THE TAP COMMUNITY RALLY MARCH 14 2008

Some of the stories and snippets about the event
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Mill protesters take it to Gunns ... An article from The Mercury:  <http://www.news.com.au/mercury/>  
 http://www.news.com.au/mercury/tasmania/
March 14, 2008 02:20pm

PULP mill protesters rallied outside the headquarters of Gunns Limited today, the anniversary of the company's withdrawal from the Resource Planning and Development Commission. About 300 people carried banners and chanted "No Pulp Mill".

Launceston General Hospital surgeon Peter Hewitt summed up the mood saying he deplored the RPDC withdrawal as much as the mill itself.

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10 Pics from the rally <http://www.news.com.au/mercury/gallery/0,22927,5030350-5015646,00.html>

"This process has been a damn fake," Dr Hewitt said.

"I think it is an absolute personal insult that they should think I am so brainless that I am going to accept the process that this mill has been subjected to."

Former RPDC commissioner Warwick Raverty also addressed the rally, urging protesters not to be violent in their protests.

For more on this story, see tomorrow's Mercury  http://www.news.com.au/mercury/story/0,22884,23374173-3462,00.html
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RPDC: Anniversary of a serial killing
Dr Warwick Raverty Speech to a memorial service on the first anniversary of Gunns withdrawal from the Resource Planning and Development Commission, outside Gunns? head office in Lindsay St.  Invermay, March 14

As a scientist, I have been trained to question continually and to re-evaluate the evidence that is put in front of me every day. Until now I have hoped in vain that Gunns would see the error of its ways and that it would counsel, or sideline members of staff who behave in an anti-social manner. I had hoped that, presented with so much public opposition, Gunns under better more competent management, might base a pulp mill in Hampshire, using 100% plantation wood and complying strictly with the Tasmanian Environmental Guidelines and regulations. Today I have to tell you that I have abandoned that hope and reached what is, for me, a sad conclusion ? namely that Gunns cannot change and is therefore not a fit and proper company to build a pulp mill anywhere. I would not now support a pulp mill in Hampshire operated by Gunns.

Today is also an opportunity, a real opportunity for all of us collectively to draw a line in the sand ? this far with the nepotism and cronyism of Rough Red and her mates and no further. Collectively we can create a new beginning for Tasmania. A Tasmania where politicians govern for the many, not for the few; where money is taken from the rich and given to the poor, instead of the way it has been for so long. This is a beautiful, unique island where sustainable agriculture, forestry, fishing, wine making, tourism, mining and all the other activities by which we earn our daily bread can live in harmony with the environment.

Read more here : <http://tasmaniantimes.com/index.php?/weblog/article/rpdc-anniversary-of-a-serial-killing-james-james-priority-prioirity-priorit/>
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Pulp mill protesters gear up after hiatus
March 15


PROTEST group Tasmanians Against the Pulp Mill yesterday pledged to step up their campaign to stop Gunns Ltd's $2 billion Bell Bay project.
TAP flew Dr Warwick Raverty, the former pulp mill assessment panel member, from Melbourne to speak at a protest outside Gunns' Launceston offices.

Read more here : <http://northerntasmania.yourguide.com.au/news/local/politics/pulp-mill-protesters-gear-up-after-hiatus/1203381.html>

TAP MOVES ON: Well we hope so

TAP chanced its wings alone to send a message to Gunns on the first anniversary (March 14) of their ‘pulling the plug’ on the RPDC Pulp Mill Approval Process. CONGRATULATIONS! It was a timely rally!

Now lets put some perspective into this. What was so refreshing is that at this TAP event there were no Wilderness Society freeloaders rattling cans and milking the crowd for all that they’d give. On this issue they (The Wildos ) believe that they own it and that they are in possession of ALL the answers … thus we should all give everything to them to squander.

“Squander” I hear you cry! Yes that’s the word because this issue is much bigger than anything that would fit within their microscopic “agenda for the environment”, not to mention their own needs as ‘an organization’ to survive. Now to say this is a bit like saying motherhood is bad thing. Well it isn’t, but not all mothers are up to their task and some do not even have a handle on the thing that gives their life meaning.

The Wilderness Society people aren’t all bad, it is simply that many are one dimensional and just so deluded in their insistence that “the environment is everything”. It is important, very very important, in the mix but it isn’t absolutely everything. There’re issues that are as big, or even bigger, that get passed over because they do not fit within the wilderness tent all that comfortably.

The Wildos need to be at the community table but AT the table, not setting the menu, arranging the seating or running the dinner conversations.

But enough of the ‘Wildos’! It looks like TAP is starting to get some momentum up and starting to work without the Wilderness Society’s lead in their saddle and with their need to pull all the levers held in check.

There is a way to go as the press seems to have bought the story that ‘really, its all about the environment’ and the black and the white of the pro and anti pulp mill story. As long as this persists Gunns and the ‘the government’ can run the line that those opposed to the pulp mill are just “nay sayers in the end” and therefore discountable, even absolutely so.

Go to it TAP and keep up your new found resolve to get the multidimensionality of this pulp mill proposal on the table, and most of all, being considered in context. It’s a winning approach.

THE TAPPER ACTION APPROACH

TAPPER ACTION is looking for more people to join our intuitive for fundamental change. That is, people who are prepared to act, or prepared to fund those who are willing to act effectively on their behalf, to neutralise the economic insanity currently being adhered to by Tasmanian politicians of ALL persuasions.

The proposed Gunns pulp mill is but one example of “political economic recalcitrance” in Tasmania. There are other examples, but the political and social discourse surrounding this particular issue is of the moment.

TAPPER ACTION is not committed to investing everything in street marches or public rallies. Why? Because, in the case of the pulp mill issue, street marches and public rallies:

• Have not worked or delivered in ways that encourage an ‘intelligent’ discourse that exposed the ‘real’ issues/problems, at least not all of them, to do with the pulp mill proposal;

• In regard to the pulp mill issue in particular, marches and rallies get to be taken over by self serving one dimensional thinking … the Wilderness Society in particular but others too;

• Are not the kind of activities that promote multi dimensional ideas ... rather they are the venues for the proliferation of simplistic one dimensional slogans.

TAPPER ACTION is committed to initiating and promoting actions that actually WORK and that expose the economic folly that so much of the political debate that is currently in play promotes. And in Tasmania in particular this is a problem.

TAPPER ACTION will not give unqualified support for any particular political party or organization but will support debate around economic concepts, perhaps new ideas, which ACTUALLY address the full dimension of the economic dilemmas currently being faced by Tasmanians, Australians and indeed ‘world citizenry’.

Please use the comment section below to demonstrate your support or otherwise for this initiative, we believe new initiative, for meaningful changes in economic rationalism!

A Guiding Principle