Shane Howard says Greens need to help save Belfast Coastal Reserve

Warrnambool Standard 2nd Aug. 2018 - ©Copyright Warrnambool Standard 2018. All rights reserved

KILLARNEY singer-songwriter Shane Howard believes a new management plan for Belfast Coastal Reserve could have repercussions across the state and all Victorians should be “justifiably concerned”. “The Belfast Coastal Reserve might seem to many Victorians to be a small, local issue, but the Trojan Horse is that this plan has the potential to give the green light to commercial horse training and other commercial activities on our beaches, across Victoria’s entire coastline,” Howard said. He described the battle for Belfast Coastal Reserve as the “fight of his life” and said the move from the state government to allow horse training on the beach on an industrial scale “beggars belief”.  “At a time in history when extinctions are running at thousands of times the natural order, when aboriginal cultural heritage is under threat and under-resourced, Victoria state Labor have handed control of these pristine beaches to the Warrnambool Racing Club,” Howard said. “Belfast Coastal Reserve is home to numerous sensitive Aboriginal cultural heritage sites. “Middens pepper the entire reserve and it’s home to one of the largest middens in the southern half of Australia. Aboriginal burial sites occur throughout the reserve as well and it holds a central dreaming story of national significance. Much of the archaeology and anthropology of the area has not yet been adequately examined or documented.” He said the Hooded Plover would be a victim of the new plan. He said there were only 600 Hooded Plovers left in Victoria and the number breeding at Killarney Beach had fallen dramatically. “The little Hooded Plover, already vulnerable to extinction, will be sacrificed so that our public commons can be used to train horses,” he said. “Make no mistake about it, this is cultural and environmental vandalism of the highest order. The state’s Attorney General should be intervening but he is the architect of this destruction because he’s also the Minister for Racing and it adds to an already shameful environmental record of the Andrews Labor government.” “The Liberal opposition is no better. In fact, former Liberal Party Premier, Denis Napthine, has been central in advocating this plan to turn our beaches into horse training tracks. The only party to support the protection of our public commons have been the Greens.”