ALBERT JACOBS dropped a lump of coal into the stockings of Roe 8 protestors Christmas Eve, granting conditional environmental approval for the controversial road.
On Monday, more than 100 people turned up at the Bibra Lake jetty to protest the decision, saying the road extension will devastate 98 hectares of the fragile Beeliar wetlands chain.
Save Beeliar Wetlands campaigner Kate Kelly says the turnout, organised at short notice, “shows the strength of the community” and its determination to fight the road.
Katie Martinez, 4, of South Lake, waves the Save Beeliar Wetlands flag. Photo by Jo Darbyshire
The Murdoch university sustainability academic told supporters the government had a fight on its hands every step of the way: legal challenges were underway and protest action on the ground would be stepping up.
She said the decision was “verging on evil”.
“While not unexpected they should do something like this, it just makes my will stronger to do something about it.”
Roe 8, which languished on planners’ backburner for years due to a lack of funding—and outright hostility from the Labor and Greens parties—is to be built as an element of the Abbott and Barnett governments’ “Perth Freight Link”, a route of various roads and highways that end up at Fremantle port.
2• Kate Kelly (green dress, left of photo) pulled together more than 100 supporters. Photos by Brian Mitchell
The federal funding for Roe 8 is dependent on the state government agreeing to make it WA’s first ever toll road, in order to recoup some costs.
Greens MLC Lynn MacLaren says she’d listed at least eight grounds on which Roe 8 should be abandoned on environmental grounds, “from irrevocable damage to threatened species habitat to an incomplete strategic environmental assessment of the region”.
“The environment minister has dismissed the key issues,” she says. “[He] has failed to acknowledge the importance of Beeliar wetlands to native plant and animal protection.
Catherine Baudines and her children Elizabeth (7) and William (2) of South Lake.
“From North Lake to Ramsar-listed Thomsons Lake, this is the last significant wetland chain south of the river.
“Fremantle and Cockburn residents recognise how vital the Beeliar wetlands are, and it’s time the state government did too.”
• Disclaimer: The author is an active member of the ALP, which opposes Roe 8.
by BRIAN MITCHELL