Freo council is recycling its plastic bags ban. It’s having another go at getting the ban through state parliament after it was initially rejected because of a mandatory fee for reusable alternatives. That’s been stripped out and this week the council’s strategic and general services committee decided to have another crack. Bag haters Helen Dyson, Jon Strachan, Jenny Marslen, Shani Graham and Melanie Bainbridge can’t wait till they’re dead and buried. Ms Graham, who’s led the bag ban from the front (and sometimes dressed in them), says it was disappointing the mandatory fee was scrapped, saying retailers had wanted it to deflect narky customers.
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PEACE is coming to Fremantle at last. After a fractious couple of years infighting over skate parks and high rise, harmony’s about to settle over the city, which has been asked to take a lead in the Mayors for Peace anti-nuclear weapons initiative. The secretary-general of MFP Yasuyoshi Komizo, who unsurprisingly is based in the Japanese city Hiroshima, has asked mayor Brad Pettitt (pictured) to organise workshops and re-engage the community to foster the peace message. Dr Pettitt says there’s unikely to be a return to Freo’s radical days of snubbing visiting US nuclear warships, as he prefers a more diplomatic approach—wooing them with lamingtons at official functions and having a quiet word later.
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THEY wanted the king brown, they got the pony. Sunset Events’ proposed bar and concert venue at Arthur Head passed its first hurdle on Wednesday, getting through the council’s strategic and general services committee. But its bid to be able to hold 850 punters during the day was scaled back to 500 on the urging of councillor Dave Hume, who also wanted the projects footprint wound back. Cr Hume says he reckons it’s a great fit for the area now it’s scaled back, but Round House guides and inner city residents still fear it’ll bring drunken yobs who’ll wee in their doorways.
This will again prove a failure with the few customers still shopping in Fremantle leaving. We know this will happen, because of the failure of the policy the last time the City of Fremantle tried to implement this. It lasted a day before the City’s businesses realised the damage that was occurring and the backlash from the shoppers.
The feral’s trying to put this through and advocate it, have the opportunity to not use plastic. At least allow the business to absorb the cost for the customer, if they want to.
This does nothing to generate more business as the people who don’t want to use plastic bags having the freedom of choice, not to use them.
Another failed policy that will be rejected, and so it should.