Follow the money

Both the Newcastle Herald and the Sydney Morning Herald report today that developer Hardie Holdings may escape penalties for alleged illegal land clearing in the Hunter due to a decision by the NSW Labor government to include the land in the Lower Hunter Regional Strategy.

Hardie Holdings is recorded as a donor to the NSW Labor Party in the most recent (2004/5) electoral commission donations disclosures (see the Democracy4Sale website).

The company had also engaged former NSW Labor powerbroker Graham Richardson as a lobbyist.

According to the media reports, the Department of Natural Resources had ordered Hardie Holdings to repair ecologically sensitive land it had damaged at its Sweetwater development, near Branxton.

Hardie Holdings appealed against this order to the NSW Land and Environment Court.

However, the Department has now confirmed that it is no longer pursuing the matter because – under the plan released last month by Labor’s Planning Minister, Frank Sartor - the land would no longer be protected by relevant environmental protection laws.

A spokesperson for Mr Sartor denied that there was any deal.

A spokesperson for The Wilderness Society, Reece Turner, described the government’s decision as “completely bizarre”, but this will not be the first (and is unlikely to be the last) time that the NSW Labor government has assisted developers by retrospectively changing the rules: they did this in the 90s to overturn a Land and Environment Court decision against a sandmining developer at Tomago, and to block legal objections to the Port Kembla copper smelter.

The Greens will continue to oppose developer donations to political parties.