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Final environmental decision on pulp mill on monday

The federal government will approve or reject Gunns' proposed northern Tasmanian pulp mill in a few days.

The Environment Minister's assessment of the mill will be completed by Monday.

The Minister, Peter Garrett, needs to approve 16 environmental modules for the mill to proceed.
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Every token tells a story

When convicts received a sentence of transportation to NSW, usually the alternative was being hanged. Some prisoners even expressed a preference for the gallows, because in the 1790s most people assumed that it was a one-way trip to Port Jackson and they'd never be seen again. Convicts awaiting transportation in jail or in the prison hulks often gave love tokens, fashioned out of defaced copper pennies, as farewell presents for their sweethearts and families.
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After 18 months of negotiations, the National Museum of Australia in Canberra has just bought the world's largest collection of convict love tokens, spanning the period from 1780 to 1856.
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"These keepsakes were wrought by hand for convicts to leave at home with the people they loved while they were sent halfway round the world. Instead of being numbers, they begin to appear as real people to us, with their own loves and attachments that were irrevocably fractured by transportation, the 18th-century equivalent of being sent to the moon."

More: The Australian, December 13, 2008

"Back in Sydney this would be booked out year round."

From the 7.30 Report: Video & Transcript

"International guide book Lonely Planet has named Tasmania's Bay of Fires as the hottest travel destination for 2009. The Bay of Fires covers almost 30 kilometres of Tasmania's north-east coast and there are calls for the area to be declared a National Park to ensure it remains untouched by development."

Rather dull introduction but it has pictures of the bay, which are always worth looking at. I have been there, once, for a biology excursion in Uni. We were collecting bugs. White tipped, blue sea with white sand and... it's a bit hard to describe without falling back on cliches.

Latest scuffle in the news is about this musical


ABC Online

Mercury

Yeah, more news but we have to brag about family.

I think Examiner stories disappear into the "pay to access archive" fairly quickly, but if you remember me saying last week that I had to go and look after nephew because niece, sister & mother were going down to Hobart. This is why (the kids go to Youngtown):

Mime theme gives school gold at festival

The [state final of the] multi-school contest, Wakakirri, an Aboriginal word meaning "to dance", was held at Hobart's Wrest Point last week.

Youngtown performed its production, Sustainability, which focused on the work of mime artist Marcel Marceau.

The school's dance and drama teacher Belinda Stephens said the pupils decided on a mime theme to demonstrate sustainability in magic.

More than 100 pupils from grade 5 and 6 were involved in the production.

"We had no idea we would win and were ready to leave when they announced us as winners," Ms Stephens said.
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I think all the grade 5/6 kids were involved. Sister reckons Youngtown was the only northern school down there and she was particularly pleased that they beat all those other (7) Hobart schools, including some private schools like Hutchins that had perfect costumes.

Might change that to the Mercury's version. Makes it sounds much more dramatic.

Public ejected after mill Bill is pulped by pollies

More than 250 people were ejected from the parliamentary gallery yesterday after they turned their backs on the major parties in a dramatic protest against the pulp mill.

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ANZ pulls out of Gunns deal
The ANZ bank has confirmed it will not fund the Gunns northern Tasmanian pulp mill.

Does it matter?

Gunns reloads in cash hunt

GUNNS is relying on international finance to fund its controversial pulp mill, after ANZ Bank yesterday confirmed it would not back the $2 billion project.

Gunns chief executive John Gay said yesterday that the move by ANZ would not affect the mill being built in the Tamar Valley.


Gunns mill 'may never be built'

A timber industry analyst says he is not sure Gunns' $2 billion pulp mill will ever be built because of delays in securing finance.

Gunns are denying it & ANZ claim it hasn't been decided yet, but this is appearing in/on various news places.

Results of the local government elections were in today's paper. Every two years, half of the alderman stand for election (4 years terms) and the mayor & deputy mayor are (re)elected each time. This time around, seems all the mayors across the state were re-elected except in Launceston. Dean lost, although he still got re-elected as an alderman.

The Examiner: Ivan Dean concedes anti-mill impact.
ABC: Alderman Dean does not think his support for the mill was the reason he lost.


On the subject of the pulp mill, I missed this when it was in the news. Work has started to remove three protesters from the top of the Batman Bridge in Northern Tasmania.

In today's news: Fund manager Perpetual has defended its investment in timber giant Gunns, the company planning to build a controversial pulp mill in Tasmania's Tamar valley.

And more on Gunns: Tasmanian timber company Gunns has offered to drop its lawsuit against 14 anti-logging campaigners if they agree never again to interfere with the company's operations.


And totally unrelated to any of the above, it's 90 years since the Light Horse Brigade's charge on Beersheba.