Submission in response to the Victorian Government’s Land and Biodiversity at a Time of Climate Change Green Paper
Information provided in the Green Paper highlights the rapid decline in the quality of our environment. The blame is mainly put on global warming and, thankfully, also on the government’s persistent push for economic and human population growth.
This ‘growth’ will exacerbate the present decline not only in the environment but also in the future welfare of the people.
It is the government’s first duty to make sure that we can survive. This will obviously not happen if it does not change its policies. Those who make peaceful changes impossible, make violent changes inevitable!
Unfortunately, no politicians have the guts to treat the population and growth issue with the seriousness it deserves. This seems to be due to political cowardice and blind obsession.
Sadly, the Green Paper offers mainly band-aid solutions.
Whatever the conscientious little man achieves is more than undone by the present policies of the government. Hence, we keep on losing thousands of species of plants and animals resulting in local and national extinctions.
The Green Paper admits that “This level of growth ( of human population) will necessitate the release of significant areas of new land for urban development and the building of more than 600,000 new households, as well as increasing the demand for the food, fibre and other services our ecosystems provide.” And, “as the population increases and economic growth continues, the demand for land and housing as well as for energy, transport and water infrastructure also grows. This inevitably places pressure on native vegetation.”
Because of the way our activities are endangering so much life on earth, we need to have a serious and honest look at ourselves and realise that, objectively speaking, we are in fact the greatest pest species on earth. In this light, it should not be difficult to see that all our environmental and social problems are directly and proportionally linked to the obsessionally driven population and economic growth rate.
#DemocraticViewsIgnored" id="DemocraticViewsIgnored">Democratic views ignored
Community recommendations to submissions like this are mostly ignored, in violation of the democratic process.
- Page 8 shows the bioregions of Victoria but does not show urban bioregions of urban cities and towns.
- Pages 13 and 14 do not show when country towns ran out of water and when water restriction were implemented.
- Page 17: Why is there no text for fig, 7, “Summary of threatened animals in Victoria, 2007?”
- Page 40: 6.6, Building ecological connections is continuously ignored in outer urban areas where existing wildlife corridors are wantonly destroyed.
- Page 46: The desperate water issue has not been sufficiently linked with population growth! The blame has been manly put on global warming and an uncertain future. Why then gamble with increasing the human population?
- Page 52: “While some adopt modern approaches and consider principles of sustainability and biodiversity, others are outdated and do not consider recent knowledge and threats.” An example is the proposed Frankston Bypass where road easements were reserved in 1960, a totally outdated decision.
There is also a constant ‘nibbling’ at the Green Wedges, resulting in environmental groups suffering burnouts through constantly fighting VCAT’S etc.
- Page 89: Consultation paper submission raised concerns about the continuing population growth, increased resource use, urbanisation, pollution and the sea change/tree change phenomenon, which means I am not alone in highlighting the absurd and obsessed push for population and economic growth. The 2030 plan expects over one million more people in the Melbourne growth areas and another 50,000 on the Mornington Peninsula. On top of that we have an artificially created baby boom by giving $5,000.00 for every new borne baby, and added to this we allow 170,000 more migrants to come here each year.
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