The Places You Love Alliance (see campaign left)  have spent a furious week of campaigning and lobbying hoping to convince federal environment minister Tony Burke to amend the EPBC Act to remove the approval bilateral provisions so the threat of the hand-over of powers to the states could be averted once and for all.

Water is now a Matter of National Environmental Significance (MNES) AND it is exempted from inclusion in any possible bi-lateral approvals. However, the other MNES are still potentially included in possible  bi-laterals.

(The approval of Ella Bay was determined using the State/Federal
bi-lateral agreement)

Read the statement from Places You Love Alliance (PYL) below

"As Many of you know I went down to Brisbane to accept my Queensland Conservation Council   "Champion of conservation" award from Minister  Powell a couple of  days ago.
 
Within my short speech I gently reminded Minister Powell that his government had emasculated the Queensland Environmental Defenders Office, a place where ordinary citizens can obtain information regarding using the law to protect Queensland's  natural environment". 

I am very upset that  the Queensland LNP Government has disempowered its North Queensland citizens in  such a shameful manner, especially as we  have so much that is worth protecting.

Hello from hot and sticky Coquette Point,

Like an unwelcome visitor the monsoon surged and dropped down on January 17. Two lows formed on the trough, one in the white-hot waters of the Gulf of Carpentaria and was destined to become tropical cyclone Oswald on the January 21- but only for 12 hours. The weather system soon reverted to a tropical low and danced in the Gulf for a week before beginning its move south. The BOM computer models gave conflicting forecasts on Oswald's movement and at one stage had it sitting over the southern Atherton Tablelands for a couple of days.

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 WILDWATCH,  by ANNE WILKINSON.

It never rains but it pours.

How true that old saying was in the Cassowary Coast this last week, then the rain left us and moved south with disastrous results.  

Such heavy rain always seems to come as a shock, but in reality it happens quite regularly. It is a wonderful boost for the water table and makes everything, including the grass, grow fast. It also leaches nutrient from the ground and causes untold problems for human mobility.

Yet wildlife seems to take it in its stride. In the silence following the drumming of the rain when it finally eased, it was really good to hear the birds begin to celebrate what must have seemed a release as they set out to catch up on their feeding and, for those with young families, hunting for food for them.

Hello from Coquette Point,

The monsoon trough has dropped down and as I speak there are two active lows, one circulation over the Wet Tropic Coast and the other in the Gulf of Carpentaria. We now are in a waiting game to see what will happen.

While most frogs are in their element, with rain falling and are noisily singing love songs I found this white lipped looking very unhappy. She was sitting on a leaf and even when I poked a camera in her face she did not move. I noticed there is a small ulcer on her skin between the right eye and nostril. The skin generally looks unhealthy and the eyes remained half closed in spite of cool rain falling all around her. Her unusual behaviour is typical of chytrid fungus, a dreadful disease afflicting frogs. This is the first time I have seen it at Coquette Point and one wonders if it is linked to the stress these frogs would have endured during the long drought.

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WHY IS THERE NO BODY CORPORATE AT “PORT HINCHINBROOK”?

When a development is sold, the developer may retain control over the whole development to ensure that prices, sales and resales are not subdued due to subdivision blocks (whether sold or not) looking neglected. 

The “Port Hinchinbrook” estate was much undersold, leaving the developer still in control (with 76% of the vote) of what amounts to a body corporate look-alike, called Port Hinchinbrook Services Pty Ltd, which remains under the control of the developer.

Hello from Coquette Point,
While the bulk of Australia is experiencing heat-wave conditions and dreadful fires the coastal Wet Tropics has been under the influence of a weak ridge that is bringing cool sea-breezes with frequent light rain showers: we are having perfect tropical, summer weather.

The monsoon trough is sitting over the bottom end of PNG and resisting all attempts by cyclones, like the cat 5 Narelle now off Western Australia, to bring it down over the Wet Tropics.

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WILDWATCH by ANNE WILKINSON

Rain at last, and what a wonderful Christmas gift it was to parched gardens, countryside and bush. Hopefully, it is also a good omen for 2013. From WPSQ, we wish everyone a very happy New Year.

The rain has brought plenty of good news to the wild world with struggling plants recovering from the dry, blossoms opening on trees and cassowary fruit such as the white apple dropping to the ground for the big birds to feast on.

Everything happens so quickly and abundantly. And quick seems to be an operative word, especially for birds like the rainbow lorikeet, at the moment.

FEASTING: Yvonne Cunningham took this picture (left) of a rainbow lorikeet tucking into the honey-rich flowers of native Melicope elleryana in her nursery garden at Coquette Point.

There has been a long history of sewage treatment non-compliance by the developer of "Port Hinchinbrook".

Prior to this recent episode, the developer had already been breached and fined several times for non-compliance.  Until QDEH has laboratory test results (due this week) that would comprise "legal" evidence that raw sewage has been discharged into the marina, it can do no more. 

This latest episode has occurred at a time when a "normalisation" scheme (contents not public) is being proposed by Andrew Cripps (MP Member for Hinchinbrook and Minister for Natural Resources and Mines) and Queensland's Coordinator-General. 

“Just as we should cultivate gentle and peaceful relations with our fellow human beings, we should also extend that same kind of attitude towards the natural environment.  Morally speaking, we should be concerned for our whole environment"   The Dalai Lama