I’m in Townsville, Queensland, Australia (a rather tropical place) on a speaking tour, and as I walked up to my hotel room I felt a wave of heat, and some stale water smell. My trusty guide, Nigel, pointed to the reason and said: “Perfect place for a thermometer, eh mate”?
The population explosion of a/c heat exchangers was a sight to behold.
Last night’s talk in Sydney went well. My thanks to all who attended. Meanwhile in Victoria, ski season opens and The Age says:
”It hasn’t got warmer than minus 3 for at least the last week,” she said. ”That’s pretty cold for Australia – there’s no sign of climate change around here right now.”
It was a tough gig last night in Sydney, not because the audience was tough, but because I’m competing with a 3 day holiday weekend, plus some world cup soccer. I can imagine the choice is easy for some. “Do I want to hear some bloke wail on about the problems with weather stations in the world or watch soccer on holiday with no work tomorrow?”
That’s why I’m doubly appreciative of the many people who came to seem Professor Tim Curtin, David Archibald, and myself speak about climate issues.
For a write up on the evening, see the story by Richard Fernandez at Pajamas Media Belmont Club and also at Twaki.
The most stunning thing I’ve learned here so far?
You have to have a permit to photograph in a National Park and then publish the photograph for any commercial purpose.
Apparently there’s 12 pages of law on it.
Here’s some of it:
The Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Regulations 2000 (Cth) on photographers who take and commercialise photographs of Commonwealth reserves.
A Commonwealth reserve is defined as one proclaimed by the Governor-General and includes places such as
Kakadu National Park, Uluru–Kata Tjuta National Park, Booderee National Park, Australian National Botanic
Gardens, Christmas Island National Park, Pulu Keeling National Park, Norfolk Island National Park and Commonwealth Marine Parks and Reserves.
To take photographs in a Commonwealth reserve for commercial purposes, a photographer should:
• Contact the Commonwealth reserve and obtain a permit to take photographs for commercial purposes by
paying the specified fee and entering into a Location Agreement; and
• Abide by the conditions imposed upon commercial photographers in the reserve by the Director.
If a photographer breaches a Location Agreement (or does not enter into one), a ranger or warden may require
him or her to hand over all copies of any photographs taken and any camera or other device used to take them.
For further information, contact the National Park you wish to visit. You can also contact the Commonwealth
Department of Environment and Heritage by phone 02 6274 1111 or see the website:
http://www.deh.gov.au/parks/index.html.
Oz and it’s people have been amazing, but I really can’t get behind a government that would trample the right of photographic art from people like Ansel Adams.
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Hi Anthony,
Sorry I missed your talk in Sydney – yes, I was one of those who were out of town for the week-end – visiting national parks and probably taking photographs – though as they are unlikely to have any commercial value I think I’m OK. I had no idea of the law regulating photography in the National Parks and I would think that that goes for most Aussies – it is probably one of those laws that no-one sees the point of and is generally ignored – we have a proud tradition – going back two centuries- of ignoring laws that are considered inconvenient – it keeps the pollies happy passing them.
Keep up the missionary work! Of course there has not been a mention of your visit on our government-funded broadcaster.
Fancy giving a talk on the queens birthday weekend in queensland?
You’d have to be bonkers mate!
Yes, queen’s birthday down in Melbourne has nothing to do with the queen (its not her birthday) but much to do with the beginning of the winter and the ski season.
And yes, lovely love snow came floating down on the hills this last week.
(Not in the same article the coda from the BoM about warm oceans…so dont get too excit just yet folks)
Looking forward to catching you down here Anthony, that is, if you can be pursuaded to leave tropical Townsville for cold and rainy Melbourne.
Aye, ya gotta have a permit to breathe in this country…. or you soon will have.
…… anyway if you think permits for national park happy snaps are tough…. Imagine the rigmarole a poor fisherman has to go through to commercially fish in one!!!…. I used to commercial fish in North Queensland, the home of the Great Barrier Reef…. Note the emphasis is on the Used To.
This country is already a tyranny of big government. That is why this ETS and RSPT is so dangerous for us…. We tremble upon the precipice.
ETS = Emissions Trading Scheme.
RSPT = Resources Super Profits Tax.
Australian Government can’t run unless it acronym’s everything….. apparently;-)
To be fair, it’s not much if any different in the US.
http://www.largeformatphotography.info/photo-permits/
Legislators really think they own the planet, and us.
They are our payed servants.
Time to remind them.
A permit to take photos……sheesh and I thought that the new wave PC and nanny state brigade was bad here in NZ, but the Ockers have beaten us on that one.
Some pretty amazing stories about IPCC lies and Nasa stonewaling and a dissident top scientist occurring now
http://fullcomment.nationalpost.com/2010/06/13/the-ipcc-consensus-on-climate-change-was-phoney-says-ipcc-insider/
http://canadafreepress.com/index.php/article/23800
BTW Australians nice people but complete primitive when it comes to laws etc. Its a living dictatorship where individual rights have been eroded beyond belief.
Some time ago I called and emailed the Nat Parks to try to obtain a permit. I couldn’t even get a response from these lazy bureaucratic w*****s.
Pleasure to meet you last night, Anthony – enjoyed your talk and those of the other speakers very much.
Best wishes,
Simon
ACM
LOL. I also ignored the rule.
Brits like to do the same. They increasingly destroy civil rights in order to protect them. You really have to sit down and have a drink with one of these people, be they Brit or Aussie to grasp the sheer insanity. I was once on a bus in Sydney that was boarded by 5 armed law enforcement officers that demanded to see the receipt of every passenger. Two armed cops stayed outside, apparently to shoot scofflaws. One poor guy had used a bus pass that was apparently electronically irregular. That caused a Swat team to move into action. Insanity.
Your link :
http://www.deh.gov.au/parks/index.html.
returns a page not found error.
Probably to protect the livelihood of professional photographers who have contracts with the govt allowing them sole rights to reproduce photos. Ignore it.
See you in Emerald on Saturday!
Ken
We cant stand PC commos.
If a photographer breaches a Location Agreement (or does not enter into one), a ranger or warden may require him or her to hand over all copies of any photographs taken and any camera or other device used to take them. . . .
Oz and it’s people have been amazing, but I really can’t get behind a government that would trample the right of photographic art from people like Ansel Adams.
I can just see a park ranger trying to confiscate one of Ansel Adams’ $5 figure view cameras. Ansel was a true conservationist, i.e., pro nuke power.
If you guys stick hang around Oz long enough, you can hit the World Science Fiction Convention in Melbourne this September. There’s sure to be a panel discussion on Global Warming. All the previous panels have been stuffed with AGW types. (It is a science fiction convention, after all.)
Welcome to Australia Anthony. I’m sure your calm and reasonable approach will win many hearts and minds. Be warned however about the ABC, many of the presenters are totally upfront about their belief in AGW and they take a disdainful condescending tone with anyone who doesn’t…believe.
I think that the extreme nature of climate here plays into the hands of the scare-mongers, there are apparently endless droughts in many parts of the country and of course this was used as confirmation of climate change… until the drought broke just recently and the rivers filled up and the plains turned green…much to the dismay and confusion of the doomsters!
Oh and while I’m at it, here’s one absolute absurdity that one encounters all the time. Government Ministers groping for ways to limit our emission, with cap’n trade or whatever. Why doesn’t someone point out that if they’re really serious about limiting emissions, that the best thing might be NOT to export a BILLION tonnes of coal every year! The hypocrisy of the establishment is monumental.
And I think like the BBC in the UK the ABC pension fund might be tied up in wind-farm/carbon capture type investments…
Enjoy this great country and keep up the good work.
Enough of the Aussie knocking thanks
Anthony,
It was great to meet you in person last night. While I did say that I believed you were winning, with number of people wanting to talk with you I did not get to thank you for your hard work. I sincerely appreciate the effort you have put into WUWT. I can see the results spreading around the world. One only has to look at comments posted online in response to main steam media articles on climate to see the effect sites like yours are having. Skeptical commentators have a level of understanding of the scientific detail of the climate debate that cannot be obtained from the MSM. You and your hard working moderators and contributors have changed the world. Thank you.
National Parks over here require permits for any commercial work within them, photography gets lumped in with commercial tour guides etc and has done for ages. The main problem is that National Parks are under funded so they look for any revenue stream no matter how small it is. Much of their finding gets swallowed up by bureacracy.
Hi All, I live in Victoria, Australia (that’s in the southern colder bit), we have snow, up in the mountains, for the long weekend. A lot of it is man-made on the ski runs, and they even use recycled water, so it’s really man-made, how cool! We are not primitive in laws and like to consider ourselves a civilised mob with good civil rights. It’ll be cold when you get to Ballarat, Anthony, but it’s been a few years since we had any real snow. Don’t forget to visit the weather station at the Ballarat Airport.
Gotta throw a log on the fire…
I was planning on coming to see you, but the missus was crook, so my leave pass was cancelled.
As for the photo permit, just tell them to go to buggery. No one in their right mind takes that sort of bureaucracy seriously.
Anthony mentions the ski season – I wonder how the snow cover on the Australian Alps is trending?
http://www.holtonweather.com/article2.htm
As Nicholls 2005 says http://www.bom.gov.au/amm/docs/2005/nicholls1.pdf
Maximum winter snow depth at Spencers Creek in the Snowy
Mountains of southeastern Australia has decreased somewhat
since 1962, but the snow depth in spring has declined strongly
(by about 40 per cent). The stronger decrease in spring
snow depth is largely attributable to warming during July-
September. The slight decline in precipitation that has been
observed during this season is too weak to account for the
decline in snow depth. Interannual variations in regional surface
air pressure are closely related to snow depth, but there
is only a weak trend in pressure and this trend is insufficient
to account for the decline in spring snow depth. Thus the
warming that is the proximate cause of the decline in spring
snow depth is not simply reflecting a change in the synoptic
patterns. In the light of recent studies implicating the
enhanced greenhouse effect in the warming trend over
Australia, the results of this study suggest that the Australian
alpine region may already be experiencing significant effects
of greenhouse climate change.
Maybe a heat island?
Four years ago, I was threatened with arrest by a wharf Gendarme in a French port for taking photographs of a roll-on-roll-off cross-chanell ferry loading in the dark. Fortunately, the gendarme put it in the too-hard basket when he found I was just a stupide touriste from New Zealand. According to him, I needed a letter from the Mayor to get a permit from the Harbourmaster which I had to show the Gendarme and his colleagues to take photographs.
“Everyone knows that, non?”
Similarly, the Metropolitan police will arrest anyone taking photographs in London if said police take objection to a photographer shooting pics of public buildings or railroad stations, etc, under the anti-terrorism laws. It is also unlawful to photograph a policeman or a member of the Armed Forces in the course of their duties.
Reply to Dave Harrison 11.29PM:
Almost Dave, but ABC Radio National (the public broadcaster) did air this with Anthony Watts, presented by Michael Duffy, one of the few non-warmists at the ABC.
The Australians who missed you for the football last night will be regretting it.
Germany 4 Australia 0