Rise & Resist by Clare Press

Author:Clare Press [Press, Clare]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9780522873740
Publisher: Melbourne University Publishing

In the community hall, Uncle Kevin Taggart, a Wonnarua elder who lives in nearby Broke, takes the stage. ‘In my opinion, it’s environmental terrorism,’ says the 67-year-old. He has lived in this area all his life. Eighteen months ago, he and his sister Pat Hansson, a gardener, were forcibly arrested for protesting the expansion of Warkworth. Were they threatening violence or damage to property, perhaps? Nope. They were sitting with a few old mates in fold-out chairs boiling billy tea on the side of a public road. A couple of mine managers turned up, told them they were in a ‘blast exclusion zone’ and asked the group to move along. When the tea-drinkers refused, the miners called the police. The white fellas were given a telling off, but five officers dragged Taggart up and cuffed him. Pat says she went into a fit from the stress of it. The siblings were charged with disobeying police direction and resisting arrest. In court, the magistrate acquitted them, saying it was ‘remarkable’ that police became involved.24 But was it? When you consider that Taggart has been outspoken against the mine for the past several years? It does not do to make a fuss, does it? Find yourself on some sort of list, I’ll wager. The mining giants know exactly which mosquitoes are irritating them.

We are seeing extraordinary new laws being introduced in Australia that erode our civil rights to object to injustice. In 2014 Tasmania criminalised peaceful protest that might hinder access to business or disrupt commercial operations. When Bob Brown fell foul of the new laws, he challenged them in the High Court and won, but while that decision was pending, New South Wales introduced its own new measures. In 2016 Mike Baird’s government jacked up the fines protestors could incur by trespassing on mine sites, while reducing what those mining companies must pay for operational misconduct: their ceiling used to be $1.1 million; now it’s five grand—less than the upper limit for fines incurred by individual protestors. The bill expands the definition of ‘a mine’ to include gas and gas-exploration sites. Its potential impacts on Lock the Gate are clear. If the government sells a licence to explore on your land in New South Wales, and you don’t welcome the cur in for a cuppa, you could face up to seven years in jail. Baird’s message was clear: your democratic right to disagree with him was subject to conditions. At the time of writing, his successor Gladys Berejiklian has done nothing to suggest she feels differently.

‘Me and Pat were brought up the Aboriginal way, to look after the land, to respect it,’ says Uncle Kevin Taggart. ‘And look what’s happened, just look what’s happened.’ The carp are gone from Cockfighter Creek,25 the air is polluted, the woodlands and road are threatened. Before he passed away, Taggart’s father asked his kids to look after the land the way their ancestors did. ‘We’ve all got to get together and speak out,’ says Taggart.

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