“We will resist you” Mayor tells Land Council over CSG

Hamish Broome 29th Nov 2012 4:23 PM

An image from a meeting at Byron Shire Council's Mullumbimby headquarters to discuss a bid by the NSW Aboriginal Land Council to explore for coal seam gas in the Byron Shire.

BETWEEN three and four hundred people attended a CSG meeting held at Byron Shire Council chambers in Mullumbimby last night.
The meeting was instigated by the NSW Aboriginal Land Council's recent prospecting application over the area, and to plan a survey in Mullumbimby to ascertain the level of local support for a moratorium on CSG.
Byron Shire mayor Simon Richardson said he expected "at least 90%" of Mullumbimby to oppose CSG.
Cr Richardson also issued a warning to the NSW Aboriginal Land Council.

You come to our shire at your peril - we have 30 years' history of environmental activism ... we will resist you regardless of the colour of your skin, Cr Richardson said.

Byron Shire Mayor Simon Richardson. 

"If you wish to look after your people economically, it is not by getting short-term low skill employment and polluting your land."
The application is also strongly opposed by the Indigenous Arakwal people, who hold native title over the area.
Byron Shire now has two prospective licenses - the other held by Arrow Energy - covering almost the entire shire except for the far west.
Further meetings in Federal and Bangalow are being planned for next week.
"As an old environmental activist I have never seen a movement which has galvanised such a wide section of the community - water affects us all, it cuts across all political divides, all economic divides," Cr Richardson said.
"Our National Party representatives need to wake up to that or they may have a horrendous shock coming in the next few years."
Northern Star