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Welcome to the Woollahra Greens website
The Woollahra Greens are an affiliated member group of The Greens NSW.
We were formerly part of the Eastern Suburbs Greens. You can find out about our sister group, Waverley Greens here.
You can join the Greens here. |
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Woollahra Greens have lodged a complaint with the NSW Electoral Commission over the inappropriate choice of a pre-poll venue for next month’s local government elections.
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 Lead candidates from Woollahra Greens (l to r): David Shoebridge, Nicola Grieve, Susan Jarnason, Suzanne Eggins, Duncan Wood
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Woollahra Greens will put their cards on the table at the coming council elections by establishing a real time on-line register of donations. The register will record every donation over $200 from every source for the whole of the campaign period.
The pressure is on all other parties to step up to the mark and let the voters know who, or what, is paying for their campaigns. On past practice we can expect little action from the major parties.
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In a first for NSW politics, the Greens’ candidate for Vaucluse, Cr David Shoebridge, clearly outpolled the ALP to form the natural opposition to a sitting Liberal candidate in yesterday’s NSW election.
“It is a terrific result for our future.” Cr Shoebridge said after hearing of the results from the weekend’s counting. “This has the Greens on a primary vote of 21% well clear of the ALP on 19%. It means for the first time in a blue ribbon Liberal electorate, the electors are looking to the Greens as the viable alternative government, and not the ALP.”
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Greens MP and Upper House candidate Lee Rhiannon has unveiled the Greens plan for a carbon tax in NSW. The Greens will move a private members bill to establish a price on carbon for greenhouse polluters to fast track the shift from coal to renewables.
Ms Rhiannon announced the plan at an Nature Conservation Council (NCC) climate change forum in Sydney.
"The Greens will move a private members bill to phase-in a carbon tax of $25 per tonne of carbon dioxide by 2011. This will put a price on polluting the atmosphere with greenhouse gases and raise $1.2 billion a year over the life of the tax to put into renewable energy and energy efficiency," said Ms Rhiannon.
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Greens MP Lee Rhiannon yesterday rejected accusations that The Greens party supports the sale of the drug “ice” (crystal methamphetamine), instead laying the blame for the drug epidemic on the failed policies of the major parties.
“The allegation in yesterday’s Daily Telegraph that the Greens policy would
allow people to buy unlimited amounts of the deadly drug ‘ice’ is totally false,” Ms Rhiannon said.
“The Greens policy does not support unlimited supply of any drug, least of all crystal methamphetamine.”
Greens policy is clear. The way to deal with the ‘ice’ epidemic is to go after the big dealers. Locking up individual users will not remove this deadly drug from our streets, nor will it reduce the alarming prevalence of ice use and dependency.
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In their usual ostrich-like approach to climate change each and every Liberal and Labor councilor on Woollahra Council opposed a Greens' motion on Monday 12 March 2007 asking for Woollahra Council take steps to ready our municipality for the inevitable impact of climate change.
"We were really asking that Council take stock of the likely affects of climate change in Woollahra so that we can take timely and preventative action to meet the predicted changes. With the fact of climate change now being readily acknowledged, we believe it is time to work out what we should be doing as a local authority to amelioriate its impacts on our residents and council's infrastructure." Cr Shoebridge said after the motion.
Remarkably few other councilors spoke to the motion. The majority simply voted for further inaction on this crucial local and global issue.
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Greens support Earth Hour on March 31st. Woollahra Greens will be amongst the thousands of Sydney-siders to turn out their lights and switch off their appliances on Saturday March 31st between 7.30 and 8.30 pm for Earth Hour.
An initiative of the WWF and the Sydney Morning Herald, Earth Hour marks the launch of a 12-month campaign to reduce Sydney’s greenhouse gas emissions and to encourage Australians to modify their energy-extravagant lifestyles.
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Inaugural Woollahra Mayoral Speakers Series.
The special guest speaker is Mr Peter Cosier who will discuss Climate Change and what we can do about it. Mr Cosier is the Director of the Wentworth Group of Concerned Scientists and former Environmental Policy Adviser to the Australian Environment Minister, Senator Robert Hill.
This is a free event and seats are available to local residents. Woollahra Council Chambers, 536 New South Head Road, Double Bay. 5.30pm for 6pm. To reserve a seat, call Patricia Vella on 9391 7013 or email patricia.vella@woollahra.nsw.gov.au.
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Climate change is the single biggest issue of our generation - but not for Mr Debnam. This weekend Greypower and Climate Action Bondi organised a well attended candidates' forum at Bondi Beach to discuss what their local candidates will do to stop climate change.
Despite more than 6 weeks' prior notice of the meeting, Peter Debnam simply didn't turn up. However the debate between the Greens Vaucluse candidate Clr David Shoebridge and Labor's Alison Rahill was both lively and informative.
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Greens Councillor and Candidate for the state seat of Vaucluse, David Shoebridge, was gagged last night when he attempted to ask the Labor and Liberal councillors in Woollahra just how much money their parties had received from the Rose Bay Marina Developer.
“I managed to ask the Liberal Councillor Andrew Petrie if he knew that the Rose May Marina developer had kicked in $10,000 to the Liberal Party last year, but when I tried to get an answer from the Labor Councillor about donations to the ALP the Mayor gagged me. What are they so afraid of, that the residents will know who pays for their parties’ political campaigns? Surely we all have a right to know.” Councillor Shoebridge said after the meeting.
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At the last Council meeting of February Greens Councillors David Shoebridge and Tanya Excell successfully moved for Woollahra Council to immediately join the Mobile Muster campaign to recycle and reuse council’s growing store of used mobile telephones.
“Research shows that there are more than 16 million obsolete mobile phones in people’s drawers at home and work. Consumers simply don’t know what to do with them and feel, quite rightly, guilty about just putting them in landfill. Mobile Muster is an industry funded initiative that takes these obsolete phones and fully recycles them, at no cost to the consumer.” Greens Councillor David Shoebridge said .
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The coming NSW State election will decide if long-held rights of working people, and their unions, live or die in this State. Since March 2006, working conditions throughout Australia and NSW have been under attack by a rampant Federal government controlled by John Howard. The NSW Greens have been consistent opponents of the Federal government’s regressive ‘WorkChoices’ legislation, and have been strong advocates for greater protection for NSW workers from its harsh realities.
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At its meeting on Monday night Woollahra Council gave its near unanimous support to the Walk against Warming planned for 4 November 2006. The Walk against Warming is being coordinated around the International Day of Climate Change Action which is also taking place that day.
Greens Councillors David Shoebridge and Tanya Excell who proposed the motion were pleased with the strong support it received.
"It just goes to show how seriously the community is taking the threat to our planet posed by climate change. This action together with countless other local initiatives across Australia should be a wake up call to our state and federal governments who have lagged behind the rest of the advanced world in combatting carbon emmissions." Said Clr Shoebridge after the vote.
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Come to the Opening Night of Al Gore's
An Inconvenient Truth
Thursday, 14th September 2006, 6:30pm
Academy Twin, Paddington
Guest speaker: Dr. John Kaye, 6:00pm
Tickets $15 ($20 Keen Greens)
Bookings contact: Nicola Grieve
0402 434 423 or on nicolagrieve@hotmail.com
Food: Delicious LGBTI* wraps... $10
*Lettuce, Goats' cheese, Beetroot, Tomato, Injera bread.
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What came first, the chicken or the human? Remarkably, when comparing Australia's expenditure on subsidising our domestic poultry industry as against our aid budget for the developing world, it looks like the chook is winning.
Foreign Policy's latest Committment to Development Index (CDI) shows that in the last twelve months Australian governments spent:
$17.12 subsidising each head of cattle in Australia;
$6.49 per pig;
$0.94 per sheep; and
$0.39 per chicken.
However our international aid budget amounts to just $0.54 per person in the developing world.
So perhaps it is a slight exaggeration to say the chicken came first: that place is reserved for the cow, followed by the pig, then the sheep and only then the human. But in 2005/06 our local chickens sure did put up a contest.
For the full report see the Foreign Policy article at this link.
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Is the leader of the NSW opposition, and our local member for Vaucluse, dangerous, unhinged, unscrupulous or just plain foolish? Here are a few Peter Debnam quotes from 2006. Judge for yourself.
Attitude towards People from the Middle East
On 17 January 2006 Mr Debnam said, when asked about the number of people of Middle Eastern background in NSW gaols:
"There are not enough [in gaol]. There's 200 thugs on the streets of Sydney who should be in jail, that's the issue. I'm saying to the Government 'get in their face, get 'em arrested, get 'em locked up."
Later that same week Mr Debnam said:
”And the issue is resources and political commitment to lock up 200 Middle Eastern thugs."
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A rearguard attempt by a minority of councillors to excise Cranbrook's Rose Bay land holdings from more stringent open space zoning requirements was roundly defeated at Woollahra Council on Monday night.
The 10 to 4 vote reflected the community's wish for a comprehensive and principled planning outcome for all open space in the municipality. The change will prohibit schools being built on any land zoned open space.
"It's a good outcome. Those councillors who were seeking to exclude Cranbrook's Rose Bay Bowling Club lands were in effect trying for a spot-unzoning. This is contrary to all decent planning principles." Clr David Shoebridge said following the debate.
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