TO THE HONOURABLE THE SPEAKER AND MEMBERS OF THE LEGISLATIVE ASSEMBLY IN PARLIAMENT ASSEMBLED:

The humble petition of the undersigned citizens of the State of Victoria sheweth that they are deeply aggrieved at the Governments failure to properly listen to competent big picture voices on the environment.

· Fire and forest management planning is essential for biodiversity protection and native forest renewal. Prohibiting our own trained custodians from carefully managing the large level of renewable resources in our own backyard also increases the footprint in someone else’s, and this too is not environmentally responsible.

· Lockout should be a last resort. Custodianship options are increasingly being denied ,even though they are a proven cost effective option for effectively looking after larger areas with their diverse risks and complex biodiversity threats.

· Unjust treatment of custodians. Those who care directly for natural resources in this country (eg landholders,and trained land managers) are not receiving justice because environmental abuse and risk claims by non custodial neighbours are often NOT being properly heard before use and custodial rights are denied.

Your petitioners therefore pray that this government stop locking up resources and locking out its people from their own land. We hereby pray that the Parliament

· Leave open the issue of future uses for our reserves, as our forefathers intended.

· Have a moratorium on the creation of any more large parks and

· Concentrate immediately on improving the means to resolve conflict equitably so that just and sound decisions for long term resource protection and genuine sustainability are more evident to all Victorians.

And your petitioners, as in duty bound, will ever pray.

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