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NEWS
Cairns Local News
Youth engage candidates on climate
TANYA MURPHY
A group of local young people met with candidates for the upcoming election at Yorkey’s Knob Beach last Friday, October 23 to ask them to commit to strong climate action. The Australian Youth Climate Coalition (AYCC) members met with Barron River Greens candidate Aaron McDonald, Australian Labor Party (ALP) candidate Craig Crawford, Liberal-National Party (LNP) candidate Linda Cooper and the Cairns Greens candidate Daniel Dench. The AYCC made their demands clear with a beach sign spelling out ‘Clean Recovery’ on Yorkey’s Knob beach, and performed a demonstration of the threatening effects of sea level rise. Barron River LNP Candidate Linda Cooper posted a selfie with the AYCC members but did not agree to match the ALP’s commitment to 50 per cent renewable energy by 2030, through a $500 million investment in publicly-owned renewables such as wind
and solar backed by battery storage.
Ms Cooper told Cairns Local News that one of the LNP’s major contributions to renewables would be pursuing the controversial Bradfield Scheme project, a plan to pump water from Far North Queensland’s rivers up to the top of the Great Dividing Range, before diverting it across the state to eventually end up in Lake Eyre in South Australia. The scheme has been rebutted on scientific, engineering and economic grounds, as it’s estimated it could cost upwards of $15 billion and take more than a decade to construct. The scheme has also been slammed by conservation groups due to the impact it would have on riverways and the Great Barrier Reef. “We’re calling on all the candidates to support a ‘Clean Recovery’ from COVID-19,” said James Cook University (JCU) student Garrett Swearingen, 20. “The candidates attended and we appreciated the seriousness of their responses. However, the LNP and ALP candidates did not demonstrate any willingness to
improve upon their current policies which fall short of the actions required to reduce the effects of the ongoing climate crisis. “The AYCC Cairns group will continue to work with the local community to push for a Clean Recovery and a commitment from all parties to meet our election asks. “First, we are asking for construction of 4 gigawatts of publicly-owned renewables through existing state-owned power generators over the next 3 years. “Second, we are asking for no public money to be spent on fossil fuel projects, especially polluting gas projects and infrastructure, and the state government must not facilitate federal funds for gas.” Fellow JCU student Holly Farnarn, 20, told the candidates she was scared for her future. “There isn’t a single second of each day where I don’t experience ‘climate anxiety,’” she said. “Not only does a changing climate threaten our endemic species and fragile World Heritage ecosystems, it threatens our livelihoods.
Friday, October 30, 2020
Pioneers hand over baton NICOLE GIBSON The innovation hub credited with pioneering the start-up scene in regional Queensland and inspiring countless would be entrepreneurs is set to close its physical space in Cairns. The region’s first startup ecosystem, TheSPACE, announced it will close its co-working premises at TAFE Queensland’s Cairns campus in mid-November, after more than 8 years. Landlords, the Department of Employment, Small Business and Training (DESBT), advised the business it required its building back as part of a program to revitalise TAFE training facilities. TheSPACE CEO Troy Haines said they investigated the possibility of securing new premises with DESBT however decided it was time to handover the baton to others offering similar arrangements. “There’s a lot of other people supporting entrepreneurs in (a co-working) capacity in Cairns now so we did the sums and decided it really wasn’t necessary anymore,” Mr Haines said. Mr Haines said since 2012 TheSPACE had been home to hundreds of co-working
entrepreneurs and played a pivotal role spring-boarding innovation in the region. The organisation hosted big names in business including Queensland’s Chief Entrepreneurs Mark Sowerby and Steve Baxter of Shark Tank fame. Mr Haines said they were also instrumental in helping James Cook University secure funding for its multimillion dollar Cairns Innovation Centre. “It was at TheSPACE, as the centre of start-up and innovation at the time, the Prime Minister of the day Malcolm Turnbull announced the $10 million-dollar funding commitment,” said Mr
Haines. Mr Haines said while the physical space would close the group would continue to support entrepreneurship under its arms Transformative Technologies and I AM Connected. TheSPACE Mentor and local businessman David Burston said since the announcement the business had been working to relocate the 14 businesses currently working from TheSPACE. “We’ve been out there busy finding homes for most of them,” Mr Burston said. “We’ll keep supporting them afterwards to make sure they’re happy.
