Herald 20170718

TO THE EDITOR
Letters are always welcome. Please include full name, address and daytime telephone number.
Contributions are accepted on the understanding they could be edited for grammar, punctuation,
spelling, repetition, verbosity, legal considerations, etc. Herald policy is to retain the
writer’s intent in all correspondence. High Country Herald, P.O. Box 242, Highfields Q. 4352
or editor@highcountrynews.net.au
Rising electricity prices
Reports confirming wholesale
electricity prices in Queensland
have been the most expensive in
the national energy market are a
kick in the guts for Queenslanders
and an indictment on this Labor
Government.
The Palaszczuk Government
had been caught out ripping off
Queenslanders.
I have met and spoken to many
constituents who are most concerned
that they feel they are paying
too much for electricity and
we now know that it is the failed
policies of the Palaszczuk Labor
Government that are ripping off
To find out more details,
please call 131 872 or
visit www.tr.qld.gov.au
Updates from the
Toowoomba Region
ANZAC Day working Group
Get involved in ANZAC Day! We’re seeking
new members to join our Anzac Day Working
Group. Members will assist in the organising,
implementing and delivery of Anzac Day events
relevant to the Mothers’ Memorial on behalf of
the community. The next meeting will be held on
Monday, 24 July, 6pm in the Community Venues,
Toowoomba City Library and we’d love to see
you there. For more information on becoming a
member call 131 872 or email info@tr.qld.gov.au
Environment grants now open
Grants of up to $5,000 are now available
through our environment grant program.
Applications close 1 August. For more info or to
apply online, visit www.tr.qld.gov.au/grants
Council meetings
The next meetings of Council’s Standing
Committees will be held on 8 and 9 August
commencing at 9am. The next Ordinary Meeting
of Council will be held on 15 August commencing
at 10am. All meetings are at City Hall, 541
Ruthven Street, Toowoomba.
Recreation providers
Calling outdoor recreation providers! Do you
run an outdoor recreation activity? Register
your details with us and receive information on
available resources, promotion and upcoming
networking events. Email info@tr.qld.gov.au or
phone 131 872 for more info.
P: 4615 4416
F: 4615 4417
Queensland families. There isn’t
a Queensland family or a business
Labor won’t hurt with their shocking
electricity policies. Wholesale
electricity prices have increased
by more than 70 per cent on Labor’s
watch.
Queenslanders are paying more
than any State for green schemes
but have less renewable power
than other states. Labor has been
gouging families, small businesses
and households with higher
wholesale electricity prices manipulating
the electricity market.
Annastacia Palaszczuk and her
Government have been pushing
Consider the alternative
Congratulations to Meredith Saunders for her
frank letter about what has happened to businesses
in Oakey since the New Acland mine began, HCH,
July 11.
Consider again the potential for local businesses
the government-owned electricity
generators to game the market to
help cover for the government’s
financial mismanagement and
budget problems.
Labor have been caught out ripping
off every man, woman and
child in Queensland, using electricity
as a tax by stealth.
Labor cannot be trusted and
their only legacy after almost
three years in office is to deliberately
slug Queenslanders to pay
for their financial incompetence.
- Trevor Watts, Member for
Toowoomba North.
Make a Change
Keep active over winter with a range of free
and low-cost opportunities available in Crows
Nest & Highfields each week. For more info on
the Change Project and activities available visit
www.tr.qld.gov.au/change
Meet your Councillors
The Toowoomba Region Councillors are headed
your way on Friday 21 July! Cr Cahill will be
visiting Hampton Visitor Information Centre 9.30-
10am and Centenary Park, Crows Nest 10.15-11am,
Cr McDonald, Cr O’Shea and Cr Ramia will visit
Haden, in front of the Haden Store 9.15-9.35am
and Rosalie Gallery, Goombungee 9.45-10.30am,
while Cr Glasheen and Cr O’Hara-Sullivan will
be visiting the Bowenville Hotel 9.30-9.50am and
the Jondaryan Public Hall 10.05-10.35am. They
would all love to see you and have a chat. For
more info, please call 131 872.
NZ Friendship Tour
We have a sister city relationship with Whanganui
in New Zealand. This year we’re visiting and
we’d like to take you with us! We’ve partnered
with Stonestreets Travel to create a stunning 14
day tour through the North Island. Departing from
Toowoomba’s Wellcamp airport on 7 November,
this legendary tour begins in Auckland and will
show you highlights including New Plymouth,
Wellington, Napier, Rotorua and Paihia before
returning to Toowoomba on 20 November. For
more info or to book, call Stonestreets Travel on
4687 5555 or visit www.stonestreets.com.au
P.O. Box 242,
Shop 11, Highfields Plaza Shopping Centre,
HIGHFIELDS Q. 4352
TRC_SEC_180717_HCH_16x4
Clarke Road bushland corridor
essential for glider survival
Australia is home to six species
of gliders, three of which
currently reside in the Charles
and Motee Rogers Bushland Reserve
on O’Brien Road, Highfields.
The Sugar, Squirrel and tiny
Feather-tail Gliders are nocturnal
arboreal species.
Gliders depend on patches of
remnant eucalypt forest vegetation
and woodlands with acacia
layers and abundant hollows
for shelter, where they make a
nest of leaves and live in social
groups during the day.
Their diets consist of a variety
of natural foods like pollen,
insects and nectar. However,
many people may not be aware
that their favourite food source
is wattle and eucalypt trees.
Gliders have a remarkable
ability to glide and this is
achieved through their gliding
membranes that spread from the
ankles to their wrists.
A glider regulates the glide
by moving its legs and also
using its tail which can act like
a rudder. Gliders in our region,
and all over Australia, are being
impacted by habitat destruction
with increasing urbanisation,
feral and roaming pet cats and
other infrastructure like barbed
wire fences in rural areas.
Gliders rely on connectivity
to survive.
They do not travel on the
ground and it is critical that they
are able to glide from tree to tree
to forage and to find a mate.
With increased fragmentation
of habitat and loss of precious
connectivity, their future survival
in the Charles and Motee
Rogers Bushland reserve will be
grim.
Currently the three species
of gliders rely on the existing
native vegetation along the
southern side of Clarke Road,
adjacent to the reserve, for their
flight path connection to other
bushland areas.
This section of trees is the last
remaining connecting corridor
OUR LOCALLY OWNED INDEPENDENT NEWSPAPER
Gliders - critical to be able to glide from tree to tree.
for these noctural species, and
other native animals to travel
from the reserve, along Clarke
road and down the Klein Creek
catchment towards Williams
Park and out towards Kleinton.
The Highfields Draft Town
Plan, shows little regard for
wildlife and this last wildlife
corridor, showing planned decimation
of all of the native trees,
wattle and shrubs on the southern
side of Clarke Road, along
with further mass old-growth
tree loss with the planned encroachment
into the reserve for
a much wider O’Brien Road.
With the announcement of
TRC planning a new tree protection
policy, one would think the
council would lead by example
by preserving as much of these
precious areas of natural vegetation
as they can.
These connecting areas of
native vegetation cannot be replaced
by small street trees and
shrubs.
VIEW ONLINE AT
www.highfieldsvillage.com.au/community/herald
Gliders and wildlife can coexist
with urbanisation, and
this can easily be achieved by
preserving a section of native
trees and layers of forest for
connectivity.
Our wildlife needs us to
speak for them, and the people
of Highfields have been doing
just that, by making their voices
heard to do what they can so that
these three glider species remain
off the “threatened species list”
locally.
We ask that TRC councillors
take into consideration all of
these elements when they make
their decision on the future of
the centre of Highfields, and
take this opportunity to show
that councils can do amazing
things to preserve wildlife and
conserve native vegetation. -
Judi Gray, President of Wildlife
Queensland Toowoomba
Branch, co-ordinator of the
Friends of Rogers Reserve
Bushcare Volunteers.
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if 20 farms were established on the 10,000ha of
land acquired by New Acland Coal. These would
provide stability of employment far into the future,
as foreshadowed in my letter, HCH July 4.
- Dr John Standley, OAM, Rockville.
HIGHFIELDS
Highfields News & Post
BP Service Station
Shell Service Station
Woolworths Caltex Service Station
Highfields Discount Drug Store
Markee Café
Highfields Bakery
CROWS NEST
Crows Nest Fuel Supplies
Meats and More
Property Management Products
Peadon Rural
Simply Beads
Crows Nest Community Arts &
Crafts
IGA Crows Nest
Ray White Rural
Crows Nest Bakery
Crows Nest News
OAKEY
Kerrytown Foodworks
Oakey Real Estate
Westgarth Real Estate
Economic situation
I am interested in a comment in the letter
to the editor from Meredith Saunders, Herald
11/7/17.
Meredith states that it is common knowledge
that Oakey’s economy started a downhill
slide when the coal mine came to town.
Mining started in the area in the early 1900s
and I wonder whether the reference is to this
early period or to when the New Acland Mine,
established in 1999, started operating as an
open cut mine in 2005.
According to the Australian Bureau of Statistics
website, the population of Oakey was
recorded in the 1911 Census as 1332.
In 1960 it was 1871, by 2006 it had almost
Oakey Bi-Rite
Oakey Post Office
Oakey Craft and Saddlery
BOWENVILLE
Bowenville Post Office
KINGSTHORPE
Zimms Corner
The Little Urban Café
Allens Rural Supplies
Kingsthorpe News and Post
Big Ken the Fruiterer (Tuesdays)
doubled to 3653, and in 2010 it was 4529. The
most recent Census in 2016 shows a population
of 5719.
From these figures, it would seem that any
economic downturn in Oakey has not resulted
from a decrease in population.
I wonder if the situation in Oakey is any
different from other small rural communities
located close to a large regional town or city.
People today are very mobile. They have
lots of choice in where they shop.
They are no longer restricted to only the
town where they live and this seems to have
had an effect on the economy of most small
rural towns. - Name supplied.
GOOMBUNGEE
Goombungee News and Post
Goombungee Store
HAMPTON
Hampton Store
COOYAR
Cooyar Store
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Meringandan Store
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2 - HIGH COUNTRY HERALD, JULY 18, 2017
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