WHY GREENS MAKE ME SEE RED BILL Leak, acclaimed cartoonist, lives in one of the loveliest places in Australia: Killcare, on the Central Coast. But one of the consequences of living in the middle of the Australian bush is fire. And in pretty seachange and treechange communities, you’re likely to find yourself in a greenie council dominated by refugees from the city who haven’t a clue about the real dangers of living among trees. So it is that at the start of a dangerous bushfire season, Leak finds himself with a backyard full of trees and flammable material that he is forbidden to clear by Gosford Council on threat of fines as high as $1.1 million. “Here I am, living on the edge of bushland that could burst into flame at any time, and I’m not allowed to clear the land in my own backyard of trees that, in the event of a fire, will bring the fire straight into my home,” he says. Council flora preservation policies warn that the removal of any native tree over 3m can attract hefty fines. This “puts homes like mine in grave danger: the refusal of local councils to allow home owners to remove trees that can extend the bushland right up to our own back doors,” Leak says. “The only possible explanation for this is the council is hell-bent on securing Green votes. I’ll accept, albeit unwillingly, the indulgence of Greens fantasies up to a point but if and when they cost me my house I think I’ll have to say, ‘A line has been crossed’.” Yes indeed. How many warnings do councils need before they understand that tea trees and eucalypts and other lovely natives, not to mention shrubs and organic litter on the ground, are lethal near homes in fireprone areas. It’s bad enough that properties are being burned out by unstoppable infernos that erupt out of neglected national parks. But to actively stop people from protecting their homes by forbidding them to remove fire fuel on their own land is insanity. Gosford Council is not alone, or even the worst. Wyong Council has recently sent residents in Lake Munmorah warning letters about clearing bush adjoining their properties where dead lantana poses a serious bushfire hazard. It’s the same all over the country wherever green sensibilities have overwhelmed sensible decision making. Who could forget Liam Sheahan, who was fined $50,000 by his local council for clearing trees around his house, only to find that his property was the only one in a 2km area which survived the Black Saturday fires in Victoria in 2009. Yet we still haven’t learned the lesson. In 2009 Blue Mountains residents signed a petition condemning the state government for failing to carry out enough burn-offs as experienced firefighters warned the area was a “time bomb”. Where 10 tonnes of ground fuel per hectare is regarded as hazardous, one veteran firefighter estimates there was 40 tonnes in areas that have been burned out in the past week. That’s despite a significant improvement in national parks and firetrails management in recent years. But greenies are brilliant at warping the narrative, so instead what most people are hearing is that the bushfires have been caused by climate change, a claim not even the IPCC has made. The ABC has allowed itself to shill for climate alarmists, claiming that the bushfire season has never started so early, when a simple record check shows raging October bushfires near Sydney on several occasions in the last century. But Monday night’s 7.30 took the cake. “Scientists told 7.30 the science is in, the link between global warming and bushfires has been established and it’s time for action,” it said. But not a single scientist was produced to say such a thing. Just the usual fear-mongering greenies such as John Connor, CEO of the Climate Institute, and Don Henry of the Australian Conversation Foundation, whose grave faces and confident pronouncements appeared before captions told the audience that these were not the promised scientists. Eventually appeared Professor Andy Pitman, who is an alarmist but at least an actual scientist and halfway responsible about what he says. And nor did he say anything which backed up the conclusive link which was the thesis of the program. The only link which has been proven conclusively is the equation between ground fuel and fire intensity. And that’s the one thing greenies don’t like talking about. Miranda Devine writing in The Telegraph
Posted on: Sat, 26 Oct 2013 01:32:06 +0000
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