the ground or the men and women of our police, fire and ambulance services who were left to clean this mess up.
Latte Green Politics Is The Core Of The Issue
Many political decisions are targeted, nay designed, to woo inner suburban greens who love the environment, even if they dont know what it means.
It’s easy, it’s attractive and it feels good. If feels like you’re making a difference – and yes, in that they are right. They are. What these well intentioned and passionate people fail to grasp is that the brand of politics they subscribe is a life-threatening danger to the people living in the bush. I live in the Federal seat of McEwen – the seat containing the communities most heavily devastated by the 2009 bushfires -and I know the people don’t want mass clearing of forest or bush.
They love it!
They live in an area they cherish and seek to protect it. But they don’t want to die in it, just because a misinformed green in the inner suburbs believes clearing of fuel is bad, that burning the bush is intolerable environmental vandalism and that “Black Saturday was a one off event”. These contentions are being actively circulated by the green movement.
It wasn’t. It will happen again. On average there’s a bad burn every ten years. Each time the loss of life and property has increased. Yet we do even less fuel reduction now than when I was a boy forty years ago.
Labor, Liberal And Green Votes – Where There’s Smoke There’s Fire
Let’s talk perfectly plain here. Environmental concern is a good thing. The Australian Democrats have actively pursued best environmental practice for 30 years. This isn’t about environmental concern or environmental activism. There is nothing wrong with that. In fact I ran an entire electoral campaign on the issue of Climate Change in 2007.
What is wrong is government, specifically, political parties pandering to the latte environmentalists purely to garner votes and look impressive and concerned.
It’s wrong and yet it works – and that is gravely concerning.
In a forthcoming article, I’m going to address issues of science and previous debate and inquires.. That is, the evidence we had before February 7th 2009 aka Black Saturday. It was predicted by credible scientists holding hard, scientific, verifiable data. They were ignored.
Today, I am contending that the problem lies with Labor and Liberals desperately seeking to win votes that would otherwise go to minor parties or independents. That problem and The Greens, specifically their supporters, are doing the Australian community great harm campaigning – particularly at local government level – with rhetoric based on pseudo science, emotionalism and the cult of the glowing ember.
Can’t See The Wood For The Greens
The labor government has had ten years to address the problems that led to Black Saturday. Before them the Liberals had their chance. The Victorian state government has had 70 years to do so!
Consider the commissions, coronial inquests and public submissions to both since 1939. We have the answers yet they’ve not been acted on in an overwhelming number of instances. It hasn’t always been due to the influence of green politics, to be sure. But that does not detract from the fact that there has been no action at all.
I remember – like it was yesterday – being caught in the 1969 bushfires. I lost a fire fighter school friend in the 1983 Ash Wednesday fires and I’ve mentioned here previously that my sister, family and friends lost their homes and in many cases their lives on Black Saturday 2009. So many lost so much, and the reason is simple. We live in the area the green movement of the inner suburbs likes to poke holes in the air about. We live here and, as was the case in February 2009, we die here.
We had commissions and inquiries after all these calamaties. Yet after the 1983 Ash Wednesday fires there was less, not more fuel reduction taking place.
How could that be?
The rise of Green politics. After the 60′s and 70′s environmental movement had passed and – it needs to be said, with some very positive outcomes – there was a brief pause in the early 1980′s. Enormous energy was devoted opposing the nuclear fuel cycle – rightly – and I applaud that work even now. It was the Australian Democrats, in the Senate, who led the charge against the damming of the Franklin River – not Bob Brown and The Greens despite their desperate and recent efforts to rewrite history to look like they’ve actually done something, anything!
I supported those real environmental actions.
But the need for fuel reduction is a real concern. It isn’t based on flimsy theories that trees enjoy being barbequed every ten years by a firestorm. Sure, Australian native trees germinate widely after a bushfire. But a firestorm is not the same thing as a bushfire.
When greens point with orgasmic enthusiasm at a series of green sprouts covering the trunks of recently burned trees, they are pointing to an desperate illusion in many cases. Much of this “green regrowth” is a last ditch stand of the tree to hang on to life - soon be extinguished as the tree rots out from the inside.
And that breathless naivity makes me ill.
Yet, this is exactly the kind of material we see published by the green movement. This and a whole swag more. Sure, not all the trees will die. Some of them will in fact go on to live, but many with this symptom won’t.
How do we know? The scarring on the hills of Lorne or Warburton after Ash Wednesday is how. Visible ten years after the fire had passed. Dead, lifeless trees. In other words – past forestry experience. It takes decades to recover from a firestorm, and if not carefully managed leaves the door wide open for invasive and undesirable species to take over.
A little bit like the Senate now the Democrats are absent.
This disinformation is swallowed whole by latte drinking greens. This is why labor and sadly the conservatives will not, can not, address this issue – they are desperate to hold the support of these “believers”.
Victorians Have To Decide. Either We Fix This Now Or We Stop People Living There.
The equation is a simple one at the end of the day. We either fix this issue by listening to bushfire scientists or we tell people they can’t live in bush-fire prone areas. It’s a simple decision but it’s painful. If we attend to proper, science based fuel reduction management then all political parties advocating it face a voter backlash from the latte sipping types we’ve discussed.
On the other hand there is going to be hell to pay if we are going to tell the people, such as those of McEwen, to pack their bags and leave their homes and lives.
The remaining option is no option at all. That is, to continue to ignore the problem, to pretend all things green are good, and to watch homes and lives burn again.
What would you decide, as a humanitarian, if it were up to you?
Scott Kane
Tags: ambulance services, anguish, Australian Democrats, Australian Greens, australians, bandaid, Black Saturday, brave volunteers, brumby, choices, Climate Change, community safety, conservatives, crises, decency, democrat, democratic, democrats, direct response, february 7th, february 7th 2009, fire season, forest management, forestry management, fuel reduction, government departments, green politics, intents, labor government, labour party, liberal party, life blood, outrage, paramount consideration, police fire, political decisions, political parties, political thought, politics, poultice, prone areas, psychological pain, pus, realities, senate, senator, solution note
I know this is not a simple issue, and the Royal Commission highlights this.
But I do wonder why an audible siren warning system for the public – and designated ‘refuge’ areas in threatened towns seems to have sent the CFA and the State Government into policy meltdown?
This whole issue deserves a better response than political grandstanding from the conservatives, Labor and Greens seem capable of delivering.
Yes, in that respect its a bit like our ‘logjam’ Senate right now. And yes, we do need the Democrats back there, and in Victoria too.
Hi Andrew,
By implementing audible warnings there are several factors that scare them.
1. Nutters ringing and complaining about fire sirens (don’t laugh – they have been).
Even the “Fire Danger Index” signs have been attacked as “unfeeling” by green groups locally.
2. It’s an admission of failure. To implement improvements is to admit they were wrong.
3. Infrastructure. It’s pathetic. On Feb 7th calls to 000 magically found themselves diverted to CenterLink in many instances because the phone system crashed. The infrastructure – I believe that’s spelt TELSTRA to a large extent is off the ark. All efforts to improve it beyond 1990′s technology – and in some instances early 20th Century – have been met with resistance at every step of the way.
Then – people such as Telstra CEO’s pay themselves bonuses.