Big environment groups are friendless and are being forced to pay people to work on community stalls it was revealed today.
The CEO of the National Irrigators’ Council, Tom Chesson said one of the big environmental corporations Environment Victoria is offering people $25 an hour to work on its community stalls in Melbourne.
“Many of these groups would have you believe that they are run by volunteers passionate about the environment –yet they can’t even find a couple of volunteers to run their community stalls in their inner Melbourne heartland.”
“Environment Victoria is so desperate for friends the job description states; ‘you don’t need to have a prior knowledge of river issues…’
Mr Chesson said this stood in stark contrast to volunteer spirit and willingness to fight of the communities and people who lived in the Murray Darling Basin and would be directly affect by the actions of big Environmental corporations.
“Basin communities like Griffith and Deniliquin, where the equivalent of over 2 million people in Melbourne, recently volunteered their time for free to attend a meeting on the basin’s future, similarly over 90 percent of the businessesin these communities volunteered to close for over half a day a week before Christmas.”
“Politicians and the public should not be deceived by big environmental corporations, some with multi-million dollar budgets, into believing that they have widespread community support.
“When you have to start paying $25 an hour for friends with no idea about the issues they are pushing to annoy Melbournians in shopping centres and on the street, they should no longer be taken seriously.”
“It is time Politicians stopped taking big environmental corporations at face value and started asking hard questions about their me mbership numbers, actual level of support and just who are paying their bills,” Mr Chesson concluded.
Contact: Tom Chesson 0418 415597