HYDROGEN made from brown coal in the Latrobe Valley is now being liquified at Hastings before being shipped to Japan. The production is an essential part of the hydrogen energy supply chain (HESC) and is described as “a great leap forward for [Australia’s] ambition to be a key player in the emerging global hydrogen economy”. The brown coal-to-hydrogen project’s commercial partners, led by Kawasaki Heavy Industries, are being backed by the federal and state governments, who each provided $50 million towards the $500m pilot, as well as the Japanese government. While carbon emissions are being released into the atmosphere during…
Author: Keith Platt
THE latest performance protest against AGL’s plans for a gas import terminal at Crib Point was staged on Monday last week (22 March) with a troupe dressed as sybils, or female prophets from ancient Greece. Demonstrating their opposition to the plan now in the hands of the state government, the Sybil Disobedients caught a bus from Bittern to Docklands, Melbourne saying they represented “thousands of concerned ordinary people living on the Mornington Peninsula and Victorian regional towns who want our governments to recognise that we are in a climate emergency”. The 12 Sybils (men and women) acted out a rehearsed…
HUNDREDS of signatures have already been added to a petition that accuses the government of “over-inflating” the number of kangaroos and allowing them to be “harvested” on the Mornington Peninsula. The petition, introduced into the Upper House by the leader of the Victorian Greens and the party’s spokesperson for animals, Dr Samantha Ratnam, follows Mornington Peninsula Shire asking the Department of Environment, Land, Water and Planning (DELWP) for details and scientific research about the peninsula’s eastern grey kangaroos. The petition now available online, calls on the government to suspend kangaroo culls and improve methods used to count kangaroo populations as…
THE fate of a 180 metre wooden section of the historic Finders pier will be decided by Parks Victoria later this year. Parks has told Mornington Peninsula Shire Council that it will “engage with stakeholders and the community in June” following an “independent heritage assessment” of the 250m long pier. The original wooden pier was built in 1864, with a concrete section added in 2011, parallel to the 180m inner portion which has been cordoned off for months due to structural defects. Parks Victoria is considering demolishing this 180m section. The pier is heritage listed and is recognised under the…
ADVERSARIES and adjudicators were on the same path last Tuesday (16 March) as they toured the site of Ryman Healthcare’s proposed retirement village in Mount Eliza. The tour was part of the ongoing hearing by the Victorian Civil and Administrative Tribunal as the New Zealand-based company tries to overturn the refusal of its development by Mornington Peninsula Shire Council. The Save Reg’s Wedge community group sees itself as fighting a David and Goliath battle against Ryman who, it claims, is using a planning loophole that allows for retirement villages “in conjunction with a place of worship” (“Grassroots bid to block…
MORNINGTON Peninsula Shire Council dropped a bombshell last week by walking away from a hearing in the Victorian Civil and Administrative Tribunal, part of a lead-in to determine what activities can be carried out Peninsula Aero Club’s Tyabb airfield. The unexpected withdrawal opens the shire up to claims for legal expenses by the PAC on top of $32,000 it has already been ordered to pay (“Shire’s $32,000 payout to aero club” The News 23/2/21). The PAC response to the shire move was to immediately declare it had “all required permits to operate” its Tyabb airfield and suggests it could lead…
MORNINGTON Peninsula Shire’s deputy mayor Cr Sarah Race brought cheers and tears to some of the hundreds of participants in last week’s March 4 Justice rally at Rosebud (Monday 15 March). As the marchers set off from Rosebud pier a coordinated sit-in was held outside the Somerville office of Flinders MP Greg Hunt and thousands of women and men gathered outside Parliament House in Canberra. Mr Hunt was inside the building, as was the Prime Minister Scott Morrison, who has been heavily criticised for not venturing outside to hear speakers at the rally. The Minister for Women Marise Payne, also…
DRESS codes and parliamentary protocols were wiped out last Wednesday when a wave of demonstrators took their complaints about AGL’s plan for an import gas terminal at Crib Point to Spring Street. It was beachgoers and surfers in wetsuits and board shorts rather than suits and uniformed chauffeurs arriving in government cars that drew attention outside Parliament House. The protest included the handing over of 3000 postcards addressed to Planning Minister Richard Wynne who is weighing up the power company’s plans which also include a 55-kilometre long gas pipeline to Pakenham. The Wetsuits for Westernport protest follows arguments against the…
ALTHOUGH it has been 30 years since an organisation was formed to investigate and improve the lives of dolphins in Port Phillip and Western Port, many questions remain unanswered. Solutions to some lifestyle problems have been found, but recent events have again highlighted the mysteries that remain. A sperm whale washed ashore at Phillip Island over the Labor Day long weekend and researchers have been unable to explain why so few dolphins live in Western Port compared to Port Phillip. Executive director of the Dolphin Research Institute Jeff Weir, said dead whale and dolphin numbers were just two examples of…
Point of difference: Painters’ interpretations of what photographers captured through the lens at Gunnamatta, above, and a restaurant at Sorrento are among the works at Sorrento Studio over Easter. Pictures: Supplied . . . . ARTISTS gain ideas and inspiration from many sources, but for an exhibition being run over Easter at Sorrento, all the works are based on photographs. Photographers and artists from Studio Sorrento collaborated throughout the coronavirus lockdown, with the photography group posted about 80 photos online from which the artists could create artworks in their own style. The coming together of the two genres led to…
HUGH Fraser last week resigned as a Nepean Ward councillor on Mornington Peninsula Shire Council. His resignation, just four months after being elected for the third successive time, took his fellow councillors, shire officers and constituents by surprise. Mr Fraser’s position on council will be filled by one of five candidates who unsuccessfully stood for Nepean Ward in last November’s municipal elections. The winner is likely to be known in about two weeks following a countback of votes by the Victorian Electoral Commission. The five candidates in the running to fill the vacancy are Susan Bissinger, Mechelle Cheers, Mark Davis,…
THE RACV is compiling a list of the Mornington Peninsula’s most dangerous roads so it can lobby governments at all levels to make roads safer and look at lowering speed limits to match conditions. The motoring organisation’s online My Country Road survey aims to find out which roads motorists and residents regard as being the most dangerous. A map on the RACV website shows the peninsula peppered with sites of serious and fatal accidents recorded between 2014 and 2018. The red (fatalities) and yellow (serious injury) dots on the peninsula are among the most thickly clustered of any comparable-sized part…
ARTIST Vicki Sullivan chose the Moon as a light source to give her painting Moon Goddess an ethereal feeling. Little did she know that when first applying oil paint to a portrait of model Lena at her St Andrews Beach studio, that an image of the finished work would end up on the Moon. Sullivan’s work is included in a digital archive of works by visual, music and literary artists being carried in a time capsule aboard the Astrobiotics Peregrine Lunar Lander scheduled to be sent to the Moon in July. Sheww said the delivery would be the first art…
THE Department of Environment, Land, Water and Planning (DELWP) is being asked to provide details about eastern grey kangaroos on the Mornington Peninsula. Mornington Peninsula Shire councillors wants to know if the DELWP has any management plans for the peninsula’s kangaroos and what scientific research is available. The DELWP says the licences it issues to kill kangaroos is based on scientific evidence but will not release details of how many are estimated to be living on the peninsula or how many have been allowed to be “harvested” each year. The move by council to contact and meet with DELWP follows…
THE Disabled Surfers Association Mornington Peninsula branch heads back into the water at Point Leo on Saturday. The event, which is expected to see hundreds of volunteers helping surfers enjoy their time in the waves, is the first for this year. The January event was cancelled due to COVID-19 restrictions and Saturday’s day at the beach will include taking precautions with sanitisers available and equipment being frequently cleaned. The number of people attending the event will fall safely within state government limits and there will be restrictions on crowding around the Point Leo Lifesaving Club. A maximum 140 surfers are…
DEDICATED followers of the hooded plover are rejoicing with the news that two pairs of the locally endangered birds have each hatched and fledged three chicks. It is only the third time in 15 years that hooded plovers on Mornington Peninsula beaches have succeeded in raising three chicks from one nest “and now it’s happened twice this season”, Mark Lethlean, president of Friends of Hooded Plover (Mornington Peninsula), said. Last week Kasun Ekanayake and Renee Mead from Birdlife Australia’s beach-nesting bird project, joined the peninsula group in a bird banding day. “We had already flagged five fledglings in December 2020,…
PREPARATION of a COVID-safe plan was part of the requirements of a permit issued for a two-day music concert held last month at The Briars, Mount Martha. Mornington Peninsula Shire charged promoters $10,000 for the use of the council-owned property and says it only gave the concert the go ahead after an assessment by the state government. Held over the 20-21 February weekend to audiences of 8000 each day, the SummerSalt concert was accused of overcrowding and lack of social distancing on social media. “People bought their tickets and went along … If they were worried about transmission, perhaps it…
HUGH Fraser has resigned from Mornington Peninsula Shire Council. First elected to represent Nepean Ward in 2012, Cr Fraser’s resignation letter – effective 9am today, Tuesday 9 March – cites “irreconcilable points of difference” with shire CEO John Baker. Mr Fraser stresses how much he enjoyed working with other councillors and community represenatives during the two four-year terms 2012-16 and 2016-20. A barrister, Mr Fraser makes no mention of the current council, which includes eight first term councillors. Here is a letter Mr Fraser has sent to “Dear Nepean Ward friends”: “I have decided to resign as councillor. This is…
THE issue of whether or not to start Mornington Peninsula Shire Council meetings with a prayer or a pledge has received another setback. Councillors last week voted against giving the public a say on four options for starting meetings. The options suggested by Cr Antonella Celi included retaining the traditional prayer; rewording the prayer to delete any reference to “God”; replacing it with a pledge; or observing one minute’s silence. Both state and federal governments start sittings with a prayer that mentions God as well as an acknowledgement of country and traditional custodians. In December, council decided on saying a…
MORNINGTON Peninsula Shire councillors are being asked to revoke Governance Rules they adopted last Tuesday (23 February) because some of them appeared not to understand what they were doing. Cr Anthony Marsh decided to try to reverse the decision just hours after councillors had spent 90 minutes debating changes to the Rules. The council meeting at the shire’s Rosebud offices finished at 11.30pm and Cr Marsh, who lives in Mount Martha, emailed his intention to revoke the decision to CEO John Baker at 1.40am Wednesday morning. The email inboxes of his fellow councillors and shire governance manager Amanda Sapolu would…
CELIA Furt has been “horrified” by the cast-offs being thrown to seagulls at Hastings. While on one of her regular trips “to say hi to the pelicans” near the boat ramp, Ms Furt’s attention was drawn to a group of seagulls feeding in the grass. She discovered they were eating loaves of mouldy bread. “People still think that feeding seagulls, pigeons and other birds, is good for them. They think that they are feeding them but, instead, they are killing them,” Ms Furt said. “If they want to feed birds, they must only feed them what’s right for them, what…
MORNINGTON Peninsula Shire has been ordered to pay $32,000 to Peninsula Aero Club for costs incurred during an ongoing fight over permit conditions. The club had sought $53,000 during a two-day Victorian Civil and Administrative Tribunal hearing in July 2020, which saw both sides represented by lawyers and one witness called by the club. The ruling against the shire comes just months before it is again scheduled to come up against the PAC at VCAT in a hearing called to determine what activities can be carried out at the airfield at the corner of Mornington-Tyabb and Stuart roads, Tyabb (“Shire,…
THE Climate Guardian Angels were out on the mudflats at Crib Point on Monday (22 February) to highlight what an “environmental travesty” power company AGL’s gas import terminal would be for Western Port. The “performance collective” believes its direct action can “communicate important and sensitive information in non-threatening and yet enormously effective ways”. The “angels” have been around since early 2013 “holding powerful polluters and their enablers (such as politicians, media and financiers) responsible for the climate and biodiversity crisis to account”. This time, they have been joined in their criticism of AGL by the state Opposition and Flinders MP,…
MORNINGTON Peninsula Shire is being urged to adopt “big picture thinking” and focus a larger proportion of its spending on the “rural hinterland” rather than built up areas. The suggestion by Cr David Gill to put the peninsula on the “international tourism map” follows the shire’s rejection of an application for $50,000 to investigate a “multi-purpose track” alongside Cape Schanck Road. The Friends of Cape Schanck group says no progress has been made on a reserve and playground at Cape Schanck in the four years since $100,000 was allocated by the shire. “Over the nearly 30 years this shire has…
AN online wine directory was launched last week to help consumers “find their perfect local wine based on their taste preferences”. Behind the Vines links lets wine buyers take a virtual tour of wineries throughout the state and then order straight from their chosen producer. The state is said to have more 21 wine regions, but for these online sales the Mornington Peninsula is classified as being part of Pinot Coast, one of “Victoria’s Five Wine Pillars”. Orders and information about wineries can be “filtered” by choosing type of wine (red, white, rose, sparkling, sweet or “any”); taste (delicate through…
THE beach at Safety Beach may have taken on a dark hue, but assurances have been given that the former pristine sands will soon return to normal. The dark grey sand was pumped from the entrance to the Martha Cove marina and spread for some hundreds of metres west of the yacht club. Russell Coleman of the Martha Cove Owners Corporation said the dredged “anaerobic” sand “quickly lightens to become normal beach sand on exposure to sunlight and wave action”. He said the sand taken from the marina entrance and the sand on Safety Beach had the same source -…
THE state government has been accused of ignoring aluminium composite cladding fire risks faced by people living in single and two-storey homes. Houses have been excluded from the government-ordered audit of buildings incorporating the flammable material. “The irony is that apartments are included in the audit, so there’s a line drawn to say it’s OK for home owners and residents to be housed in combustible buildings but not tenants or owners of apartments,” Ron Corcoran said. Alarm about the dangers of aluminium composite cladding was raised in June 2017 when 72 died when London’s 20-storey Grenfell Tower caught fire. In…
MORNINGTON Peninsula Shire last followed the state Opposition in reinforcing opposition to power company AGL’s plan for a gas import terminal at Crib Point. The Opposition’s resources spokesperson Ryan Smith on Monday last week said the decision was based on supporting “local residents”, “serious environmental concerns” about the route of a proposed pipeline to Pakenham and because “the legally recognised indigenous traditional owner group opposes the project” (“Opposition against AGL gas terminal” The News 10/2/21). One day later, Mornington Peninsula Shire issued a news release “welcoming” the Opposition’s stand. “With state Planning Minister Richard Wynne due to make a final…
TUESDAY 9 February was the first Mornington Peninsula Shire Council meeting open to the public since April, when COVID-19 forced them online. Just 50 members of the public were allowed to attend last week’s meeting at Mornington Community Theatre and strict safety measures applied: mandatory masks, QR codes, social distancing and “a symptom self-assessment” before leaving home. Councillors and staff were masked up, although the 1.5 metre distance seemed hard to achieve for some, especially when a rear shot showed the mayor Cr Despi O’Connor lean left and whisper in the ear of governance manager Amanda Sapolu. It is not…
MORNINGTON Peninsula ratepayers will not have to pay $10,000 to Rye CFA because of a “muck-up” by a “junior officer”. The CFA was told by the officer on behalf of the shire that it could not hold its annual tin rattle because of safety issues. CFA volunteers traditionally approach motorists for donations every January at the corner of Dundas Street and Nepean Highway. The shire, after “banning” the tin rattle, later admitted its traffic and transport team did not have the power to stop the collection (“Shire backs down on tun rattle ban” The News 1/2/21). It said there had…