Moree resident Joy Cunningham writes about mining and coal seam gas
“ONLY when the last tree has died and the last river been poisoned and the last fish been caught will we realise we cannot eat money” – 19th century Nehilawe (Cree) proverb.
Australia was declared to be merely a place to obtain cheap raw products at the expense of running down its manufacturing base.
Simply put, Australia would become a quarry – that is, according to the Foreign United Nations Industrial Development Organisation Treaty signed by Australia in Chile in 1975.
This is in breach of sections 128 and 44(i) of the Australian constitution.
Now prime agricultural land is being trespassed by companies exploring for coal and coal seam gas, using 65 hazardous chemicals that would be illegal to use in warfare and fluid volume exceeding three million gallons.
The legal maxim states that when someone owns land, they own everything above it to an indefinite height and everything below it to an indefinite depth.
Yet landholders are being told that this is not so regarding the controversial entry onto private property by “exploratory” coal and coal seam gas companies.
By the laws of England (and Australia), every invasion of “private property, be it ever so minute, is a trespass” (Entick v Carrington (1765) and Southam v Smeut (1964)).
Consequently, a fully empanelled, informal jury is the only way of deciding this issue.
Every man is independent of all laws except those prescribed by nature. He is not bound by any institutions formed by his fellow men without his consent (Cruden v Neale (May Term 1796)).
