Antinuclear

Minerals Council wants environmental groups to be stripped of charity status

AUDIO: Minerals Council calls for green groups to be stripped of charity status ABC Radio The World Today Tim Lamacraft reported this story on    February 16, 2015  

ELEANOR HALL: The peak lobby for the New South Wales mining industry is calling for green groups to be stripped of their charity status. The Minerals Council says activists are masquerading as environment organisations and should not receive special tax treatment.

Critics say it’s an attempt to squash free speech.

Tim Lamacraft has our report……..

SIMON LONGSTAFF: When the NSW Minerals Council makes this claim, I’d really be cautious to know whether or not their membership supports this.

There’s some very large international companies, like BHP Billiton and Rio Tinto there, and I’d be quite personally surprised if they supported this kind of call.

The second thing I’d be wanting to think about is who’s actually making the call, and in the case of the Minerals Council from New South Wales, they are a body which is an industry association, they have an interest to promote things like subsidies, tax relief for mining and a whole lot of other benefits and clearly anything which seems to stymie the progress of their members……..

PHIL LAIRD: Minerals Council have had a history of trying to silence people who oppose different projects that are put up.
They’ve only just recently put a strategy in to try and remove the planning assessment commission in New South Wales, the independent decision maker, after two mines had been rejected.

What they see is how farmers and others who have a charity that’s working on their behalf to put forward their concerns about mining and for the Minerals Council this is something that they don’t want to see.

I think that these guys are trying to shut down free speech on behalf of multimillion dollar mining companies who are basically exporting our wealth overseas. http://www.abc.net.au/worldtoday/content/2015/s4180628.htm

February 18, 2015 - Posted by Christina Macpherson | AUSTRALIA - NATIONAL, civil liberties