Election of Property Rights Australia Board

21st July 2011
Report to Members
In an election at the first teleconference of the new board put in place at the Annual Conference, Joanne Rea and I swapped jobs.  She is Chairman, I am Treasurer and Lee McNicholl is Vice-Chairman.
I only ever intended to hold the job of chairman for twelve months in a sort of inter regnum.
It has been an eventful and challenging two years and I have no regrets.  We’ve got a good proactive board with a good Assistant to the Board in Fiona Knox and there is still a niche in the scheme of things that only an organisation like PRA can fill.
I intend to haunt the political arena a little more and with that in mind I attended last weekend’s LNP Conference in Brisbane.  As a result of youthful experiences in politics in the National Party I was awarded an Honorary Life Membership twenty years ago.  This gives me automatic speaking and voting rights at most party forums which can be useful.
The tenor of the whole conference was unreservedly pro-regional and attention to agriculture was nominated first of their list of priorities when elected to government.  We need to take a bow as one of our outstanding panel of speakers at Roma, Megan Baker, was recruited to speak at the conference by Bruce Scott MHR, after hearing her delivery at our conference.  She gave the same speech about gas and coal companies behaving badly.  A very assured performance by Megan was rewarded with a spontaneous standing ovation.  Congratulations  Megan!
The first resolution on the conference agenda called for the protection of our valuable farming land and water resources from coal and coal seam gas mining.  Three points need to be made about this resolution

• That it was placed first on the agenda,
• That it came from Rockhampton branch and not from any of the threatened areas,
• That Campbell Newman addressed the conference from the floor speaking in favour.

Needless to say, it was passed unanimously.
The problems were certainly highlighted to the policy chairmen who were present.
The stellar launch of Campbell Newman to standing ovations and “thunderous applause” (as one paper reported) was a highlight as were the performances of Tony Abbott and Warren Truss on Saturday.
In a scathing critique of the live export fiasco, CEO of AACO, David Farley, told party members of the billion dollars in 1980’s currency spent to get the northern herd disease free so live exports could occur.  Even though the trade has now opened, the protocols set will make the quota allocated almost impossible to fill.
I had an extended conversation with Brad Henderson who is now Federal Director of the National Party.  Members may recall that Brad assisted Dominic Devine and his board to set up PRA and wrote the promotional material we still use.  Brad is convinced there is still a need for an organisation like PRA to advocate the rights of landowners in an uncompromising way as no one else has used the courts to attempt to stop the collectivist ideology of the extreme environmentalists.
Chairman Joanne and I will attend the Northern Outback Beef and Roads Forum in Cloncurry on August 31st.  One of us will give a speech for a few minutes on the Delbessie Agreement.  The program promises to be very informative.
In closing I would simply quote Professor Wolfgang Kasper’s address at our first conference, “Keeping private property secure from political opportunism is worth a political, and if necessary, a courtroom fight.”
Regards
Ron Bahnisch
Ron Bahnisch, Ex-Chairman
Property Rights Australia
Phone:  07 49213430
Fax:       07 49213870
Email:    pra1@bigpond.net.au
http://www.propertyrightsaustralia.org/
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PROPERTY RIGHTS AUSTRALIA

“The erosion of private property rights is the single biggest issue