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November 22, 2011
Now we can see one of the benefits of a minority government in the context of a capital intensive mining boom that is driving Australia's economic growth.
It was Tony Windsor, not the Greens, who used his political power with respect to the mining tax to negotiate on behalf of those farm groups and environmentalists who are worried about the potential impact of coal and coal-seam gas developments on precious but poorly understood underground water resources from the Darling Downs to the Liverpool Plains.
Windsor has said he won’t back the government’s Mineral Resources Rent Tax unless more is done to make coal seam gas mining sustainable.He also called for $200-400 million annually from the tax revenue to go toward bio-regional assessments. He also wants to see the Commonwealth have greater power over granting coal seam gas mining rights.
The Gillard Government has acted to address the concerns over:
• The competition posed to agriculture and the environment by the massive volumes of water required for mining;
• The potential damage to and contamination of underground aquifers; and
• The potential threat posed by millions of tonnes of super saline water brought to the surface with coal-seam gas.
The new Independent Expert Scientific Committee will provide scientific advice about coal-seam gas and large coalmining approvals where they have significant impacts on water. It will oversee research on the impacts on water resources from coal-seam gas and large coalmining projects. And it will commission and fund water resource assessments for priority regions.
Gillard gets what she wanted --the passage of the (much watered down) Mineral Resources Rent Tax (MRRT) in the House of Representatives---after negotiating with Andrew Wilkie to increase the $50 million profit threshhold at which the mining tax will apply to $75 million, phasing up to $125 million.
Then she can chalk up another significant piece of legislation passed. She just needs to negotiate with The Greens to find some of the revenue lost from raising the threshold.
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At last!
Someone in parliament finally understands the role of science and puts the horse before the cart as to "development".
Really goes against a twenty year trend.
For me, it's an article of faith above just about all others.
It should have been applied in Tasmania with logging processes, but the continued trend by politicians is away from a locale's consideration, after all the FTA's say that outside capital must have precedence over a locale and its inhabitant's concerns. Instead, history of enviro since Gunns has indicated that, far from politicians and developers recognising the necessity of EPA's and proper forward planning, there is seen an institutionalised, studied denialism written into corporate and political conduct on these things- the curent fedminister, Burke's, ambivalence and probable duplicity on these issues is the real motif of the times.