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treepete.bsky.social
Pete
@treepete.bsky.social
840 followers 610 following 420 posts
Plants, ecology and society, amongst many interests
Living on Bundjalung country Aust
Posts Replies Media Videos
Reposted by Pete
kudelka.bsky.social
Labor’s Turin shroud.
yungenchee.bsky.social Yung En Chee @yungenchee.bsky.social · 15h
As the @albomp.bsky.social gov (94 seats!) tries to ram thru industry-serving regressive EPBC laws that'll see further biodiversity, climate & environmental damage, here's the current play on the @kudelka.bsky.social bingo card

A1, A2, B5, C1, C2, C3, C5, D1, D2, D3, E1, E2, E3
November 23, 2025 at 10:14 PM
Reposted by Pete
glmiller.bsky.social
Science, health, housing, environment: all failing/failed = Duopoly

johnmenadue.com/post/2025/11...
Innovation talk, austerity walk: Australia’s failing science policy
Despite constant rhetoric about innovation, Australia is steadily dismantling its scientific capacity. Public schools, universities and the CSIRO are all under pressure – the result of decades of mark...
johnmenadue.com
November 23, 2025 at 9:55 PM
Reposted by Pete
euanritchie.bsky.social
I love Northern Australia, and it breaks my heart what's happening and is planned for this region. More people need to know why this place is so special and what's at risk, so I wrote about it. My first article for @australiainstitute.org.au's The Point. thepoint.com.au/opinions/251...
Northern Australia is extraordinary, and it’s under severe threat
Right now, this region, is under siege, in large part due to insatiable corporate and government desires to ‘develop’ the North.
thepoint.com.au
November 23, 2025 at 8:06 PM
Reposted by Pete
richarddenniss.bsky.social
You cant protect nature if you wont protect native forests from chain saws & bulldozers

Great column by Virginia Young on Labors deeply flawed new ‘nature laws’…the ones that’s are so flawed the mining industry are desperately lobbying the Liberals to vote for them

thepoint.com.au/opinions/251...
Australians are being asked to believe we can protect nature by exploiting it faster and with less scrutiny
The point.com.au
thepoint.com.au
November 22, 2025 at 9:29 AM
Reposted by Pete
dumbeblonde.bsky.social
Oh those pesky blocky Greens
marnshibski.bsky.social Marns🌿🍉🐸 @marnshibski.bsky.social · 3d
They (Labor) don’t know and don’t truly GAF as long as ‘business’ is happy 😔
#auspol
November 21, 2025 at 9:58 AM
Reposted by Pete
euanritchie.bsky.social
This is utterly outrageous by the Group of Eight unis, and deeply insulting and undermining for environment and climate experts trying their hardest to achieve a more sustainable future for society. Shameful stuff.
yungenchee.bsky.social Yung En Chee @yungenchee.bsky.social · 3d
1/ No surpirise that Business Council of Australia's leading the charge for further regressive changes to Watt's already regressive EPBC package

But 🤯 that the Group of 8 Unis (ANU, Monash, UAdelaide, UMelb, UNSW, USyd, UQ, UWA) have signed the 'Letter from the Alliance of 26 industry Groups' 🤬🤬🤬
Alliance of Industry Groups: Letter on EPBC - Business Council of Australia
www.bca.com.au
November 21, 2025 at 5:30 AM
Reposted by Pete
euanritchie.bsky.social
This is why for a long time I've found the Prime Minister's Prizes for Science a rather insulting propaganda exercise

www.abc.net.au/news/science...

CSIRO funding as a percentage of GDP:

1982-83 = 0.17

2024-25 = 0.03

...

Scientific extinction event imminent?
The CSIRO cuts are just the tip of the iceberg for Australia's science funding
Australia is known as a country of innovators, but with a combination of brain drain, continuous cuts, and a loss of critical science projects, is Australia losing its edge?
www.abc.net.au
November 19, 2025 at 7:01 AM
Reposted by Pete
johnmenadue.com
Issuing statements and then stepping back: the international powers sponsoring the agreement remain silent. They see the tents collapsing, children freezing, people living in mud, yet they exert no pressure, impose nothing, hold no one accountable. #auspol #gaza
Gaza winter catastrophe repeating in tents that resist neither wind nor rain
The seasons change, but for those fighting for survival through wet winters and baking summers in Gaza's tents, the suffering remains.
johnmenadue.com
November 18, 2025 at 5:45 AM
Reposted by Pete
kayawanu.bsky.social
There's an 11year old girl sitting in adult cells in Perth lockup because she got caught shoplifting a drink and a pastry from Coles.worth less than $10
slackbastard.bsky.social Andy Fleming @slackbastard.bsky.social · 7d
'7NEWS can reveal the Adelaide teen accused over a sickening attack on a homeless woman at Hawthorn is the son of prominent business leaders. The Youth Court has been told the former private schoolboy was already on bail at the time of the alleged assault which was filmed and posted online.'
November 17, 2025 at 4:15 AM
Reposted by Pete
davidshoebridge.bsky.social
The Australian Government for the past five years has been pushing weapons sales into the UAE at an astonishing scale. This is the result. Australia tying itself to more appalling war crimes, now in Sudan.
November 15, 2025 at 9:50 PM
Reposted by Pete
elainejohnson.bsky.social
More big news today as the Land and Environment Court makes orders, by consent, overturning approval of Glencore’s Ulan Coal Mine expansion.

Johnson Legal proudly represented Mudgee District Environment Group, in their fight for a clean, healthy and safe environment.
www.smh.com.au/environment/...
Courts turn on coal mines over climate impacts
The NSW Land and Environment Court invalidated the approval for the Ulan coal mine expansion near Mudgee, based on a precedent set in July.
www.smh.com.au
November 15, 2025 at 9:28 AM
Reposted by Pete
grogsgamut.bsky.social
"Losing faith: new research shows young Australians have no confidence in either side of politics to tackle climate change"
#ThePoint

thepoint.com.au/news/251114-...
Losing faith: new research shows young Australians have no confidence in either side of politics to tackle climate change
Fewer than a quarter of young Australians trust the nation's political leaders on climate
thepoint.com.au
November 13, 2025 at 11:43 PM
Reposted by Pete
euanritchie.bsky.social
Honestly, the LNP are largely irrelevant. More importantly, @australianlabor.bsky.social also has no intention of _genuinely_ reaching net zero by 2050 either, if you _look closely_ at their policies and performance.
November 13, 2025 at 7:36 AM
Reposted by Pete
yungenchee.bsky.social
If only Australia's mainstream media cared as much about Australia's relentless increasing production of Coal, Gas & Oil as they do about about the moribund LNP's climate non-policy

👇THIS👇 (by @timinclimate.bsky.social) is the REAL story
November 13, 2025 at 5:31 AM
Reposted by Pete
racheljourno.bsky.social
What do you do when you *hate* renewable energy but you own a heap of it?

I guess you could use it to do more coal exports. Sure. Why not? 🔌 #energysky
reneweconomy.com.au
November 11, 2025 at 3:50 AM
Reposted by Pete
euanritchie.bsky.social
“You’re basically saying you can trade koalas with a land snail in Tasmania or a small plant in north Queensland.” - Prof Brendan Wintle @biodivcouncil.bsky.social

What's wrong with @australianlabor.bsky.social's environmental law reforms 👉 www.theguardian.com/australia-ne... [email protected]
Will Labor’s environment laws actually address Australia’s biodiversity crisis? Five reasons to be concerned
Experts say the proposed legislation is full of problems, including excessive ministerial discretion and relaxing like-for-like offset rules
www.theguardian.com
November 7, 2025 at 11:10 PM
Reposted by Pete
thejuicemedia.com
The Canadien Government has made an ad about the proposed Ksi Lisims LNG terminal & PRGT Pipeline, and it's surprsingly honest and informative.
Honest Government Ad | Ksi Lisims & PRGT Pipeline
YouTube video by thejuicemedia
www.youtube.com
November 8, 2025 at 1:06 AM
Reposted by Pete
joellegergis.bsky.social
As COP30 begins, here's a gentle reminder that well-intentioned half measures aren't going to solve the climate crisis. The era of fossil fuels must come to an end. My latest in The Guardian... www.theguardian.com/commentisfre...
Net zero is an insidious loophole that distracts from the scientific imperative to eliminate fossil fuels | Joëlle Gergis
History tells us that polite incrementalism and political kowtowing will prevail at Cop30 – even as catastrophe unfolds around us
www.theguardian.com
November 7, 2025 at 12:18 AM
Reposted by Pete
barbarapocock.bsky.social
The Greens have just secured a Senate inquiry into the capital gains tax (CGT) discount, exposing one of the most regressive tax breaks in Australia’s system which is inflating house prices by incentivising speculative investment in property!
November 4, 2025 at 5:49 AM
Reposted by Pete
euanritchie.bsky.social
We don't need a repeat of the treachery that led to the farce we're now inflicted by, the ironically named 'Safeguard Mechanism'. australiainstitute.org.au/post/the-saf...

The conservation and environmental movement must own, learn, and not repeat their mistakes.
November 4, 2025 at 2:29 AM
Reposted by Pete
ebonybennett.bsky.social
"The fact the Greens want to stop native forest logging and the Nationals want to speed up land clearing is not proof that any legislation Labor drafts must fit in the “sensible centre.” - @richarddenniss.bsky.social
thepoint.com.au/opinions/251...
It wasn’t the laws that were too weak to stop those projects, it was the ministers
The Prime Minister is betting that by 2028 people will forget the North West Shelf and EPBC backflips, but it would be a brave backbencher willing to make that same bet.
thepoint.com.au
November 3, 2025 at 11:39 PM
Reposted by Pete
yungenchee.bsky.social
In addition to legal experts @envirojustice.bsky.social , I'd add that environmental & conservation science experts also call for real reform, not more rhetoric, slippery words, and confident endorsements or centrist exhortations that are flatly wrong

(next post & embedded🧵 if u'd like more info)
Excerpt from Environmental Justice Australia's media statement on Minister Watt's EPBC reform package " The reform package has small positive elements: • Including definitions of "critical habitat" and "unacceptable impacts" in the Act is an improvement, but they are undermined by discretionary powers elsewhere. • A national EPA is welcome, but it won't have power to make positive decisions for nature. • Better enforcement and penalties for those that break the law are overdue and welcome. • National environmental standards are sorely needed as the cornerstone of meaningful reforms, but we are yet to see them, and the way they would apply would make them discretionary, weak, and too often unenforceable. However, the reform package also has deeply concerning elements that need fixing: • No assessment and prevention of climate harm to nature. • No end to logging and land clearing loopholes like Regional Forest Agreements and "continuous use" exemption. • Widespread political discretion undermines key positive improvements. • The offsets scheme is deeply problematic and essentially a "pay-to-destroy" model with minimal checks and balances. • Handing decisions of national and international significance to states and territories who are ill equipped to make these decisions. • First Nations rights are largely sidelined: there is no Free, Prior and Informed Consent (FPIC) embedded in the Act and no First Nations Engagement Standard, as recommended by Samuel. • Recovery plans for threatened species and habitats can be overridden by Ministerial protection statements. • The Environment Minister can decide to switch off important safeguards for offshore gas and petroleum projects - impacting consultation with First Nations communities and environmental assessment "
November 2, 2025 at 4:28 AM
treepete.bsky.social
The most detailed and informed analysis of the EPBC legislation I've seen yet, thanks to the EDO

www.edo.org.au/2025/10/31/e...
EPBC Act reforms make it to parliament – EDO’s first impressions   - Environmental Defenders Office
On October 30, Bills were introduced into the House of Representatives to reform the Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act 1999 (Cth), create a National Environment Protection Agenc...
www.edo.org.au
November 2, 2025 at 12:10 AM
Reposted by Pete
antipovertycentre.org
They say most suspensions are reversed, so what’s the harm?

But everyone who’s received that text message knows the harm starts there. Anxiety, stress, wasted time & energy. It starts even before that – submitting to mistreatment just to avoid the text.

Ty @caitkelly.bsky.social for reporting.
November 1, 2025 at 10:15 PM
Reposted by Pete
euanritchie.bsky.social
Zoe Daniel joins the chorus of deeply unhelpful hot takes from non-experts about the EPBC reforms.

This opinion piece is so poorly constructed and full of deeply ignorant and superficial commentary. It reads like it’s written by a Labor staffer.

www.theguardian.com/commentisfre...
Australia must put politics aside and pass nature laws that benefit the economy and the environment. We owe it to our kids | Zoe Daniel
There’s no such thing as a perfect legislative solution. It’s about finding one that’s workable – for the community, for the economy and for nature
www.theguardian.com
November 1, 2025 at 9:58 PM