There is something significant missing from most of the political and media discussion about the Australian government’s promised, and now abandoned, nature protection laws: the environment. Logically, it should be a focus of the debate. In practice, it barely gets a look in.
Nature bats last :(
If you listen to Cook and WA industry groups – which the West Australian newspaper does, decanting the claims on to its front page apparently without question – these changes would be a threat to jobs and could lead to skyrocketing electricity and house prices. It’s often ludicrous, but effective politics.
Thats the wrong way around, Cook is listening to the Mining industry and the billionaire owner of the West Australian Newspaper, KerryStokes, who also has massive mining interests.
But more importantly, the government is also listening to a large portion of people who rely on mining for a paycheque. Its that Upton Sinclair saying, “It is difficult to get a man to understand something when his salary depends on his joy understanding it.”
