Lawyer for Norther Land Council accused of ‘doctoring’ anthropologists’ report about proposed nuclear waste dump site
Indigenous land owners accuse lawyer of manipulating nuclear waste storage report June 4, 2014 – Jane Lee Legal Affairs Reporter for The Age A lawyer who was key to the Howard government’s plan to store nuclear waste on indigenous land has been accused of manipulating the legal process required to ensure its approval.
Traditional owners from four indigenous clans are challenging the Ngapa clan’s 2007 nomination of Muckaty Station for the dump site in the Federal Court in Melbourne. The owners, including Aboriginal elders, argue they did not consent to the nomination, were not consulted on the agreement reached and were misled on the government’s proposal for the nuclear storage site.
Ron Levy was then the chief legal counsel for the Northern Land Council, which was set up to help indigenous people in the Northern Territory acquire and manage traditional lands. Mr Levy will be called as a witness later in the five-week case before Justice Anthony North.
Ron Merkel, QC, for the traditional owers, told the court on Thursday that Mr Levy “personally edited” anthropologists’ views in a Council report which concluded that only the Ngapa Lauder clan owned the site. Mr Levy also wrote a new section in the final report, reflecting his view that the Land Commissioner could depart from judges’ previous decisions on land claims, “if relevant material was before the commissioner.”
Mr Merkel said that he did this “(so) that the Lauder Ngupas would be recognised by the Northern Land Council as the only traditional owners of the site so their consent could be secured.” The site nomination could then “jump a hurdle” of having to consult in more detail about about the plan with other clans, he said………..
Mr Merkel told the court on Tuesday that Mr Levy, who controlled the consultation process, also failed to tell the full Northern Land Council or traditional owners about the only up-front $200,000 payment given to traditional owners for the site nomination or the terms of their agreement.
But he later told the federal goverrnment that he had all traditional owners’ full consent.
Mr Merkel said there was no explanation for this “unless … Mr Levy had a plan from the outset about how to achieve the end result and he did”. http://www.smh.com.au/federal-politics/political-news/indigenous-land-owners-accuse-lawyer-of-manipulating-nuclear-waste-storage-report-20140604-39jk8.html#ixzz33nhZjp26.
Muckaty nuclear waste case highlights financial irregularities in the project
Financial irregularities in Muckaty compo http://localtoday.com.au/get-local/local-news/137684-financial-irregularities-in-muckaty-compo.html By AAP 03/06/14 There were financial irregularities in the compensation package for indigenous people who face a nuclear waste dump on their land, a court has heard. A $200,000 up-front payment to a narrow group of indigenous families was not part of the package that was negotiated, lawyer Ron Merkel QC told the Federal Court on Tuesday.
Mr Merkel pointed to letters and meeting minutes which showed the Northern Land Council’s (NLC) 2007 discussions with the Commonwealth, in which it secured use of the remote land near Tennant Creek as a radioactive waste management facility.Negotiations ultimately arrived at a package of $9 million to be held in a charitable trust, $2 million for a road on Aboriginal land and $1 million, over five years, for scholarships.
“There was no mention of a $200,000 payment, which was the only payment to go directly into pockets,” Mr Merkel said.
“It was the only money to be paid up-front.”
A $200,000 payment was made to a narrow group of indigenous families who, Mr Merkel said, did not represent all traditional owners of the land.
The court was also told the same group was cited in letters in which the NLC sought to reassure the federal government it had obtained informed consent from all traditional landowners.
The case is being heard by Justice Anthony North, who also sought to confirm whether Mr Merkel’s clients were opposed to “the dump or the deal”. “My clients are not trying to get a penny of this,” Mr Merkel said. “They were never given the right to consent or not to consent and if they were included, as they should have been, then the NLC would not have got consent (of all traditional land owners) at all.”
Highlighting process flaws was the only legal avenue to challenge the project, Mr Merkel said, and his clients did not want it to proceed.
The Commonwealth and the NLC are yet to make opening submissions.
Forty witnesses will be called for the hearings being held in Melbourne, Muckaty Station, Tennant Creek and Darwin.
Federal Court hears of invalid plan to dump nuclear waste on Aboriginal land
Nuclear waste dump on Aboriginal land invalid, court told The West Australian, 3 June 14. Sydney (AFP) – The earmarking of a remote Australian outback area as a nuclear waste dump was invalid because officials failed to contact all traditional Aboriginal landowners affected, a court heard Monday.Muckaty Station in the Northern Territory was nominated in early 2007 as a site to store low and intermediate radioactive waste under a deal negotiated with the Aboriginal Ngapa clan.
While Australia does not use nuclear power, it needs a site to store waste, including processed fuel rods from the country’s only nuclear reactor at Lucas Heights, on the outskirts of Sydney,…..Opponents have fought against the dump for years, with a trial starting in the Federal Court in Melbourne Monday alleging Muckaty’s nomination was invalid due to a failure of the government and the land council to obtain the consent of all Aboriginal owners.
“What we’re here to say is ‘no more’ and that this process was so legally flawed that it is invalid,” Ron Merkel, who is representing traditional owners, told the court.
“The opposition is in no small part based on a spiritual affiliation to the land and that radioactive waste will poison the land,” he said in comments cited by Australian Associated Press.
The court was told the consent of all groups with a claim to the land was required for the facility to go ahead, but some Aboriginals whose country was affected have never had a chance to voice their concerns until now……..Speaking to reporters, Kylie Sambo, of the Warlmanpa people, said the idea of a waste facility on the land, which is in the centre of the country, was “poison”.
“We don’t want it to spoil our country because we love our land and we’ve been there for centuries,” she said. “My uncle once told me, ‘You may think you own the land, but in fact the land owns us’.”
The Australian Conservation Foundation said the case raised questions about the country’s management of long-lived radioactive waste.
“Australia has never has an independent assessment of how best to manage radioactive waste; now we urgently need one,” campaigner Dave Sweeney said.
The case is set to run for five weeks. https://au.news.yahoo.com/thewest/world/a/24084083/nuclear-waste-dump-on-aboriginal-land-invalid-court-told/
Aboriginal elders were misled by Northern Land Council over Muckaty nuclear waste dump plan
Northern Land Council ‘misled’ elders over Muckaty Station nuclear dump site http://www.theaustralian.com.au/national-affairs/policy/northern-land-council-misled-elders-over-muckaty-station-nuclear-dump-site/story-fn9hm1pm-1226940619084# PIA AKERMAN THE AUSTRALIAN JUNE 03, 2014 ONE of the country’s most powerful Aboriginal bodies has been accused of misleading Top End residents about the safety of using Muckaty Station as a nuclear waste dump site.
In the opening day of the legal challenge to the proposed nuclear waste facility at Muckaty, 110km north of Tennant Creek, opponents of the plan said they would never accept nuclear waste there.
Ron Merkel QC, representing Mark Lane Jangala and three other elders who oppose the waste dump, told the Federal Court that the Northern Land Council had acted outside its powers and misrepresented the facts during “consultations’’ with traditional landowners.
“This is a matter which has literally torn the Muckaty community apart,” he said.
Mr Merkel’s submissions claim the NLC failed to ensure traditional owners understood the effect of nominating Muckaty as a nuclear waste site, telling them it was safe to bury it and downplaying any risks. The NLC is also accused of incorrectly identifying people with an interest in the land and not consulting in a culturally appropriate manner with Aboriginal interpreters.
Muckaty Station was chosen by the Howard government in 2007 after being volunteered by the NLC in a deal worth more than $12 million to the NLC and $10m initially to the Northern Territory government, which would receive another $2m a year from other governments once the facility was operational.
Mr Merkel said “not one” Aboriginal person at Muckaty had any right to any money if the dump went ahead according to a deed that nominated the site.
The hearing continues in Melbourne this week before moving to the NT.
Aboriginal owners fear that radioactive waste dump will poison their land
NT nuclear dump will ‘poison’ land: trial The indigenous owners of Muckaty Station, which is earmarked for a nuclear waste dump, fear it will poison their land. SBS News, 2 June 14, Source AAP “….…The indigenous owners of the Northern Territory’s Muckaty Station were asked to welcome a nuclear waste dump while waving away their rights to compensation, a court has heard.The remote site near Tennant Creek has been earmarked, since 2007, as the site of a major Commonwealth-run radioactive waste storage facility.
A seven-year bid to halt the project reached the Federal Court on Monday, where Justice Anthony North was told its indigenous owners were being short-changed………
Mr Merkel said the waste to be stored at the site would remain dangerously radioactive for 200 years, and indigenous people he represented had a connection to the land for 50,000 years. The indigenous owners did not want it to proceed, he said, because they believed it would affect their spiritual affiliation with – and “poison” – the land.
The court was also told proper process to determine Muckaty Station’s indigenous ownership, or to obtain consent from all affected families, was not followed.
“It is an unusual structure for what is a compulsory acquisition of land,” Justice North said………
Kylie Sambo, 20, of the Warlmanpa people, said it was a relief for her community to get its day in court after more than seven years of campaigning against the waste dump. “It’s a poison. We don’t want it to be there,” she told reporters. “We don’t want it to spoil our country because we love our land and we’ve been there for centuries. “My uncle once told me, ‘You may think you own the land, but in fact the land owns us’.”Muckaty Station has been selected as the preferred site to provide long-term storage for radioactive waste that is now being held at Lucas Heights and then sent to France for further processing. http://www.sbs.com.au/news/article/2014/06/02/nt-nuclear-dump-will-poison-land-trial
AUDIO: Muckaty Nuclear waste case in court today – puts scrutiny on Northern Land Council
Muckaty nuclear waste proposal in Federal Court today, ABC Rural By Lauren Fitzgerald , 2 June 14, A row over the future site for Australia’s first nuclear waste dump hits the Federal Court today. Muckaty Station, 600 kilometres north of Alice Springs, was nominated by the Howard Government as its preferred site for storing low and intermediate level nuclear waste in 2007.
That policy, continued under Labor, has been met with vocal resistance from some traditional owners since its inception. Muckaty Station was declared Aboriginal land under the Land Rights Act in 1997, with seven different clans identified as part of the Muckaty Land Trust.When the Northern Land Council nominated a small part of that property to host a nuclear waste facility, they did it on behalf of the Ngapa clan.
But four other groups say they also lay claim to that particular area.
Dianne Stokes is one of the traditional owners opposing the dump. She says she has waited a long time to have her case heard in court.”While I was waiting we went around to all the big cities to protest, went to public meetings to let everyone know that we’re still going ahead on this court challenge,” she said.
“The Commonwealth and the Northern Land Council weren’t talking to the traditional owners and they weren’t consulted properly at the beginning.”………
Maurice Blackburn Social Justice Practice will represent the Traditional Owners opposing the facility, on a pro-bono basis. Lawyer Elizabeth O’Shea says the case is significant for a number of reasons.
“There’s also some provisions about misleading and deceptive conduct, which is traditionally consumer protection and we’re alleging that the Northern Land Council was engaged in that behaviour. “And it will test some provisions as well that the Commonwealth is relying on, so some technical legal stuff.
“But mostly I think it’s interesting because the Northern Land Council is never usually put under this level of scrutiny, and we’re ready to undertake that process and give traditional owners the opportunity to be heard.” She says that if the case is successful, she hopes the decision will give Traditional Owners more say over particular land use proposals…….. http://www.abc.net.au/news/2014-06-02/muckaty-nuclear-waste-federal-court/5492958
Background to the Federal Court case on the proposed Muckaty radioactive wastes dump
Comment: Australia’s radioactive waste management on trial Australia has never had an independent examination of the best way to manage our nation’s radioactive waste. It’s time for that to change. By Dave Sweeney 28 MAY 2014 IT IS A LONG WAY FROM THE LORE OF THE WORLD’S OLDEST CONTINUING CULTURE TO THE LAW COURTS OF MELBOURNE BUT A STORY THAT STARTED YEARS AGO IN CENTRAL AUSTRALIA WILL SOON BE THE FOCUS OF A MONTH LONG FEDERAL COURT TRIAL SEEN BY MANY AS A TEST OF BOTH AUSTRALIA’S SOCIAL CONTRACT WITH ITS FIRST NATION PEOPLE’S AND COMMITMENT TO RESPONSIBLE ENVIRONMENTAL STEWARDSHIP.In May 2007 the Northern Land Council nominated an area of land on a pastoral station called Muckaty around 120 kilometres north of Tennant Creek in the Northern Territory as a site for a national radioactive waste dump.
The proposal was advanced through a commercial in confidence agreement between the NLC, an Aboriginal clan group and the then Howard government that saw the group “volunteer” an area of the shared Muckaty Land Trust for the burial and above ground storage of radioactive waste in return for federal payments, promises and a “package of benefits” worth around $12 million.
The dump plans lack of transparency, inclusion and scientific or procedural rigour left the majority of Aboriginal land-owners without any awareness of or ability to input into the process or the plan.
Like all things nuclear, this is an issue with shelf life and now after years of sustained community opposition a Federal Court trial is set to explore the unresolved issues of ownership, consultation and consent at hearings in Melbourne, Tennant Creek and Darwin throughout June.
Critics maintain that the dump plan fails two fundamental tests: it has explicitly excluded and marginalised Aboriginal landowners from decision making processes and power and it is based on an approach to radioactive waste management that is increasing at odds with international industry best practise and sound thinking.
The Federal Court’s focus will be the question of consent and control, and these concerns are of pivotal importance. Shared title for the Muckaty lands was only formally granted to Aboriginal people fifteen years ago and now many are saddened and angry that access to this area could be lost for centuries to come through a secretive process and without their knowledge or consent. Further, it is unreasonable and unconscionable for any government to play the politics of carrot and stick with some of the nation’s poorest people in order to find a remote place to dump some of the nation’s nastiest industrial waste.
The need to responsibly manage the serious and long term environmental and human risks posed from any industrial waste is a clear test of a mature society. When that risk involves the unique properties of radioactive waste then the need is magnified and multiplied.
Radioactive waste is a serious environmental management challenge. The material is often hot, always hazardous and extremely long-lived. Current problems at waste facilities in the US and elsewhere highlight the complexity of the issue and no nation on earth currently has a safe, final disposal facility for high level radioactive waste. This issue demands and deserves genuine attention but for too long been mismanaged by successive politicians seeking a short term ‘fix’ to a long term threat……. http://www.sbs.com.au/news/article/2014/05/28/comment-australia-s-radioactive-waste-management-trial
Clean energy industries will require compensation as Australian govt slashes renewable energy funding
Budget 2014: Clean energy bodies call for compensation as Government cuts green funding ABC Radio Australia, 16 May 2014, Clean energy industry representatives have slammed federal budget cuts in the sector, calling for compensation if legislation is changed. By environment and science reporter Jake Sturmer, Alex McDonald – The Federal Government has taken the sword to renewable energy, cutting hundreds of millions of dollars from various green programs.
“I think it’s a very depressing message for the industry and for the investors in it,” said Miles George, head of the 
country’s largest renewable energy provider, Infigen.
Among the changes is a decision to spread the Government’s $2.55 billion Emissions Reduction Fund (direct action policy) over 10 years rather than four.
-……………………“If we actually throw away options, a fear for me is that the energy mix that we currently have just gets ossified,” said ARENA chairman Greg Bourne.
“Infrastructure is hospitals, infrastructure is schools, but infrastructure is also the energy system that you have within a country and without the energy system, your overall system begins to grind to a halt.” Mr Bourne says the current reliance on traditional energy sources is “not fit for purpose in this century”.
The last significant piece of green energy legislation, the Renewable Energy Target (RET), is currently under review. After investing billions in the sector, Mr George warns any changes would be a breach of faith. “If the legislation is now to be changed we would expect to be fully compensated,” he said.
“If [they] took the RET away tomorrow … we would lose 40 per cent of our revenue and our Australian business would fail … along with nearly all wind farms and wind farm businesses in Australia.” Mr George says Infigen has made investments over the past 10 years on the basis of legislation that had “bi-partisan support”.
“If the legislation is now to be changed retrospectively and that has a negative effect on our business, we would expect to be fully compensated,” he said. “This is the way Australia does it. Australia does not wreck existing legislation without compensation.”
The Environment Minister declined an interview but maintains that tough decisions needed to be made in the current economic climate.
Environmental and racial injustice. The saga of Northern Territory radioactive trash dump plan continues
Environmental Injustice in Australia – Nuclear Waste, The Stringer, by Kate O’Callaghan, May 8th, 2014 Muckaty Station is a small township in the remote Northern Territory, 110km north of Tennant Creek and roughly 800km south of Darwin. Also known as Marlwanpa, the land is held under Native Title having formally been returned in 2001 to thetraditional owners – the Milwayi, Ngapa, Ngarrka, Wirntiku, Kurrakurraja, Walanypirri and Yapayapa peoples. Muckaty is also the proposed site of Australia’s first national nuclear waste dump or, as it’s officially called, radioactive waste repository.
Despite the absence of consultation with the broader community, in 2007 the Howard government approved the Muckaty dump site with plans to open the facility in 2011. After thesecretive deal was negotiated with the NLC, so secretive that some members of the Ngapa clan were not even given a copy, a bitter conflict erupted. Other clans, environmental groups, unions and the NT Government expressed outrage at the lack of proper consultation with the traditional owners. Despite ongoing attempts to contact the government, opposing community groups had their meeting requests ignored, correspondence unanswered and were continually ignored.
In 2010, the subsequent Rudd government introduced legislation giving them the ability to override the Northern Territory’s threat to block the construction of the Muckaty dump. After years of opposition, the Gillard government passed the legislation in 2012. The National Radioactive Waste Management Bill removed community appeal rights, indigenous & environmental protections, and gave the government the ability to override state or territory concerns about environmental impacts. After her election in 2013, Northern Territory Senator Nova Perris expressed her objection to the Muckaty site, stating it would cause “profound grief, suffering and loss on Aboriginal people.”……..
while there are still disagreements on the best way to deal with nuclear waste, there is consensus that the process must involve a high level of community consultation. According to a UK report by an expert committee on nuclear waste, “There is a growing recognition that it is not ethically acceptable for a society to impose a radioactive waste facility on an unwilling community.” It is clear at Muckaty that the Australian government did not engage in meaningful consultation with the community as a whole. More deplorable than this is the willingness of successive governments to dump this problem on marginalised indigenous communities. This is in direct conflict with our international obligations under the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples which requires that no disposal takes place on indigenous lands without without “their free, prior and informed consent.”
So what’s next for the people of Muckaty? After being postponed, the legal battle against the Commonwealth Government and Northern Land Council is expected to commence in the Federal Court in June 2014. The legal team will include prominent human rights lawyers Julian Burnside and George Newhouse, who will challenge the nomination of the indigenous land for the nuclear dump site. The case will be an important litmus test for any similar legal challenges in the future. It is crucial that the government looks toward the responsible and transparent management of radioactive waste and away from the secretive tactics that have defined the past decadehttp://thestringer.com.au/environmental-injustice-in-australia-nuclear-waste/#.U3Er04FdWik.
Evidence to be taken in Tennant Creek, on the legal case against Muckaty nuclear waste dump
Muckaty trial to be held in Tennant Creek http://www.theaustralian.com.au/news/latest-news/muckaty-trial-to-be-held-in-tennant-creek/story-fn3dxiwe-1226880701026 NEDA VANOVAC AAP APRIL 11, 2014
THE federal government is exploiting the Northern Territory’s constitutional weakness by planning to build a nuclear waste facility there 
against traditional owners’ wishes, Senator Nova Peris says.
This week it was decided that a Federal Court trial would sit in Tennant Creek and Darwin in June to take evidence on the proposed dump, which is fiercely opposed by four of the five traditional owner groups at Muckaty, about 120 kilometres north of Tennant Creek.
Legal proceedings have been running against the federal government and the Northern Land Council (NLC) since June 2010, with those opposed accusing the NLC of breaching its duties by failing to properly identify the traditional Aboriginal owners of the nominated land, not consulting adequately and not getting proper consent before recommending the site. “The Northern Territory is not our nation’s dumping ground,” Senator Peris told a Muckaty dinner in Darwin on Thursday.
“The only reason the dump was proposed to be built here is because we are a Territory and not a state. Exploiting our constitutional weakness is not acceptable.”
Ms Peris called for a scientific and rational approach to determining how Australia would deal with its nuclear waste.
Lawyer Elizabeth O’Shea said it was a victory for traditional owners to have part of the trial sit in Tennant Creek.
“We’re very concerned about the health and age of a number of our witnesses,” she said.
“It’s hugely important that the court has taken this step and we’re very pleased, and it’s caused great comfort for our clients.”
The Muckaty decision affects all of Tennant Creek, traditional owner Penny Phillips says, so it’s important for the community to be able to observe the legal process.
“All the people there, the old people and the young ones too, they can step up and start talking up,” she said.
“Our people fought for country for years and years – you get back country and you have to look after it.
“If you put the dump there, who’s going to look after the next generation?”
The trial will begin in Melbourne on June 2.
Legal bullying made a scientific journal remove its article about climate change
The journal that gave in to climate deniers’ intimidation The Conversation, Elaine McKewon, Research Associate, Australian Centre for Independent Journalism at University of Technology, Sydney 1 April 14,
In February 2013, the journal Frontiers in Psychology published a peer-reviewed paper which found that people who reject climate science are more likely to believe in conspiracy theories. Predictably enough, those people didn’t like it.The paper, which I helped to peer-review, is called “Recursive fury: Conspiracist ideation in the blogosphere in response to research on conspiracist ideation”. In it, cognitive scientist Stephan Lewandowsky and his colleagues survey and analyse the outcry generated on climate skeptic blogs to their earlier work on climate denial.
The earlier study had also linked climate denial with conspiracist thinking. And so by reacting with yet more conspiracy theorising, the bloggers rather proved the researchers’ point.
Yet soon after Recursive Fury was published, threats of litigation started to roll in, and the journal took the paper down (it survives on the website of the University of Western Australia, where Lewandowsky carried out the study).
A lengthy investigation ensued, which eventually found the paper to be scientifically and ethically sound. Yet on March 21 this year, Frontiers retracted the paper because of the legal threats.
The episode offers some of the clearest evidence yet that threats of libel lawsuits have a chilling effect on scientific research………
the journal’s management and editors were clearly intimidated by climate deniers who threatened to sue. So Frontiers bowed to their demands, retracted the paper, damaged its own reputation, and ultimately gave a free kick to aggressive climate deniers.
I would have expected a scientific journal to have more backbone, certainly when it comes to the crucially important issue of academic freedom. http://theconversation.com/the-journal-that-gave-in-to-climate-deniers-intimidation-25085
Court judgment on Andrew Bolt and Racial Discrimination
Brandis Backs Down on Bigotry, ProBono Australia, March 27, 2014 Federal Attorney General George Brandis has watered down his controversial changes to the racial discrimination laws, however community organisations remain steadfast that no changes should be made to the current law.
Previously the Coalition Government’s proposed changes, as part of an election commitment, were to Section 18C of the Racial Discrimination Act (RDA) , which prohibit public conduct that is reasonably likely to “offend, insult, humiliate or intimidate” a person or groups because of their skin colour or national or ethnic origin.
However, the Government has announced that while continuing to repealing some sections of the Act a new section will be inserted which Senator Brandis claims will preserve the existing protection against intimidation and create a new protection from racial vilification……….
Co-Chairs of Reconciliation Australia, Dr Tom Calma and Melinda Cilento released a joint statement saying they are opposed to any changes to the RDA which weaken the protections against racial discrimination.
“The Racial Discrimination Act 1975 (RDA) currently ensures all Australians are protected from discrimination on the grounds of race, colour, descent or ethnic origin,” Dr Calma and Cilento said.
“Any changes to the RDA that weaken protections from racial vilification would pave the way to a less reconciled, just and equitable Australia. We therefore strongly oppose the current proposed changes to the RDA which repeal Section 18C.”
The Reconciliation Australia Co-Chairs said the use of defamation laws by politicians from both sides of politics was well known and exemplifies the balance between free speech and the need for citizens to be protected from scurrilous and false verbal attacks.
“We note that Section 18D of the current Racial Discrimination Act contains exemptions for ‘anything said or done reasonably and in good faith’ and, in the case of publishing, anything that constitutes ‘a fair and accurate report of any event or matter of public interest’.
“We note that in the key case against which the alleged free speech restrictions of the RDA are being measured – the Andrew Bolt case – the judge, J Bromberg, found that Mr Bolt contravened section 18C because the articles were not written in good faith and contained factual errors, and therefore not made exempt by Section 18D of the RDA.
“In his judgment J Bromberg found the Section 18D exemptions did not apply because of ‘….the manner in which the articles were written, including that they contained errors of fact, distortions of the truth and inflammatory and provocative language’.
“Section 18D does provide free speech protection for comments that may be considered offensive to many Australians as long as these comments are delivered in a reasonable and honest way.”
New South Wales Aboriginal Land Council has also condemned the moves to amend the Commonwealth Racial Discrimination Act………http://www.probonoaustralia.com.au/news/2014/03/brandis-backs-down-bigotry#
Australia’s new “Freedom Commissioner”, Tim Wilson – what a (bad) joke!
He made clear on Monday he supported repealing the section of the Racial Discrimination Act that made it illegal to insult or offend people on the basis of their race.
Tim Wilson: Freedom Commissioner, The Age, Tony Wright, Dan Harrison December 18, 2013 The Abbott government has sent shockwaves through the anti-discrimination and political establishments by appointing one of the nation’s most vociferous critics to the Human Rights Commission. Continue reading
The few surviving Maralinga nuclear veterans lose yet another case for justice
Australian veterans affected by nuclear testing lose final bid for case to be heard http://www.abc.net.au/news/2013-12-10/veterans-affected-by-british-nuclear-testing-lose-court-bid/5147678 By Sally Block 10 Dec 2013 Australian veterans of British nuclear testing in the 1950s and 1960s have lost their bid to have their case investigated.
About 300 surviving members of the Australian Defence Force applied to the Australian Human Rights Commission to have their case heard.
The veterans were involved in the nuclear tests by the British at Maralinga, Emu Field and Monte Bello islands. Their lawyers argued the Menzies government at the time exposed them to the harmful effects of radiation in full knowledge of the damage to their health and that is a breach of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.
The Commission knocked them back, saying it is out of their jurisdiction to inquire into the acts or practises by the Commonwealth that are alleged. Continue reading
Will BHP Billiton pursue Aboriginal activist Kevin Buzzacott for legal costs?
Aboriginal elder Kevin Buzzacott gets no answer from BHP AGM BHP Billiton would neither confirm nor deny that it plans to pursue a South Australian Aboriginal elder for court costs.http://www.abc.net.au/news/2013-11-21/aboriginal-elders-asks-bhp-to-drop-costs/5107622 ABC Rural Babs McHugh Kevin Buzzacott of the Arabunna people was ordered by the Federal Court to pay costs to the SA and Federal Governments and BHP after a failed appeal over the expansion of the Olympic Dam uranium, copper and gold mine.
Mr Buzzacott argued the proposed expansion, which has since been shelved, was approved without proper consideration of the long term environmental impact. But three judges ruled that lawyers for Mr Buzzacott failed to make out the grounds for appeal and ordered him to pay court costs.
Sources close to the world’s largest mining company told the ABC it’s very unlikely the the miner would consider pursuing Mr Kevin Buzzacott for costs. They added that BHP Billiton doesn’t have a track record of pursuing individuals on this basis.
1 This month.
20 September –National Day of Action in Melbourne on the International Day of Peace
Help Aunty Sue Protect Her Land and Sacred Sites From Destructive Rocket Testing.
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PETITION – To: Prime Minister Anthony Albanese and the Australian Labor Government
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