There has been a flurry of legislative action and announcements during the final months of the year following varying periods of consultation. The concerns about the legislation have been covered in recent issues of STEP Matters and more details are provided by the peak bodies leading the campaigns, the Nature Conservation Council and Total Environment Centre. Here is a brief update concentrating on the implications for urban areas.

Crown Land Management

The new Crown Law Act was pushed through state parliament on 9 November. The government claims that the new legislation will reduce complexity and deliver better management. It is expected that commencement will be in early 2018 after the required policies and systems have been prepared.

Submissions to the inquiry pointed out that, in fact, the problems with the current legislation are with administration, not the act itself. There are many examples of the misuse of crown land, for example the Talus Reserve in Willoughby that Willoughby Council allowed to be taken over by commercial interests that have generated a private profit.

Under the new legislation crown land may be transferred to local government or vested in other NSW government agencies. It is unclear whether they will be given the financial resources to carry out these new responsibilities. It seems there would be no barriers to councils classifying the land as operational land that could be sold or leased for development without any community consultation. Time will tell!

Climate Change Policy

One item of good news is that the NSW government announced a policy to reduce greenhouse gas emissions to zero by 2050. The announcement documents contain lots of statements of intention but most of them are dependent on federal government policy and action.

The sincerity of the government’s policies are now called into question. A Climate Change Fund was established by the NSW government in July 2007 to help households, businesses, community organisations, schools and government to save water, energy and greenhouse gas emissions. We now learn that the $240 million for private land conservation under the new Biodiversity Act will come from this same fund ‘to help landholders and land managers reduce the impacts of climate change on natural systems’.

Biodiversity and Land Clearing Laws

On 17 November the biodiversity laws were passed with the help of the Shooters and Fishers and Fred Nile’s Christian Democrats in the Upper House. Over 7,000 submissions were received with the majority expressing alarm about the prospects for increased land clearing and relaxed biodiversity offset provisions. Some minor changes have been made to the draft bills:

• Some vitally important areas will be excluded from the land clearing codes which means that it will be harder for farmers to clear them. These areas include coastal and Ramsar wetlands, littoral rainforest, core koala habitat, critically endangered ecological communities, old growth forests and high conservation value grasslands.
• The act ensures that the Office of Environment and Heritage will remain responsible for compliance and enforcement of the legislation, rather than the Department of Primary Industries as the government originally suggested.
• The Minister for the Environment and Minister for Primary Industries have the power to stop the use of land clearing codes under certain circumstances which is significant due to the expansion of codes under the new legislation.
• The use of biodiversity offsetting is greatly expanded under the new legislation which is a significant concern, however the final legislation has improved the offsetting provisions by requiring the minister to ensure that offsets result in ‘no net loss’ of biodiversity. This creates the opportunity to pressure the minister to adopt a more strict interpretation of offsetting that will have tangible result for bushland across the state.

Further consultation will occur on regulations that are yet to be released on aspects such as ‘red lights’ for development that impact on critically endangered species, testing of the Biodiversity Assessment Method that will determine how the impacts of development on biodiversity are managed and the long awaited State Environmental Planning Policy that will decide the fate of urban vegetation and biodiversity.

The government is still trumpeting the benefits that will come from private conservation actions but it is unclear how this can compensate for lost vegetation and habitat in other areas and that there will be sufficient long-term funding. In fact it has recently been discovered that the Climate Change Fund has been raided to provide funding for private land conservation.

Draft land clearing codes and regulations will be released early in 2017 for consultation.

Greater Sydney Commission District Plans

The much anticipated District Plans were released on 21 November. Submissions may be made up to the end of March and the intention is to finalise the plans by the end of 2017.

The District Plans cover the next 20 years. The overriding document is the Plan for Growing Sydney that covers development up to 2056. Over this time Sydney’s population is projected to grow from the current 4.6 million to 8 million.

On first perusal the District Plan for northern Sydney appears to recognise the value of our bushland and coastal environments. The detail is not available on how Local Environment Plans can be used in future to ensure the preservation of wildlife corridors and local bushland as well as national parks.

At forums organised by the Better Planning Network, commissioners have emphasised social and economic aspects of the plans. The environment seems to be a poor relation instead of being a vital consideration that will impact on socio-economic outcomes. For example, who wants to live in a concrete jungle of high rise apartments with no shade or natural landscape nearby?

The consultation period provides an opportunity for the public to reinforce the importance of maintaining healthy quality green spaces, bushland and national parks that are identified in the District Plans. Please write a submission.

In November the Turnbull Government ratified Australia’s commitment to comply with the Paris Agreement on Climate Change. Australia has set a target to reduce emissions by 26 to 28% below 2005 levels by 2030, which builds on the 2020 target of reducing emissions by 5% below 2000 levels. The 2030 target is equivalent to about 13% below 2000 emission levels so the 2030 target is not as good as it sounds.

Currently the government’s main plan to reduce greenhouse gas emissions to meet our obligations under the Paris Treaty is called the Direct Action Plan. Introduced in 2014, the scheme operates by reverse auction, funding projects voluntarily proposed by the private sector. Projects are selected on the amount of greenhouse gas emissions expected to be abated at the cheapest price. So far $1.7 billion has been allocated out of a budget under the Emissions Reduction Fund (ERF) of $2.55 billion over 4 years.

Direct action also involves an emissions ‘safeguard mechanism’ to discourage large emitters from increasing their emissions above historical benchmarks. It commenced on 1 July 2016. It is not clear yet whether the rules will be effective in controlling increases in emissions.

This article draws on two recent analyses of the effectiveness of the Direct Action Plan:

• Paul J Burke, Undermined by Adverse Selection: Australia’s Direct Action Abatement Subsidies, Australian National University, April 2016
• Margaret Blakers and Margaret Considine, Mulga Bills won’t Settle our Climate Accounts: An Analysis of the Emissions Reduction Fund, The Green Institute, November 2016

Risk of Adverse Selection

Paul Burke questions the effectiveness of the direct action projects because of fundamental flaws in the scheme design:

1. There is no way of preventing the direct action scheme subsidising projects that would have gone ahead anyway. For example funding has been provided for replacing machinery that is inefficient and upgrading lighting in supermarkets. These projects would provide a financial benefit to the proponent in any case so a subsidy has no justification.
2. The international rules of carbon accounting require additionality. This means that credit for emissions reductions must not include changes that would have occurred anyway, say, because of legislation.
3. The information about emissions expected to be abated will depend on a definition of baseline emissions, that is, what emissions would have been if the project had not been implemented. It is the proponent’s responsibility to identify their baseline in accordance with approved methods, and there is some flexibility. The government’s inability to know true project baselines creates a major challenge. Projects with overgenerous baselines will be able to submit relatively low auction bids because the abatement they offer will be easy to achieve, and thus cheap. These bids are well placed to secure funding. If the baseline is higher than business as usual, in the end the project will deliver less abatement than notionally indicated.

Effectiveness and Value for Money of Abatement to be Delivered

Margaret Blakers and Margaret Considine have undertaken the first ever analysis of the ERF auctions. They found that direct action not only fails its own test of delivering ‘real and additional’ emissions reductions, but also that it cannot serve as the foundation for more serious action without very substantial changes to its architecture. Their key findings are:

1. Large sums of money (around $1.2 billion) have been poured into protecting land sector carbon. At the same time there is no federal policy safeguarding existing landscape carbon stocks. They are turning a blind eye to state governments rolling back land clearing controls. The entirety of the abatement purchased by the ERF so far (143 Mt CO2-e) at a cost of $1.73 billion accounts for less than 20% of projected emissions from land clearing up until 2030.
2. Over half of all abatement comes from just two mulga-dominated bioregions in south-west Queensland and western NSW. The value of ERF contracts in and around these regions is about $1 billion. With carbon payments estimated to average $195 per hectare, this represents many times the per hectare value of land in the region. Paul Burke makes a similar point. This situation only applies to land with existing land clearing permits predating 1 July 2010. The payments rest on the assumption that clearing would have happened without the subsidy. No doubt some vegetation has indeed been preserved, albeit at a high price. Some of the spending has questionable additionality, however, given that the incentive to clear was anyway rather low (clearing is expensive and the productivity of the land is low).
3. Much of the scheme’s expenditure has either been wasted or is at risk due to doubtful additionality (as per Paul Burke’s examples) and lack of permanence. 25% of ERF abatement has a ‘permanence’ period of only 25 years, after which time landholders regain ‘full land-use flexibility’. As well, the concentration of abatement in the semi-arid mulga regions carries its own risks such as from drought and climate change itself.

Fundamentally the ERF abatement profile is at odds with Australia’s emissions profile. Over 80% of our emissions are from industry, but 80% of direct action abatement is from the land sector. Only 4% is from the energy and industrial processes sectors, which produce most of Australia’s emissions.

Inadequacies in Methods for Vegetation Abatement

All the methods apply to ‘forest’ which is defined under the international rules. No methods are available at present for non-forest native vegetation or existing native forests on public land. Native forests on private land protected by legislation or covenant do not qualify because they are required by law to be protected.

Most landscape carbon resides in natural ecosystems. If well-managed, these will be resilient and are likely to persist and accumulate large carbon stocks in soils and plants over decades and centuries. Natural ecosystem management requires coherent, continental-scale policies and funding for the long term coordinated by the states and Commonwealth, not the ad hoc project funding that direct action provides.

The ERF is failing the climate, failing the land sector and failing the budget. To be credible, Australia’s climate policies must address the land sector in its own right and must stem the loss of carbon from the landscape caused by clearing, logging and other forms of degradation.

Ultimately the only effective long-term strategy to reduce Australia’s greenhouse gas emissions is to place a direct price on emissions.

In 2015 the winner of STEP’s prize for a project relating to an environmental issue was awarded to Jade Moxey from Sapphire Coast Anglican College This year she has done it again with a project that extended her previous research that scotched theories that cattle grazing can stop the spread of weeds. She showed that fireweed is similarly not controlled through sheep grazing. Then she showed great initiative in organising testing of whether the toxic alkaloids in fireweed have the potential of health impacts for sheep and humans.

We also decided to give a highly commended prize to Darryl Domer and Carlos Meier, home schooled, for an evaluation of cell grazing compared with conventional open paddocks. They found that cell grazing provided significant economic and ecological benefits including increases in water use efficiency, pasture productivity and plant biodiversity. The results showed that that cell grazing could provide a potential solution to global food security when applied to a larger scale.

Marian Haire awarded STEP’s prizes.

South Dural Residents and Ratepayers Group, a developer initiated lobby group, has made numerous applications since 1990 to Hornsby Council for the rezoning of 240 ha of rural lands in south Dural for urban purposes. The latest attempt is currently under consideration. Click here for details of the history of the lobbying

In the latest attempt, consultants’ reports have been commissioned as part of the first step of the application, that is, to change the zoning from rural to various levels of residential density and recreational zoning. Submissions closed on 2 December.

The spine of the proposed development is an area of bushland along Georges Creek and another unnamed tributary of Berowra Creek. Indeed the developer is touting the natural views and the tall forest as a feature that will allow six storey apartments to fit into an ‘eco-friendly’ community. All in all the proposal is for 2,900 dwellings that could house 9,000 people.

The bushland is of high conservation value with areas of Blue Gum High Forest (10.5 ha), Sydney Turpentine Ironbark Forest (22 ha), Blackbutt Gully Forest (30 ha) and Shale Sandstone Transition Forest (1.4 ha). The first two listed are classified as critically endangered ecological communities under the federal Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act.

As the opposing residents’ group, the Galston Area Residents Association, points out there are many reasons to oppose the application, for example:

• it is inconsistent with the metropolitan plan to preserve remaining rural land
• current roads cannot cope with current traffic let alone that generated by the extra residents
• public transport is inadequate and the north west rail line is a long way away so buses will have to operate on clogged roads
• there is insufficient provision for schools, shops, recreation areas and other basic infrastructure

STEP opposes the rezoning application for three main reasons:

1. Inadequate vegetation data and mapping

The bushland area comprises about 64 ha, a quarter of the site. As large parts of the land are privately owned it has not been possible to carry out on the ground vegetation mapping. This applies in particular to the area of Blue Gum High Forest of about 10 ha. This is in the context of the total area of Blue Gum High Forest remaining in Sydney of less than 200 ha. Other areas of significant vegetation have not been sampled adequately or consistently.

It is totally unsatisfactory to be asking the public to comment on such inadequate information, especially when dealing with endangered ecological communities.

2. The proposed zoning map does not reflect the described development or the stated purpose to conserve native vegetation

The higher density six storey buildings are planned to be built closest to the bushland but they are zoned R3 (medium density). It should be zoned R4, high density residential.

There are also inconsistencies in the minimum lot sizes of 125 m² and 225 m² stated in different parts of the proposal documents. The prospect of lot sizes of 125 m² is alarming! No room for trees.

Most of the riparian areas are described as having high conservation significance so should be zoned as E2. However the proposed zoning is RE1. It appears the intention is to allow a gravity feed sewer to be installed along the creek lines, hardly compatible with conservation. Construction of a sewer would need road access that would damage the natural creek line and, on past experience, create a wide band of weed invasion.

3. Large areas of the zoning proposal are deferred

The deferred areas are the main bushland strips that interface between the residential areas and the core riparian areas. They cover a significant part of the bushland. The reason given is the uncertainty of the biodiversity legislation that had not been passed when the proposal was submitted.

These deferred areas will be hard to manage because of the proximity to the housing development so government agencies will probably not want them.

An absolute tragedy would occur if they were traded for biobanking sites elsewhere as it would be impossible to find equivalent vegetation communities to be restored to offset the losses. They should become areas that are off-limits to biobanking.

The effect of this proposal on the existing vegetation will be very damaging unless very detailed precinct plans to protect it are drawn up and very active and expensive management takes place in perpetuity.

It is unsatisfactory to expect the public to comment on this proposal with incomplete and inadequate information.

Summary

Ideally STEP would like this parcel of land to remain rural, but in the event of it being rezoned for residential development STEP would like the potential impact on biodiversity reduced. Possible mechanisms for this include:

• The RE1 zoning changed to E2 to allow better management of the biodiversity values
• The deferred areas to be zoned E2
• The areas zoned E2 to be managed by the local council with the provision of funding for long-term management from the developer
• The area currently proposed for R3 (medium density) should be greatly reduced with a zoning of R2 (low density) in areas with scattered trees
• Very limited R4 (high density) set well back from the bushland
• The minimum lot size for dwelling houses and semi-detached houses increased well above 225 m², preferably up to 500 m²
• Find an alternative to gravity-fed sewers down the creeks
• Development set further back from the areas of biodiversity constraints so that the bushland edges are not as severely impacted
• Provision of buffering by revegetation should be considered along bushland edges

Most people who live in the upper North Shore and who are interested in bushland, or gardening, or geology, or maybe all three, would be conscious of whether they live on ‘shales’ or ‘sandstones’. They might also be aware that the shales generally overlie the sandstones, or so it would seem. But I had a conversation once with a lady who lives at Duffys Forest who believed that she and her neighbours lived on ‘Wianamatta Shales’. Well it was a reasonable assumption – but incorrect!

The shales that were once extensively quarried at Duffys belong to a thick lens some 140 to 170 m above the base of the Hawkesbury Sandstone, and at these levels and geologic times, the meandering, braided river channels that deposited the sands were starting to pond, and flood plain lagoons became more extensive and persisted for longer, accumulating clays that were preserved beneath further layers of river sand; or torn up and redeposited as sand with shards of shale. Eventually the sand was washed down only in intermittent flood bursts; its sand bars invading the muddy lagoons and the sands interlayering with the clays and silts, creating the transitional Mittagong Formation. The clays then took over as the river basin became a swampy, Triassic coastal lowland, and the Wianamatta Group was formed, but more about Mittagong and Wianamatta in later articles.

Shale Lenses: Form and Size

Hawkesbury Sandstone shale lenses lie sometimes only a few tens of metres or less below the stratigraphic top of the sandstone and they have been mapped and interpreted in different ways over the years. Without drill data it can often be difficult for a field geologist to know if scrappy, lateritised shale floaters and outcrops on a ridgetop are lying within or on top of the sandstone. As such, they were mapped sometimes as outliers of Wianamatta Group or Mittagong Formation, but latterly they have tended to be pushed down into the sandstones. A good example of such ambiguity would be the lateritised shale ridge capping at St Ives Showground, whose topographic setting could fit it into either category. Not only do such shale lenses tend to increase in frequency upwards in the sandstone sequence, but they are more common northwards and towards the coast.

Most lenses are just oversized slivers less than a metre thick and tens to hundreds of metres in lateral extent, and they tend most commonly to consist of laminite: a thinly bedded (mm to cm) alternation of shale, siltstone and sandstone. If you're out and about there are several places you can see them such as the south wall of the Argyle Cut in the Rocks. And on the M2 at Barclay Road overbridge, North Rocks, the NorthConnex guys are excavating a sandstone face with a laminite lens, though this may well soon be concreted over. There's a great example on the cliff top north of Wattamolla, and then there's Beacon Hill, just off Warringah Road, where shale once quarried for ceramics is still visible at the base of the hillside flanking the sports oval. This lens is more substantial and actually yielded numerous fish fossils of freshwater affinity.

Laminite – millimetre-thick alternating layers of sandstone and shale, Wattamolla cliff top

The Beacon Hill shale lens is thick, but not as thick as the Duffys Forest lens which was 35 m thick before quarrying. Thick also was a lens at Lucas Heights which is of the order of 10 to 20 m. Substantial lenses also occur at Canoelands, Kirrawee, Menai and Darkes Forest, and most of these larger ones tend to carry shale and mudstone in addition to laminite. There is a very readable account published on-line by ANSTO of the Little Forest lens at Lucas Heights, in which the author found little difference between its shale and typical Ashfield Shale of the overlying Wianamatta Group.

In terms of area, the larger lenses may originally have covered several square km, though because they were formed in lagoons and oxbows there is a tendency for them to appear long and narrow. The Darkes Forest lens for example extends along its ridgetop for nearly 4 km and the Duffys Forest lens measures 3 km in outcrop from north to south.

Shale/mudstone overlain by sandstone in former wall of Beacon Hill Quarry

Shale Lenses and their Vegetation

The shale lenses have a marked effect on soils, and this is reflected of course in the vegetation. Shale soils being more fertile have often been cleared for orchards and smallholdings, as at Darkes Forest and Canoelands, though there are significant surviving natural vegetation remnants, as described below.

Darkes Forest

I first stumbled on Darkes Forest by following the signs to the orchards from the Princes Highway, and was surprised to drive past quite tall forests of straight trunked trees; quite a contrast to the sandstone woodlands and shrublands along the highway. The forests are catchment protected so it's unwise to venture too far in, but it's easy to distinguish White Stringybarks, Sydney Peppermints and Sydney Red Gums shading an open floor peppered with tall shrubs of Two-veined Hickory Acacia binervata and a variety of other species including Gymea Lilies. About 200 ha of this forest remains, and has been declared as O'Hares Creek Shale Forest community and listed as endangered. See photo at the top of the page.

Menai

You may drive past the 5 ha Halls Drive Bushland Reserve off New Illawarra Road without noticing it, and be unaware there is any shale in the area, but venture in and you'll see shale fragments in the soil and be confronted with several species of eucalypts of both shale and sandstone affinity. It's probable both White and Common Sandstone Stringybarks are present as are Red Mahoganies, and these are accompanied by Sydney Red Gums and scribbly gums (unsure of species). The last two are perfectly at home on sandstone, but there are also abundant Blackthorns Bursaria spinosa – shrubs more typical of shale terrain. The plant community falls within the broad embrace of the critically endangered Shale Sandstone Transition Forest community.

Kirrawee

The 1:100,000 scale published geology map shows a chain of shale bodies running for 10 km along the ridge line between Sutherland and Cronulla. These are almost entirely built over except for some tiny patches of bushland adjoining Kirrawee railway station. These feature grassy woodland dominated by Grey Ironbarks and are a good example of Sydney Turpentine Ironbark Forest.

Beacon Hill–Frenchs Forest

The only surviving bushland on Beacon Hill itself is totally on sandstone not the shale of the former quarry, but shale lenses mapped around Frenchs Forest nearby carry surviving forest and woodland, though this has been under recent threat from hospital and road construction. A tree that can still be found there is White Mahogany Eucalyptus acmenoides, a shale-loving northern species also common in Edna Hunt Sanctuary near Epping, both areas at the southern limit of its natural range.

Duffys Forest

This semi-rural ridgetop settlement spreads across sandstone and shale, extending over the old shale quarry which has been manicured into a housing estate, country club and golf course. Much of the shale-related bushland was lost in the quarrying but some survives on its north-east and south-west sides. Whether it's truly Duffys Forest plant community may depend on interpretation, as key Duffys species such as Brown Stringybark Eucalyptus capitellata and Caley's Grevillea Grevillea caleyi are either absent or extremely hard to find there.

Trees that can be found include common species like Red Bloodwood, Silvertop Ash, Common Sandstone Stringybark, Sydney Red Gum and Christmas Bush, with a scattering of Blackbutts and Turpentines. The tree flora has affinities with both Duffys Forest and Shale Sandstone Transition Forest communities.

The shale is heavily lateritised, and iron-rich laterite debris have accumulated downslope on sandstone benches and in hollows. Among the species supported in such sites are a wealth of Proteaceae including Waratahs.

Berowra

When you walk from Berowra to Berowra Waters you descend to a firetrail that follows the contour. The hillside here has flattened into a broad bench and there are numerous shale and siltstone fragments in the soil. A shale band has created an aquiclude, wetting the soil to support abundant Umbrella Fern groves, plus thickets of the green-flowered Grevillea mucronulata; not a common plant on the North Shore but very abundant here. The Berowra example is a departure from the ridgetop shale settings and threatened, shale-related plant communities, and if any threatened community is represented there it is Coastal Upland Swamp.

Canoelands

The name of this locality is said to derive from timber getters finding stringybark ‘canoe trees’ with scars from bark removal. The stringybark was said to be Eucalyptus cephalocarpa but there are no known localities of this species north of Merimbula. The few hectares of bushland remnants among the Canoelands orchards carry tall straight stringybarks that are most likely E. globoidea. Such remnants have been mapped as critically endangered Turpentine Ironbark Forest in Hornsby Council's surveys.

This is the second in a series of articles by John Martyn on Sydney’s geology. Click here for his article on the Narrabeen Group.

Sheldon Forest in Turramurra contains the second largest area remaining of the critically endangered Blue Gum High Forest covering an area of 5.4 ha. Sheldon Forest is linked to Rofe Park and Comenarra Creek Reserve so that the bushland extends from the railway line at Turramurra to Lane Cove National Park and provides an essential wildlife corridor that can potentially link Lane Cove National Park to Ku-ring-gai Chase National Park. It has been degraded over the years from fill from Warragal Rd and the rail cutting, weed invasion, storm water erosion, and waterlogging, feral animals, rubbish dumping and suburban encroachment.

In 2014 Ku-ring-gai Council signed a BioBanking Agreement with the NSW government under the Linking Landscapes through Local Action grant program. Council agreed to improve the reserves’ biodiversity values by undertaking management actions. These actions will create biodiversity credits and in return council has received grant funding.

Note: In many BioBanking schemes a developer purchases the credits and the money is used to restore a vegetation community elsewhere to make up for the loss caused by the development – see NSW Offsets Policy: A Dubious Way to Prevent Loss of Biodiversity (STEP Matters, Issue 181).

The BioBanking Agreement establishes a fund of $1.6 million that provides an ongoing, annual income to council to manage the bushland. The fund will give council annual management payments of between $100,000 and $130,000 for the first 20 years of the agreement, and thereafter about $40,000 each year in perpetuity. Council will contribute an additional $469,000 over three years to help manage the sites.

Action so Far

Anyone driving down Warragal Road, Turramurra just over the railway line will have noticed a lot of activity. Council has given us information on the works completed or in progress:

• In 2014 a sediment basin was constructed near the railway line and a large amount of ‘foreign’ soil was removed that had been dumped when the railway line was constructed. Creek stabilisation works were completed that were designed to encourage natural revegetation.
• Weed removal and preparation for ecological burns near Albion and Jubilee Avenues.
• Weed removal and stabilisation along Warragal Road.
• The revegetation of approximately 1800 m² of Blue Gum High Forest using appropriate species and densities.
• Extensive fencing, both temporary and permanent, to assist with stabilisation and regeneration after the weed removal.

There will be much more work to do to ensure the permanent restoration of the native vegetation so that the weeds do not take over again.

It should be noted that the sloping land adjoining Warragal Road is part of the council road reserve and is fill. As such it should be managed as a buffer to the Blue Gum High Forest in Sheldon Forest. The boundary between the two should be clearly delineated so that any erosion from the slope is managed and does not degrade the forest soil.

The stormwater outlet from Warragal Road discharging directly into Sheldon Forest is also a concern as it will have an impact on the viability of Blue Gum High Forest species in the affected areas. In the long term this stormwater should be redirected to an alternative sub-catchment.

The permanent fencing along Warragal Road is receiving a lot of comment. It is meant to be ‘non-intrusive’. Maybe it will weather to a natural colour?

Well the July election is done and dusted and the Liberal–National Coalition just scraped in. Despite Malcolm Turnbull’s previous statements about the need for serious action on climate change it appears that he does not have the political will to overturn past government decisions to downgrade climate change research and development.

CSIRO Cuts

CSIRO is an organisation independent from the government but still very much dependent on government funding. In February the CEO announced that climate science is settled so the focus can change to adaptation and mitigation. This statement was used to justify cutting over 100 climate change research jobs. Funding could be diverted to fields that could be more lucrative.

The size of the cuts was modified following an international outcry but there was still a cut of about 75 positions from the Oceans and Atmosphere division. Research is to be centred in Hobart in a new Climate Science Centre that will coordinate the work of 40 scientists carved out of existing CSIRO teams, and also tap into work by the Bureau of Meteorology and universities.

In August another modification was made when new Science Minister, Greg Hunt, ordered CSIRO to revive some other climate science programs in climate analysis and forecasting in Hobart. But these jobs will be financed out of the existing budget.

Fundamentally we still have less climate science capacity than before the cuts were announced. Some outstanding scientists with a huge accumulation of knowledge such as John Church, global sea level expert, will not return.

Support for Renewable Energy

There are plans to cut most of the funding for Australian Renewable Energy Agency as well as its ability to give grants. As the world responds to the urgent need to build new renewable electricity generation capacity, this plan is puzzling. Again the government’s reason is long-term ‘budget repair’. Australia has a long history of leading research into new solar technology. Hundreds of jobs will be lost from current research organisations and the potential opportunities for future commercialisation.

These policies conflict with the plans to help Australia become an innovation nation. The message from the government is that research is an expensive luxury rather an essential part of our long-term future.

NSW residents are currently waiting for the state government to respond to the deluge of submissions opposing the new draft biodiversity and land clearing laws. The application of this legislation to Sydney’s bushland is unknown at present.

Urban Forests

Essentially there is a conflict between the need to accommodate the expectation of continuing high population growth and the desire to maintain a desirable city to live in. The high population growth is totally undesirable but we have had plenty to say about that before.

Now turning to the ideal of having liveable cities, one of the major elements is adequate tree cover. This is not impossible to achieve if there is the political will to get the planning right. Given the attitudes of the current NSW government to trees, residents will need to make it loud and clear that they will not accept a continuation of current policies.

In North Sydney Council’s Urban Forest Strategy document 2011, urban forest is defined as:

… the totality of trees and shrubs on all public and private land in and around urban areas and is measured as a canopy cover percentage of the total area. The canopy cover may vary in density depending on the vegetation type (eg almost solid cover under rainforest vegetation to more open cover under woodland or eucalypt forests) however the canopy cover percentage for urban forest measurement purely measures the percentage of land that has tree or shrub vegetation (over 3 m tall) above it, regardless of density.

Benefits of Urban Forests

Reduction in the Urban Heat Island Effect

Heat from the atmosphere is used in vegetation transpiration processes which convert water from leaves to water vapour. This has a cooling effect similar to that when humans perspire. Trees can transpire significant volumes of water and it has been estimated that a mature tree can transpire up to 150 L/day. In a hot dry location this produces a cooling effect similar to that of two air conditioners running for 20 h.

Much of the urban landscape is paved and devoid of vegetation. This means that there is usually little water available for evaporation, so most available natural energy is used to warm surfaces. Construction materials are dense, and many – particularly dark-coloured surfaces like asphalt – are good at absorbing and storing solar radiation.

Trees are a very effective means of blocking the sun’s radiation and, depending on the species and its maturity, up to 95% of the incoming radiation can be blocked. Trees can reduce a building’s temperature by directly blocking radiation through windows and cooling the surrounding air, and can also keep the soil cool thus providing a sink for heat from the building. These effects have been quantified as reducing air temperatures in built up areas by 1 to 5°C.

Reduction in Energy Demand

A typical adaptation response to the lack of external cooling is reliance on air conditioning, which generates waste heat and contributes to greenhouse gas emissions. Studies in the US have indicated that 5 to 10% of electricity demand in cities is from air conditioners used to compensate urban heat island effects. Increases in peak energy demand drive up infrastructure costs and increase the risk of power cuts during heatwaves. Air conditioner use amounts to nearly one-third of the power consumed in Perth on the hottest days in February and March.

Other Benefits

• Reduction in water run-off and erosion during storm events
• Improvement in water quality as the slowing of water run-off allows particulate matter to precipitate out and not pollute waterways
• Wind mitigation
• Improvement in air quality by absorbing gaseous pollutants and trapping particulate matter on their leaves
• Storage of carbon
• Reduction in noise pollution
• Shade for parked cars and outdoor pursuits
• Visual amenity and privacy
• Improved property values
• Attraction of birds and habitat for other wildlife

Recommended Canopy Cover

There have been many international studies of recommended canopy cover targets for urban forest. For example, according to the North Sydney report, for this climatic zone the recommended percentages for specific land-use areas are:

• 15% cover in central business districts
• 25% cover in medium and high density residential areas
• 50% cover in low density residential areas

Many cities now have urban forest targets in place, for example:

• Sydney city aims to increase urban forest cover (including private land) by 50% by 2030 and 75% by 2050
• Melbourne aims to increase canopy cover from 22 to 40% by 2040
• London aims to increase urban tree cover from the current 25% to 32% by 2065
• In 2015 New York City achieved a goal of planting one million trees to increase its urban forest by 20%
• Australian government has pledged to develop decade-by-decade goals out to 2050 for increased overall tree coverage

In 2014 the Institute for Sustainable Futures documented the tree cover in various parts of Sydney: Hornsby (59%), Ku-ring-gai (52%), Blacktown (19%), Parramatta (23%), City of Sydney (15%) and Rockdale (12%).

The figures for Hornsby and Ku-ring-gai are distorted by the inclusion of national parks that can provide some regional benefits such as improved air quality and cooling breezes if the wind is blowing in the right direction. However they do not provide the same benefits associated with trees in the immediate vicinity.

Stumbling Blocks

There are many barriers to achieving and maintaining urban forest. Generally the larger the trees the more effective are the benefits listed above. However there is a cost with managing larger trees. Trees ultimately need to be replaced when they reach their useful life expectancy. In an urban environment one cannot allow trees to reach the age where they become dangerous. There is also the need to achieve access for solar panels.

Developers will argue that the land is worth much more if it is built on. As we have seen all too often in Sydney, house blocks that had room for gardens, now have high and medium density housing with minimal, if any, tree cover remaining. SEPP65, the planning policy for high-rise is supposed to provide for deep soil planting but it does not seem to be enforced.

SEPP65, the planning policy for apartments covering all of NSW, now has a minimum deep soil requirement of only 7% of site area (Apartment Design Guide, p61). This is totally inadequate for a high rainfall area such as the North Shore where the native trees can reach heights of 30 m or more. Ku-ring-gai Council requires a minimum 50% site area for deep soil landscaping on sites over 1800 m².  This should be maintained and not over-ridden by SEPP65 Apartment Design Guide requirements.

Tiny backyards in new fringe areas and boundary-to-boundary development of new houses in existing suburbs often eliminate private land’s potential contribution to the urban forest. This puts incredible pressure on the public realm to provide the urban forest on top of needing to meet demands for infrastructure.

Compact city land-use policies and urban forest policies need to work together to ensure that cities have high-quality built environments and extensive tree cover. These policies must set the overall goals and outline strategies to deliver on them for both public and private land.

The Greater Sydney Commission has been created by NSW legislation with a brief to make Sydney more liveable, more productive and more environmentally sustainable.

Currently district plans are being developed that are intended to be a link between local planning (eg council LEPs) and longer term regional planning.

Draft district plans are to be released towards the end of this year at the same time as the government is finalising the biodiversity legislation. The Greater Sydney Commission is currently undertaking extensive consultation in order to identify and prioritise issues.

This is a crucial time for the general public of Sydney to tell our politicians that our bushland and urban trees are vital. The campaign to inform the public about these issues is being led by the Total Environment Centre.

The tremendous efforts of the local community have produced some beneficial outcomes.

Issue 185 of STEP Matters provided an update on the battle by residents of Beecroft and the Beecroft Cheltenham Civic Trust to save bushland from subdivision and development at 79–87 Malton Road. This bushland is the last remaining corridor along Byles Creek between Lane Cove National Park and Pennant Hills Park.

The matter was brought before a Land and Environment Court conciliation conference. However it was inevitable, the final court determination approved the sub-division.

The asset protection zone around the houses to be built will entail the loss of a lot of vegetation but not as much as originally expected. There are conditions requiring the Vegetation and Fauna Management Plans applicable to the asset protection zone to take measures to preserve threatened species such as Leptospernum deanei and a possible nesting site of the Gang-gang Cockatoo. Part of the site (Lot 6 of approximately 1 hectare) will be passed into council hands to be conserved as open space.

A develpoment application for neighbouring land at 77 Malton Road (approx 7000 m²) has also been approved. Unfortunately, 77 trees will be lost for bushfire protection and construction. The owners are prepared to work with council to come to an agreement over the walking track along Byles Creek that will allow the public access to Byles Creek Valley and Lane Cove National Park.

Two weeks before the Federal election with Warragamba Dam threatening to spill due to severe storms, the Baird government committed to raising the dam wall to prevent potential flood impacts on marginally held seats in western Sydney. Perhaps for the same reason, NSW Labor reversed its ‘don’t raise the dam’ position and supported the proposal. However, no new information was released to justify this decision. The economic case and environmental impact statement for such a major project are years away, so it seems to be another case of decision now, judgement later for NSW.

This is not a new proposal. A similar scheme was defeated in 1995 following a strong campaign by the Kowmung Committee led by Andrew Cox, after the Greiner–Fahey government had committed to raising the wall in 1993. The subsequent Carr government then approved construction of a large spillway beside the dam, completed in 2002, to protect it from major floods.

In December 2012 the NSW government accepted a recommendation from Infrastructure NSW in its 20 year State Infrastructure Strategy:

to review all major flood mitigation options available, including raising the Warragamba Dam wall, to significantly reduce the potential economic and social impact of flooding in the Hawkesbury Nepean Valley

This report was overseen by chief executive officer, and former Sydney Water head, Paul Broad, and ex-premier and chairperson of Infrastructure NSW, Nick Greiner. To them the dam was unfinished business.

Raising Warragamba Dam’s wall will inundate over 3,000 hectares of World Heritage listed national park lands, wilderness and wild rivers. Lower reaches of protected wild rivers, including the Kowmung, Coxs and Nattai Rivers, will be flooded. Temporary inundation caused by the proposal will scar wilderness areas, kill riverbank vegetation and deposit sediment. The affected parts of the southern Blue Mountains national parks, arguably the most protected parks in Australia, may have to be revoked, as they will be degraded if this scheme proceeds.

Temporary impoundment of floodwater will result in the ‘bath-ring effect’ – visual scarring of the landscape when natural areas are temporarily inundated. The NSW government would like us to believe that the drowned World Heritage Area will not be degraded, but once native vegetation is inundated and smothered in sediment, it becomes replaced by an eroding mess of bare earth and weeds.

Views from McMahons Lookout, Splendour Rock, Burragorang Lookout and many others in the Blue Breaks will be ghastly. Lake Burragorang will have a much expanded ‘bath-ring’ and may also gain an enlarged Schedule One area further up the Coxs River, interfering with Katoomba to Kanangra walks, spoiling or placing off limits favoured campsites.

The Camden White Gum forests in the Kedumba Valley, listed as vulnerable under Commonwealth environment laws, will also be lost when flooded.

The Blue Mountains Conservation Society is opposed to the development. Vice-president Tara Cameron said:

We are very concerned that between Badgerys Creek airport and raising the Warragamba Dam wall, the world heritage values of the Blue Mountains will be deemed at risk by UNESCO. Australia has an international obligation to protect these areas not destroy them. This is an environmental disaster
(BM Gazette, 20 June 2016).

Developer Benefits

Former National Parks Association CEO, Andrew Cox, now with 4Nature, believes that the proposal may put more people at risk of flooding, not less. ‘We’re worried that by raising the dam and providing some level of protection it will actually trigger development on the flood plain,’ Mr Cox said.

Western Sydney Leadership Council chairman, Christopher Brown, has already flagged developing flood-prone land as a potential funding source for the dam wall extension.
‘I think there’s the capacity to use a value-capture funding method to reduce the impact on taxpayers,’ he said.

‘Maybe via a levy on land release that was previously considered flood-prone so we might be able to do it at a cheaper rate than what the government’s talking about.’ He suggested the wall extension could potentially be made higher than 14 m if such a levy was charged (Sarah Gerathy, ABC News, 17 June 2016).

Removing planning restrictions to develop flood prone areas will be highly profitable for some, but will endanger lives. In fact much of the North West Growth Centre around Riverstone is significantly affected by flood prone land. Residential areas are nevertheless planned within the maximum possible flood zone despite the acknowledgement that the enlarged dam will have no effect on extreme floods.

Flooding associated with the Upper Nepean which recently inundated Picton, as well as floods coming down the Grose, Colo and Macdonald rivers are not mitigated by the proposed dam wall raising.

Solutions

The best way to reduce the impacts of flooding on people is to relocate low-lying homes and avoid further building in flood prone areas. Floodplains are for floods and the proposed higher dam wall does not alter that fact.

Given Sydney Water’s new capacity to access water from the lower levels of Warragamba Dam, and the water security provided by the desalination plant, a less damaging solution would be to reduce the dam’s full storage level by a third and allow that proportion to be used for flood storage. The dam’s hydroelectric plant could be refurbished and then operate to lower the stored water to desired levels following a flood, while generating electricity for the national grid.

Efficient use of existing dam capacity, along with better flood planning and emergency response will save lives and the World Heritage area from an unnecessary $700 million dollar dam project and its contingent real estate development boom on the floodplain.

This article was written by Keith Muir. It was originally published in the Colong Foundation for Wilderness Bulletin, August 2016 edition. Reprinted with permission.

In the 19th century deer were imported and released into areas like Royal National Park because they were regarded as useful (for food and sport) and beautiful animals. Now their numbers have exploded.

At the request of the premier, the NSW Natural Resources Commission (NRC) has completed a pest animals management review. They released a draft report early this year and held public hearings around the state and received of over 600 submissions. Its final report and recommendations were submitted to the premier in August. The review found that pest animals cause considerable stress in communities:

It’s hard to measure, but even conservative estimates indicate NSW farmers spend around $22 million to manage pest animals per year, while the total annual economic impact of pest animals in NSW is conservatively estimated to be $170 million. Pest animals also affect 40% of all listed threatened species.

The findings cover pests that have long been causing problems for landholders such as wild dogs, pigs, foxes and rabbits, but they now also recognise that deer are a major cause for concern. For years feral deer have been allowed to run wild in NSW with management aimed at keeping deer numbers high enough to be a game resource. As the report states:

We need to manage the risks and impacts from all invasive species and that means treating feral deer and feral cats as pests just like wild pigs and dogs.

Therefore one recommendation made is that NSW government should:

• exclude all species of deer from the NSW Game and Feral Animal Control Act 2002
• include all species of feral deer in a regulation addressing pest animals under the NSW Biosecurity Act 2015

The Invasive Species Council is concerned that the powerful hunting lobby is determined to maintain the status quo. The Council is calling on people to contact the premier and the Minister for Primary Industries, Niall Blair and support the recommendations of the NRC in order to protect our natural environment from exploding feral deer numbers.

Here is a selection of facts supporting the case for the declaration of feral deer as a pest species. They:

• are out of control throughout NSW
• have been declared by the NRC to be our 'most important emerging pest animal threat'
• are a menace on our roads – in the Illawarra region feral deer have caused nine fatalities in a seven year period and 100 collisions with trains
• can be found in most regions of NSW, threatening the Royal National Park and the Illawarra escarpment rainforests, Kosciuszko National Park, the coastal forests between Newcastle and Coffs Harbour and even woodlands and rangelands in the west
• damage fences, pastures and cropsand can spread weeds and diseases
• impact rainforests and forests
• limit regeneration by reducing seed production and seedling recruitment, heavily browse ferns and other plants and push open the forest understorey
• have already been declared a feral pest in Queensland, SA and WA

To many people who are fascinated by Sydney's native flora but have no formal training in geology, the rocks around and about are generally thought of, in simple terms, to consist either of sandstones, shales or volcanic rocks. To express this in a crude stratigraphic way there are believed to be Wianamatta shales lying above Hawkesbury Sandstone which in turn rests on Narrabeen shales. Plus there are the volcanic diatremes of course.

‘Narrabeen shales’ is a term you often hear and read especially when plant communities like Pittwater Spotted Gum Forest and coastal clay heath are described, even in the formal sense by qualified botanists, and generally refers to the Newport Formation. But this term grossly misrepresents the reality, so firstly let’s look at the Narrabeen Group in more detail.

The Narrabeen Group

This group has the widest distribution of any major suite of rocks in the Sydney Basin making up much of the Greater Blue Mountains and covering a vast swathe of the Central Coast and its hinterland. It reaches a maximum thickness of something like 800 m (by comparison, the Hawkesbury Sandstone reaches roughly 250 m in thickness). It could be argued that ‘Narrabeen’ is a poorly chosen type-locality name because, although the group is a collection of 21 distinct formations scattered across the basin, only two of them are present in full on the Northern Beaches, plus just an isolated seashore outcrop of a third one.

Local Formations of the Narrabeen Group

1. Bulgo Sandstone

The ‘isolated seashore outcrop’ is of the Bulgo Sandstone, the top 10 m of which just, but only just, breaks surface on the outer tip of Long Reef. However, out under the sea, deep drilling for the ocean sewage outfall passed through 200 m of Bulgo Sandstone.

Commonly a grey-green colour when fresh, the Bulgo Sandstone can carry, in addition to quartz, a high proportion of grains of volcanic rock of a type similar to those classic columnar-jointed lavas you see on the coast at Kiama; therefore it bears only passing resemblance to the (very quartz-rich) Hawkesbury Sandstone. You can see the Bulgo Sandstone in full at the southern end of the Royal towards Bulgo village where it forms a stunning cliff line; and its pebbly, more quartz-rich lower layers host the famous Figure 8 Pool.

The Bulgo Sandstone's volcanic sand grains break down under weathering to clays leading to the common misconception that the southern slopes of the Royal are over a shale sequence. These clay-rich soils are much deeper and more fertile than those developed over quartz sandstones, and also have inherited plant nutrients from the sandstone's volcanic component, which helps in their hosting of a diverse littoral rainforest community.

In the photo at the top of the page, facing the full brunt of the waves, the topmost 10 m of the Bulgo Sandstone emerges and protects the soft Bald Hill Claystone of the Long Reef rock platform from being washed away into the Tasman Sea.

2. Bald Hill Claystone

Overlying the Bulgo Sandstone, the Bald Hill Claystone is a strange and remarkable rock by any standards. It's not a shale but the name ‘claystone’ means, like shale and mudstone, it's made largely of clay minerals. It's crumbly but only locally truly shaley.

Also, its kaolinite is stained a deep, dull red-brown (some say chocolate colour) by hematite which, like the kaolinite, was the result of recurrent contemporary weathering of layer upon layer of fine volcanic debris 248 million years ago in early Triassic times. You can see grey-green bands of sandy or gritty debris interlayered with reddish claystones in the cliff faces and platforms at Long Reef.

Bald Hill Claystone at Long Reef is also well known for its Triassic ‘paleosols’ – fossil soil profiles in which you can even recognise ancient root traces.

Red is the prominent colour of the Bald Hill Claystone but you will notice here at Long Reef that the red beds are interlayered with light coloured, greenish-grey bands made of sand grains derived from weathering of volcanic rocks.

In the Northern Beaches, the claystone only supports vegetation on Long Reef Point, though well to the south it's present below the Hawkesbury Sandstone cliffs of the Illawarra Escarpment from the Royal to at least as far as Fitzroy Falls: its formal type locality is actually Bald Hill at Stanwell Tops.

At Long Reef Point it hosts heathland, shrubland and Themeda Grassland, but with a major problem of invasive bitou bush.

3. Newport Formation

The Newport Formation rests above the Bald Hill Claystone via a transitional few metres of a curious, spotted volcanic ash deposit called the Garie Formation.

You can see a thinned version of the Newport Formation in the cliffs of North Garie Head in the Royal, then northwards it dips below the sea before surfacing low on the North Head cliffs – you can view its 15 m thick laminite and ledge-forming flaggy sandstones from the first lookout walking clockwise round the Fairfax Walk. However, it's much easier to see the formation in the cliffs from Narrabeen northwards where it consists mostly of thinly bedded sandstones and laminites with lenses of conglomerate (see photo).

Northwards along the coastline and across Pittwater into the Hawkesbury estuary there is a thickening and coarsening of the sandstones, and you can easily see this on Barrenjoey and Lion Island where only the topmost quarter of their thick sandstone cliffs belongs to the Hawkesbury Sandstone. You can often strain your eyes deciding where one formation finishes and the other begins, though the Newport sandstones tend to have dirtier, rustier weathering surfaces. The sandstones are impure quartz lithic ones and locally interbedded with laminites which are exposed especially north side of Lion Island where the formation has undergone a name change to Terrigal Formation.

The Newport Formation is host to some important plant communities. Its sandstones and laminites of the coastal cliffs weather to a stony, clay-rich soil which supports coastal clay heath and endangered Themeda Grassland. But traverse the peninsula and this all changes to pockets of littoral rainforest intermixed with endangered Pittwater Spotted Gum Forest. The host soils are weathered, thick quartz lithic sandstones with intermittent laminite layers – but definitely not shales.

Thick sandstones persist westwards and upstream into the Hawkesbury estuary but the tree species change, the principal eucalypt becoming Angophora floribunda comprising the Rough-barked Apple–Forest Oak Forest community defined by Smith & Smith in their plant survey projects for Hornsby and Warringah shire councils.

Barrenjoey lighthouse is built on a capping of Hawkesbury Sandstone but the lower two thirds of the headland is coarse-grained, rusty weathering sandstones of the Newport Formation which are the host rocks of the endangered Pittwater Spotted Gum Forest

This is the first in a series of articles by John Martyn describing his exploration of Sydney’s geology.

There is surprisingly little information that describes, interprets and records heathlands and its ecology in Australia. However, Nick de Jong’s book, which has more than 700 full-colour photos, goes a long way to addressing this gap in our knowledge.

Nick has recorded, identified, described and photographed more than 320 species of plants from Ulladulla’s coastal headland heathlands. The information he has collated showcases the areas species-rich native flora and it is presented in such a way that it will help you with plant identification.

Whilst the wildflowers form the heart of the book, Nick also describes ten coastal walks and discusses the evolutionary adaptations of the plants to wind, salt, fire and weed invasion. Many of these issues are the subject of current scientific study.

If you’re interested in coastal heathland plants, this book will be an important addition to your library.

• Describes 10 scenic coastal walks
• Identifies and describes 320 native plants and their flowering times
• Contains 700 full-colour photos
• Explains habitats, ecology and cultural history
• Identifies birds and butterflies

Cost: $45 ($35 + $10 postage)

To order, contactThis email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it..

Back in the 1970s, a speck of harbourside bushland in Hunters Hill achieved unexpected fame as the site of the world’s first Green Ban when militant union leader Jack Mundey joined forces with local residents in what became known as the Battle for Kelly’s Bush.

Gordon Library is hosting an evening with James Colman, the author of a new book on the life of Jack Mundey.

Date: Tuesday 27 September
Venue: Gordon Library Meeting Room 1
Time: 6 to 7 pm
Cost: $5, wine and cheese will be served
Book: https://bookings.kmc.nsw.gov.au/coursesAndevents
Tel: 9424 0120

After Kelly’s Bush, Mundey and his Builders Labourers’ Federation went on to save The Rocks and dozens of other well-known Sydney sites from the bulldozers. Across Australia, the green ban era saw many battles between residents, developers and officialdom – reaching a peak in the mid-70s. By this time its message had spread far and wide, and Mundey himself had become an international identity in the urban conservation movement.

The House that Jack Built is the first serious book on the man himself. Lane Cove author, architect and planner, Jim Colman, describes for the first time how Mundey moved from his early days as a young builder’s labourer from north Queensland to a leadership role in the Australian heritage movement.

And when the fervour of the green ban era had subsided, Mundey did not hang up his boots. He served a term as an alderman on the Sydney City Council and sat on the council of the Australian Conservation Foundation for a record term. Later he chaired the NSW Historic Houses Trust and in 1998 was named a national living treasure by the NSW National Trust. Amongst his many accolades are two honorary doctorates and an honorary master’s degree in environmental studies.

Colman’s book is a very readable, thoroughly researched and lavishly illustrated coverage of Mundey’s key achievements and activities in the planning and conservation fields during a busy half century. It reveals how this erstwhile communist and trade union leader became a dedicated conservationist who achieved fame – and notoriety – for exploits which were praised by the many, denounced by the few. And despite its evidence that we have made some solid progress in heritage conservation during the Mundey era, it concludes with a warning from the man himself:

The greatest single threat to the environment, locally as well as globally, is the rapacious greed of big multi-national corporations.

John Martyn discovered this beautiful pink fungus in Sheldon Forest.

Fungi expert Ray Kearney identified it as Cantharellus lilacinus. A wet weather rarity.

STEP was actively involved in the fight against the O’Farrell government’s legislation introduced in 2012 allowing amateur hunting in national parks, euphemistically called the Supplementary Pest Control Program.

Fortunately a strong public campaign of opposition and a damning report on the activity of the Game Council, the body slated to manage the hunting process, led to a complete rethink of the legislation (see STEP Matters Issue 172, p 5). Instead the government decided to trial over three years, a closely supervised volunteer ground shooting program in 12 national parks and state reserves, mostly in western NSW.

The evaluation of the program will ultimately assist the government in deciding whether, and if so, how, to proceed with supplementary pest control beyond the three year trial period.

In April 2016 the Natural Resources Commission reported in a media release on an interim review of the trial. It stated that the Supplementary Pest Control trial in national parks is building significant positive relationships among volunteers, neighbours, Aboriginal groups, and National Parks and Wildlife Service staff.

The media release stated that:

Both National Parks and Wildlife Service staff and the selected volunteers from the Sporting Shooters Association of Australia, NSW are working together very professionally, safely and with due regard to animal welfare …

An ongoing priority of the pest control trial will be to identify the specific set of circumstances where ground shooting using volunteers can be most useful to National Parks and Wildlife Service primary pest management program …

Overall the Commission found that the trial is being implemented in-line with relevant legislation and ministerial requirements, is meeting human safety and animal welfare requirements and that the efficiency and effectiveness of operations has improved.

In response to the Commission’s recommendations the NSW government has commenced night operations and committed to continuing to improve efficiency and effectiveness of the trial.

Common sense has prevailed. If only political expediency had not taken over when the first decision was made in 2012 to bend to the dangerous proposal by the Shooters and Fishers Party to allow amateur hunters into the majority of national parks.

STEP welcomes new members of the committee and other members who would like to contribute to our work in some way. This work could involve publicity of events, updating our website, writing or researching submissions or whatever you can suggest.

Committee meetings are usually held on the first Wednesday of each month except January.

Our AGM is on 11 October 2016. Nominations for office bearers and committee members should be made in writing and received at least seven days before our AGM.

If you are interested in helping out, please send us an email and we will phone you back. Nomination forms are also available from This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it..

The NSW Government has been reforming the legislation governing the operation of local government under the catchy title of Fit for the Future reforms. The process started in late-2011 with the appointment of an independent local government review panel and a legislation taskforce. This process covers a lot more than the amalgamation issue.

One of the current stages (phase 1) of the reform program focuses mainly on changes to the governance and strategic business planning processes of councils. Later phases will focus on how councils raise revenue and how they exercise their regulatory functions, as well as a program of restructuring and updating the local government legislation.

A quick Google search reveals significant concerns about the current phase of the process. The Law Society and the Office of Local Government are two bodies that have expressed concern in their submissions that insufficient information is available about proposed legislation changes for a meaningful consultation to take place. The timeframes are also unrealistic. As has occurred with the amalgamation process the objective seems to be to rush through the changes so they can be implemented by about September 2016.

Many of the proposals go beyond STEP’s ambit of interest but the Ryde Hunters Hill Flora and Fauna Preservation Society has made a detailed submission that calls into question the intent of the whole process:

The Society considers that the proposed changes represent a more radical re-write of the role and purpose of local government in NSW than that of the amalgamation process. It would seem that the amalgamation debate process has exhausted and diverted local communities and their elected councillors from the legislative review.

It has distracted attention from these proposed legislative changes which will have a profound impact on the integrity of local government as a tier of government as most NSW residents understand it. In its overall intent phase 1 proposed changes could be interpreted as a cynical attempt by the State government to remove the autonomy of local government in decision-making and centralise power at a state level of government.

State of Environment Reporting

Under the current Local Government Act councils are required to include a State of the Environment Report in their annual report every four years. One particular issue raised by the Ryde Hunters Hill Flora and Fauna Preservation Society about the recent explanatory paper is the proposal to remove this requirement. Instead councils would be required to report on environmental issues relevant to the objectives established by the ‘community strategic plan’. At this stage it is not certain that there will be any provisions for the community strategic plan objectives to include environmental issues so a council would not need to budget to fund and report on environmental measures.

According to the explanatory paper this amendment is designed:

to reduce the compliance burden on councils arising from the preparation of a separate state of the environment report every four years.

It is unclear whether the reporting in the community strategic plan will relate to the council operations only and not measure aspects relating to all the residents of the council area. It is more appropriate to cover this sort of detail in a later stage of the review process.

This proposal has received very little publicity so it slipped through our radar.

State of the Environment (SoE) reporting is an essential requirement for understanding the incremental changes that are happening to our environment as the population juggernaut continues to invade Sydney. SoE reports provide a consistent and efficient framework for on-going environmental monitoring and reporting and necessitate timely appraisal of how councils are meeting vital goals. They provide a mechanism to feed into regional environmental planning processes. The information gathered can be integrated into council’s operational and strategic planning processes. This ensures that councils meet their responsibilities as natural resource managers.

NSROC SOE Report 2011–12

An example of the regional reporting is the Northern Sydney Regional Organisation of Councils (NSROC) combined report that provides a comprehensive snapshot. As the report states:

The Regional SoE Report allows NSROC communities … to have a broader understanding of water, air, biodiversity, waste, noise, heritage and planning issues and serves to enhance coordination between councils.

Here is a summary of some data from the 2011–12 report, the most recent available.

Bushcare volunteer hours have reduced from the previous year by 10% to 41,782. If these hours are valued at $25 per hour this equated to over $1million of free labour.

Residential energy consumption is going down, probably thanks to the solar panels on lots of roofs. Exported solar power in the region has grown from 219 MWh in 2007–8 to 15,473MWh in 2011–12.

Water consumption is reducing. But waste generation is a different story. The amount going to landfill continues to increase while there is also more being recycled.

There are some surprising variations in performance on a per capita basis between council areas which makes one wonder about the consistency of data definitions and/or collection methods.

On 4 May 2016, the Senate Standing Committee on the Environment tabled a report on its inquiry into the Register of Environmental Organisations. Maybe it was hoped that with all the attention being given to the Budget, no one would notice.

The rhetoric from LNP politicians presaged the political agenda behind the inquiry such as the accusations by the Attorney General, George Brandis that environmental organisations (EOs) are destroying jobs. The implications were that the objective of the inquiry is to justify the removal of tax free donation status of environmental charities. The terms of reference for the enquiry related mainly to administrative aspects of the REO but included an examination of:

activities undertaken by organisations currently listed on the Register and the extent to which these activities involve on-ground environmental works

Under the Income Tax Assessment Act 1997 (Cth) an environmental organisation that is given Deductible Gift Recipient (DGR) status is required to have a principal purposeof:

• the protection and enhancement of the natural environment or of a significant aspect of the natural environment;or
• the provision of information or education, or the carrying on of research, about the natural environment or a significant aspect of the naturalenvironment.

Note the or above and yet the terms of reference focused on ‘on-ground’ works.

The inquiry received hundreds of submissions, held hearings and studied the activities of some EOs on the ground. They observed that:

Broadly speaking, the activities of environmental DGRs can be summarised under four categories:

• environmentalremediation
• education andresearch
• policy advocacy and representation
• other activities including those carried outoverseas

The committee acknowledged the significant and ongoing contribution of environmental charities to the protection and enhancement of the natural environmental in all states and territories. However the report stated that:

Having regard to the terms of reference of the inquiry, the committee is of the view that the purpose of granting DGR status to environmental organisations should be to support practical environmental work in the community.

They then have taken a very narrow interpretation of the meaning of ‘practical’. The significant recommendation is that:

… legislative and administrative changes be pursued by the Australian Taxation Office to require that the value of each environmental deductible gift recipient’s annual expenditure on environmental remediation work be no less than 25% of the organisation’s annual expenditure from its publicfund.

The committee accepted that definitional issues may arise from this recommendation. The committee’s view is that remediation work should include revegetation, wildlife rehabilitation, plant and animal pest control, land management and covenanting. Activities such as education, research, advocacy, legal services, activities involved in representing member organisations and activities carried out overseas should not qualify as remediation work.

The government report maintained that the recommended restriction would not impede the ability of EOs to carry our advocacy work.

The Labor Party senators published a dissenting viewpoint. Here are a few quotes from their report:

The overwhelming weight of evidence presented to the committee points to the vital importance of maintaining the tax deductibility of donations to environmental organisations, without imposing further conditions or constraints on the operation of those organisations.

Despite the efforts of government members, no disinterested evidence was adduced in support of the proposition that a distinction should be drawn between so-called ‘on ground’ environmental activities on the one hand, and advocacy, on the other.

In these circumstances, the Labor members of the committee find it extraordinary that government members have recommended to, in effect, constrain the capacity of environmental organisations to engage in advocacy work. We completely reject this undemocratic proposition. Citizens should be supported to question government decision-making and corporate power, not manoeuvred into silence by legislative and administrative action.

The dissenting report also pointed out that the recommendation would create additional red tape for both the environmental organisation and the Taxation Office in collecting information required to check that the organisations are complying with the requirement. Why should EOs be treated differently to other not-for-profit charities?

In STEP’s view it is totally unfair to propose such restrictions on the ability of EOs to raise funds while the corporate sector is free to lobby in their own interests and the expenditure incurred is tax deductible. EOs are acting in the interests of current and future generations to preserve a world that is being destroyed by government and corporate short term interests.

Example – longwall mining under Sydney’s water catchment – more longwalls would probably be approved by now if environment groups had not done such detailed research to highlight the issue. The authorities now recognise now serious the risks are of major loss of water flows and contamination.

STEP’s Environmental Protection Fund does have DGR status so we will need to review our position if and when any changes are made to the legislation.