The Lock the Gate Alliance today called on the Premier and State Government to stick to their word and protect strategic cropping land from coal and unconventional gas mining.

The Government is currently reviewing the Strategic Cropping Land Act and creating new Regional Plans for the Darling Downs and Central Queensland. In their current form, both of these pieces of legislation contradict LNP pre-election promises to “ensure there will be no open cut mining on strategic cropping land; and not allow underground mining, coal seam gas activity or other development on strategic cropping land if it is likely to have a significant, adverse impact on the productive capacity of that land to produce food and fibre in the future.”

This afternoon's judgment in the NSW Land and Environment Court, rejecting the O'Farrell Government's attempt to bankrupt the Fullerton Cove Residents Action Group, is a victory for common sense and an embarrassing rebuff for the government, according to the Lock The Gate Alliance.

Justice Rachel Pepper knocked back a bid by the the Department of Trade and Investment to force the residents group to foot the government's legal bill, following the group's unsuccessful legal challenge to the approval of pilot coal seam gas wells at Fullerton Cove, just north of Newcastle on the edge of the city's water supply. The government's legal team failed to convince Justice Pepper that the residents acted in their own self interest in lodging their case, with the judge confirming that the group had indeed acted in the public interest.

Lock the Gate Alliance said plans by the shadow resources spokesperson, Ian Macfarlane, to fast track Coal Seam Gas (CSG) developments in NSW would be fatal to the farming communities his National Party colleagues are supposed to represent.

"The announcement reported yesterday was a slap in the face to rural communities who have been asking the Coalition to introduce reforms to protect farmland and water resources from CSG" said Carmel Flint, Campaign Co-ordinator with Lock The Gate Alliance.

Lock the Gate secretary, Sarah Moles, has joined a Brisbane hunger strike to protest Aurizon's role in exporting coal from proposed mega-mines in the Galilee basin. 

Aurizon (formerly QR National) intends to bail out India's debt-ridden GVK, allowing development of the first of 3 huge coal mines in western Central Queensland.

Lock the Gate has responded to the Australian's article 'Galilee exports delayed until 2017' saying: