Antinuclear

Martin Ferguson helps coal lobby in setting up private spy company

a lack of evidence doesn’t seem to have stopped the federal Minister for Resources and Energy, Martin Ferguson, from successfully advocating for heavy-handed laws framed in the language of anti-terrorism, but designed to repress political advocacy.

not only does the coal industry appear to be manipulating our political and legislative processes, it continues to pollute, expand, and cause death and massive damage with impunity. For years, it has successfully curtailed government action to combat climate change.

It is the coal barons, not activists, who threaten society, The Age, Shaun Murray, January 10, 2012 Anti-coal activists pose a political threat. That’s why we’re being spied on. I’d like to know how the government can justify employing a private
company to spy on me. As an anti-coal activist, and member of one of three main community groups in Australia campaigning against the coal industry, I was alarmed by revelations in The Saturday Age that the Australian Federal Police has singled us out as a potential threat and is employing a private company to spy on us.

As peaceful community activists, we collectively have no history of or motivation to disrupt energy supply. We pose no threat to society – unlike the coal industry, which wields massive political influence and holds the greatest responsibility for the hundreds of thousands of deaths, extinction of species, and billions of dollars of damage annually that climate change is causing…... Yet a lack of evidence
doesn’t seem to have stopped the federal Minister for Resources and
Energy, Martin Ferguson, from successfully advocating for heavy-handed
laws framed in the language of anti-terrorism, but designed to repress
political advocacy.
Indeed, the real threat that anti-coal activists pose is a political
one – mass protests at Hazelwood Power Station in 2009 and 2010 helped
to withdraw the social licence of this dangerous, polluting industry.
This in turn led to the current federal government legislation to buy
out and close 2000 megawatts of brown-coal generation, and no doubt
caused political fallout for the coal industry and its political
allies. It is unsurprising that the coal industry would flex its
political muscle in response, demanding tougher laws to deter such
effective advocacy……
So not only does the coal industry appear to be manipulating our
political and legislative processes, it continues to pollute, expand,
and cause death and massive damage with impunity. For years, it has
successfully curtailed government action to combat climate change. Now
the crisis looms: leading scientific experts tell us that the world is
on track for 4 degrees of global warming, potentially by as early as
2060, resulting in mass extinction and a reduction of Earth’s carrying
capacity to less than 1 billion people. As burning coal is the single
greatest contributor to the climate crisis, it therefore “poses the
single greatest threat to civilisation and life on this planet” (in
the words of Professor James Hansen, NASA’s top climatologist).
: http://www.theage.com.au/opinion/politics/it-is-the-coal-barons-not-activists-who-threaten-society-20120109-1pro1.html#ixzz1j6BHiHNd

January 10, 2012 - Posted by Christina Macpherson | General News