August 09, 2020
Gold permit bad look for Greens
A former Green MP is calling out the party’s parliamentary caucus for failing to stop the Ministry for Business granting Oceania Gold a 40 year permit to mine on conservation land near Whangamata.
Coromandel Watchdog chair Catherine Delahunty says the Government has betrayed the public and broken a promise that conservation land would be protected from new mines.
She says the Greens have been too busy being a good coalition partner and they have failed to stand up for their core principles.
With technologies emerging to extract gold from electronic waste, she says there is no need to dig more up from the ground with all the damage that causes for forest and waterways.
"The elders here have said to me the gold itself should be left in the whenua. It is 2020. We've just had COVID. 70 percent of citizens want a green-led recovery. This is not green. This is vandalism and it should be stopped," Ms Delahunty says.
Catherine Delahunty from Coromandel Watchdog of Hauraki.
Copyright © 2020, UMA Broadcasting Ltd: www.waateanews.com