The state government has declared ten local government areas (LGAs) natural disaster areas following the trail of destruction left by ex-cyclone Oswald as it bulldozed its way down the coast on the weekend.
Premier Barry O’Farrell toured the region yesterday, flying over the worst hit areas in the Clarence Valley and touring the town of Grafton.
Subsequently the LGAs of Ballina, Bellingen, Byron, Coffs, Clarence, Kyogle, Lismore, Nambucca, Richmond Valley and Tweed were all declared natural disaster areas.
Grafton dodged a bullet when the Clarence River topped out at 8m, just below the level of the town’s levee, the highest peak ever recorded. Last-minute sandbagging at some parts of the levee saved the town from inundation.
Despite scientific argument that global warming is contributing to the spate of extreme weather events experienced recently, Mr O’Farrell appeared to deny any connection in a radio interview yesterday.
He told Richard Glover’s ABC Sydney Drive program: ‘the fact is we have lived with fires, floods and storms in this country as long as Europeans have been here. Our Indigenous communities lived with them before that… These things come and go.’
I wish you would go Barry.
Who does he think he is to deny climate change? God or someone!
Thanks to Bazza O’Farrell and his mates for the OK from our lords and masters to ignore 98% of the scientific community and carry on with our greenhouse emissions regardless because the Aborigines put up with floods and fire (obviously he there to record the levels and frequency of these events). What a joke! And HE is the Premier! God help us!