CLANCY OVERELL | Editor | CONTACT
Queensland Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk has today declared the catastrophic damage being caused to the Great Barrier Reef by coal mining is nothing compared to the damage being caused to Brisbane’s trendy inner-city suburbs by street artists.
“If you think coral bleaching was bad, you need to take a look at The Valley nowadays. The inner-city street art is a complete eye sore” she said.
“It’s actually quite a problem. Our government has decided to stall all environmental funding until we can find a way to stop this rise in hideous street art”
“The reef is going to have to wait”
Queensland scientists say that two-thirds of the largest natural living organism has now been devastated by severe coral bleaching, with the most intense damage occurring further south this year – but the Premier says they are just ‘geeing it up’.
“I don’t know what these so-called scientists have against me, but they really need to stop being so anti-coal” said Palaszczuk.
“Don’t they understand that the Adani coal mine will result in maybe just under 1500 unskilled jobs as well as a few vital favours in the future”
Palaszczuk says maybe her government might be able to do something about the coral bleaching if she can get enough votes out of this coal mine to get elected again.
“Voters need to remember that I’m not on $200k a year to do nothing. I promised to provide jobs to the people of India, and that’s exactly what I’ll do”
“Maybe further down the track, we can look at it”
“…once I get enough political points out of funding a near-obsolete industry back onto its feet, maybe then we can talk about this precious coral and the precious tourism operators up north”
An aerial survey of the reef’s 2,300-kilometre length by the Australian Research Council’s Centre of Excellence for Coral Reef Studies showed 1,500km had been bleached.
Compared to its 2016 survey, where the northern third was worst off, this year the central third — Cooktown down to Townsville — recorded the most intense bleaching.
