SAUSAGE SWIZZLE
or
About 40 or so people attended the PR function plus
several officials, including the Vice Chancellor.
The officials gave explanations, tried to placate people, and to
sell the project. But the impression given was, decisions have
been taken and there will be no changes, whatever the residents
may feel.
Officials appear to realise that the situation could only become
worse, and it would become terribly bad once the construction
started. Once the laboratories are in operation, the meeting
provided no reassurance that the interests of the residents,
schools and residential colleges would be safeguarded.
Questions were asked about the Risk Profile, as raised by the
Chair of the PWC, but this is still not available, there is
still no reassurance for the community. Only vague generalities
about codes, regulations, standards, committees, security
officials etc., were given.
The so called Community Liaison Committee is still not formed and
the proposals for membership suggest that it will only be a token
body, again trying to placate the community, and a device to
protect the University and the CSIRO, not the residents. Again
this shows the need for approval to be withheld until there is
genuine, relevant and impartial procedures and information
available.
One conclusion that could be drawn from the meeting, was the lack
of understanding and sympathy of the officials, and their
unwillingness, or inability, to respond to the needs and
reasonable anxieties of those affected by the proposal. The
officials are decent people, but they have financial and other
commitments to the project, and their tunnel vision means they
cannot judge the project in its wider social context. This is
where the Parliamentary Committee, the State Government and the
City Council are important.
Various documents were available for persual, including a massive
Environmental Impact Statement or Plan. It was impossible to
study such long and complicated documents at such a meeting, and
no summaries nor explanations were provided. The official
responsible said people could put their name in a book and they
could receive copies, but they would be charged for photocopying,
per page.
Here are life affecting proposals by huge public organisations,
but the affected citizen is asked to pay considerable sums of
money to be able to study vital information. This is not open,
transparent, neibourhood friendly behaviour.
Since the begining, both the university community and the
neighbourhood have been kept in the dark; they have not been
allowed to study the project and its possible consequences. This
is another exaample of an inability or a refusual to allow for
genuine participation and consultation. Formal speeches and
declarations of priciples are not participation.
For the above reasons this proposal should not be approved by the
Parliamentary Committee, the State Government nor the Brisbane
City Council until all information is freely and fully available,
and there can be genuine consultation with the community and
impartial assent, including the consideration of an alternative
site which, given the success of Silicon Valley and other such
diversified developments overseas, is clearly possible.
Sausage Swizzle indeed. We may not have much redress against the
faceless officialdom of the University and the CSIRO but, we
will remember at the ballot box
This page is maintained by
The Rivermouth Action Group Inc
E-mail: activist@rag.org.au
as a community service.