THE BYRON SHIRE Volume 28 #34 Tuesday, February 4, 2014 Phone 02 6684 1777 Fax 02 6684 1719 editor@echo.net.au adcopy@echo.net.au www.echo.net.au 23,200 copies every week
Inside this week
Valentines Day
page 17 T H E C H E A P E S T P R I C E T O PAY I S AT T E N T I O N
CAB AUDIT
NO CSG!
Bentley mining blockades begin – p9
Angry bees in several bonnets – p11–15
Activists target Metgasco investors There’s a new approach by activists battling against the planned natural gas industry expansion in the region: a number of Metgasco’s largest shareholders have been sent a letter advising them about the size and effectiveness of the social movement that opposes its operations. It comes as protesters gear up for a fight against proposed drilling operations at Bentley, near Lismore. Michael Qualmann, on behalf of Gasfield Free Northern Rivers, sent the letters last week saying that Metgasco had been understating the scale of public opposition and that the regional community was well organised and had undertaken training in non-violent direct action.
Awareness campaign Mr Qualmann says Byron Bay resident John Vaughan, whose super fund is listed in Metgasco’s 2013 annual return as its eighth largest shareholder, contacted Mr Qualmann after the letter was sent and told him that he may lose his home in litigation. ‘I don’t know why anyone would consider this litigious’, Mr Qualmann told The Echo, ‘I’m actually doing the shareholders a service by providing them with information about risks to their investment that they may not be aware of.’ He also referred to the 87 per cent who voted against gasfield developments in the Lismore poll and that over 119 communities had declared themselves gasfield free by margins over 90 per cent and were prepared to fight to prevent gasfield establishment. Both Mr Vaughan and CEO of Metgasco, Peter Henderson, declined to comment to The Echo.
OUR LOWEST RATES
in 10 years
Health and Beauty the Byron way – p18–19
Sign on for a sporty good time – p20
Byron Shire Council Notices Page 41
Off on a MPs squabble great big over police adventure numbers Chris Dobney
Last week, hundreds of kindergarten kids started their formal education, and four-year-old Jess was just one of five children to start at The Pocket Public School. The day was made easier by big sister Amy, who offered a hand to hold. Photo Eve Jeffery
Bikie meth lab bust in Bangalow Chris Dobney
Police arrested five people last week and found what they allege is a methamphetamine lab in a suburban street of Bangalow. The raid on the Palm Crescent property netted two rifles, a shotgun, methamphetamine, cannabis, cocaine, steroids and cash, all valued by police at $14,000. A 33-year-old man was issued a court attendance notice for allegedly hindering police officers in the course of their duty during the raid. The raid was part of the cross-border operation, which has been underway since November. In this case, members of the Ballina chapter of the Rebels motorcycle gang were targeted, and police allege they were trafficking drugs from NSW into Queensland where they were being sold to buyers on the Gold Coast. One of those arrested is Bangalow resident Jamie Adams, 31, who reportedly languished in solitary confinement in a Queensland prison for two days following
his arrest on the Gold Coast on Wednesday. Police allege he is the treasurer of the Ballina chapter of the Rebels motorcycle gang and he has been charged with aggravated drug trafficking. Police allege he bought – and possibly manufactured – drugs in NSW and sold them in Queensland.
QLD’s anti-bikie laws hit NSW Additionally a simultaneous raid on six properties in southern Queensland resulted in the arrest of five people. Richmond LAC crime manager, detective inspector Cameron Lindsay, said his officers were working closely with Queensland police involved in Taskforce Maxima and specialist NSW police from Strike Force Raptor, ‘to tackle outlaw motorcycle gang activity in northern NSW and southeast Queensland’. He described the drug manufacturing activities as ‘extremely dangerous’. ‘Explosive chemicals are used, neighbouring properties are put at risk and people are put at risk,’ he told ABC radio.
State Nationals MP Geoff Provest (Tweed) claims a call for more police in the Tweed-Byron Local Area Command is political grandstanding, but actual police numbers appear to tell a different story. A petition calling for the state government to live up to its preelection promise to increase police numbers in regional areas was launched last week by federal Labor MP Justine Elliot and Labor’s upper house state spokesperson for the north coast, Walt Secord. At the launch, the pair said that in the past two years police numbers in the LAC had dropped by 20 officers. In February 2012 there were 198 officers and the latest official figures reveal that there are now only 178 officers. ‘As a former police officer, I share the community’s disappointment in the north coast Nationals’ failure to deliver police. They are putting at risk our communities’ safety,’ Ms Elliot said. But Mr Provest hit back, saying it is a political scare campaign and has no basis in fact. ‘Interviews are being conducted right now for five new police officer positions in the Tweed Byron Local Area Command,’ he added. ‘The figures Ms Elliot is using to claim a reduction in police numbers are misleading as our Highway Patrol officers are no longer included in the allocation of officers in the local area command.’ But a spokesperson for Ms Elliot told The Echo that Mr Provest was wrong and the removal of 17 highway patrol officers to a separate command had been accounted for in the figures.