Bentley camp is celebrating a victory while Metgasco laments a loss, but in all it’s a sad and silly waste of time and money.
Metgasco’s chief understandably is cross and wants compensation, but consider this: if a thousand people gave up five hundred dollars a week that they could have earned doing something more lucrative than camping at Bentley to defend our land and water against an absurd industry for six weeks, they’ve lost three million bucks – whoever won the day. Are the demonstrators due for compensation? If not, why not?
Politicians’ failure to represent their electorates allows this industry to dictate outrageous terms over the land and its people. Politicians ignore scientific opinion and threaten to drag our police force into an ugly degrading fight with the community that every police officer has sworn to protect. These politicians should personally compensate Metgasco and everyone else whose time is wasted by this unnecessary conflict. Compensation shouldn’t come from money we’ve paid as tax – that’s our money, not theirs. We knew years ago that approving these licences was wrong and we told them so. It was clear when the trucks drove over the Akubras that this would end in tears and it’s not over yet.
Alistair Bell, Byron Bay
