Exhibition opening Friday 19th April, 5.30-7.30pm. Art Space, Lord Street, Port Campbell.
All Welcome.
Cr. Simon Illingsworth to open exhibition
Exhibition open times -
Friday 19th April -1pm to 4.00pm
Saturday 20th April -10 am to 4 pm
"My objective, with your help, honourable members, is to make Melbourne, and even Victoria, a great place to live. Not merely a great place in population size or area to rival such places as Shanghai, New York, London or Sao Paulo. Such greatness would be mere obesity, with all the disadvantages of such.
This article reproduces a leaflet written by Jim Quirk, who was my father. The leaflet advertised a 'Nature Show' at the lower Melbourne Town Hall in 1966. The Field Naturalists Club of Victoria and the Society for Growing Australian Plants sponsored the Nature Show to help the plight and status of the wombat in Australia. I wonder if the same results could be achieved today. Have we advanced at all? Reading of the particularly dire conditions for wombats in South Australia, it would seem not. And, think of the kangaroos who suffer so badly still at the wrong end of rifles and who are caught up so messily and tragically in urban development. The discursive nature of the account below may be a reflection of a time when conservation was a battle but our lives were not as stressed and rushed as they are today. We were more able to organise politically for causes in NGOs which were not then commercialised.
Videos of KELVIN THOMSON and all panel speakers have been added to this article. Open mic part now published here too. Today, June 14, 2014, a packed hall with people standing at the back in the Hawthorn Arts Centre voted for a national plebiscite to ask the people what size population they wanted. The forum interacted with a panel of four speakers: Kelvin Thomson, MP for Wills; Sheila Newman, Evolutionary Sociologist and Candobetter.net editor and writer; Clifford Hayes, former Bayside Council Mayor and planning activist; and William Bourke, Leader of the Sustainable Population Party. There was a queue for the open microphone and the meeting closed later than expected. All motions passed with an overwhelming show of hands.
Public forum with Kelvin Thomson, William Burke, Sheila Newman, Clifford Hayes and numerous community groups. Sustainable Population Australia & Victoria First are hosting a panel discussion and open mike on Melbourne's population future. The event will be filmed to use as a document to show how Melbourne people feel about overpopulation. "Melbourne's population growth is treated by the media, by governments and by planners as though it is inevitable, giving the impression that the fate of Melbourne is to be a city of 7 to 8 million by mid-century. What the public seldom hears is that Melbourne's huge growth rate is not inevitable, nor that growth of the population does not magically stop at mid-century unless changes to existing trends are made. If present growth rates continued, Melbourne would be a city of about 20 million by the end of the century. The truth is that Melbourne's future could be largely in our own hands. This meeting is a chance for the people of Melbourne to question the ideology that "Melbourne must keep growing"" (Jill Quirk, President SPA Vic & Tas). "Melbourne has been growing by 200 people a day, 1,500 a week and 75,000 each year for some time now. The latest projections are that this rapid growth will escalate still further. But Melbournians are not asked whether this is what we really want for our city." (Kelvin Thomson, President, Victoria First)
This article features videos of the four Victorian based candidates for the Stable Population Party - Jill Quirk, Clifford Hayes, Michael Bayliss, Steven Armstrong and Jonathan Page - not necessarily in that order. It is very interesting to see what the candidates have to say and how they present. Australians have a chance of making a crucial difference by voting for these candidates in the Senate and in the lower house for the next Federal Election. Candidates are also running in other states. Check this website for details: http://www.populationparty.org.au/templates/pop/page/page_html_standard.php?secID=210
Monash University's Dr. Bob Birrell of Monash University Centre for Population and Urban Research spoke at the Sustainable Population Australia AGM on July 20, 2013 to a conference center packed to standing room only. The speaker was retained for questions until long after the end of the talk. "It was chilling the way Dr Birrell calmly and factually revealed the deep globalised shit we are in. It just doesn’t make sense at all. If only the public understood what is being done to them and their children...not to mention our environment." Videos by Steven Armstrong.
BOOK LAUNCH & DISCUSSION, Balwyn Library 2pm: Sustainable Population Australia, Victorian and Tasmanian branch
At this meeting we are proud to launch an exciting new book, published in December 2012, Demography, territory and law: rules of animal and human populations by population sociologist and SPA member, Sheila Newman.
“Mr. Rudd needs to be severely questioned on the title of his talk but the context makes this unlikely. Were he speaking in parliament or the public realm he might be questioned but his speech on Thursday will be heard at a forum of an industry known for its bias to high population growth with no practical or logical end point.” (Jill Quirk, President, SPAVicTas)
Not so livable Victoria - Melbourne rally calls on government to curb immigration and stop advertising for new settlers overseas for Victoria in view of environmental and amenity impacts of huge population
Jill Quirk (President Sustainable Population Australia (SPA) Victorian and Tasmanian Branches, and National Representative) will host Dr Geoff Mosley to speak at the AGM, this Saturday, 7/7/2012, at 2PM.
By upwards engineering population growth, the Victorian and Australian Governments are showing disregard of "ultimate deprivation" and leaving "future generations with the task of rationing energy, oil and food..."
"Despite this grim picture, unlike global population growth, our own population future is very much under our control and we need not be overwhelmed. Stability of population numbers is within our reach this century.
Melbourne people can hear MP Hon. Kelvin Thomson speak at the A.G.M. of Sustainable Population Australia (Victorian branch) on July 16th at 2.00p.m. The topic will be, "The population issue in Australia - post Population Strategy." The title refers to Minister Burke's recent "Population Strategy." In this article we talk about why this meeting is so important for Victorians and Australians and discuss events leading up to it, from Barry Jones's Australia's Population Carrying Capacity Inquiry (1994), through the Bracks Population Summit (2002) and Tony Burke's "Population Strategy" (2011). We at http://candobetter.net hope that subsequent events in Victoria will maintain and support SPA Vic's promotion of a better population policy for Australia. (Inside: Link to Steve Vizard's surprisingly good program contrasting Jones Report with Burke Report.)
Committee for Melbourne growthers are scraping the bottom of the barrel looking for new ways to get people to move to the hated high-rises the property development lobby has planned all over Melbourne. Mary Drost says, "Both Andrew McLeod and Bernard Salt are obsessed with growth.
This article title is based on the title of a debate at the Municipal Association of Victoria AGM, which took place on Thursday, October 21 at Hotel Sofitel. The article itself is based on speech notes from SPA Victoria's president, Jill Quirk, for her part in the debate.
Quark writes about how the mainstream press is becoming increasingly hysterical in its promotion of growth lobby propaganda, particularly since the Australian Federal election in August 2010.
Population sociologist Sheila Newman's talk, "Stable Population dynamic demystified," presented fascinating original material using social and biologica
Kelvin Thomson MHR, Federal Member for Wills, is holding a Population Reform Forum at a breakfast at the Zoo on 7 May 2010. These forums are being held at the same time all round Australia. Please note that the Melbourne Forum has been so popular that it is booked out and there is a waiting list! I mention this in case anyone is still thinking of attending.
Jill Quirk, of the Victorian Branch of Sustainable Population Australia, did a cracking job on this meeting that has given people another opportunity to hear and talk with Kelvin Thomson, Federal MP. Wills, Victoria. It would be a good start if all the other SPA branches in Australia also invited Kelvin to enlighten their cities and regions.
Meeting 29 November - details end of story
What a coup for long-time environment and democracy activist, Julianne Bell! Last night in Melbourne at the AGM of the Royal Park Protection Group, federal ALP Member for Wills, Hon Kelvin Thomson announced and detailed his 14 point plan for population reform, which is reproduced at the end of this article.
Shortly after his lunch with the "Progressive Business Association" must have ended, Mr Madden, who apparently departed shyly out the back door, looked surprised to be intercepted and presented with the resolutions of the Bastille Day Rally against Urban Expansion and Rotten taxes by Julianne Bell, Rosemary West and Jill Quirk, acting on behalf of the environment and de
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