VINTAGE 2011 - 2ND WETTEST IN OZ HISTORY

THE AUTHOR ADDRESSING THE SOUTH AUSTRALIAN WINE PRESS CLUB IN THE NATIONAL WINE CENTRE AT THE 2010 VINTAGE ROUND-UP LUNCHEON. BILL MOULARADELLIS IS TO THE LEFT, WINEMAKERS FEDERATION AUSTRALIA LOBBYIST ANDREW WILSMORE IS PEEKING OVER THE SPEAKER'S SHOULDER, AND THAT'S CLUB PRESIDENT BRENTON QUIRINI ON THE RIGHT photo LEO DAVIS

2011: Year Of Moulds & Misery
Far Too Much Bad Fruit Picked
Wine Lake Still The Same Size
by PHILIP WHITE


AT last year’s annual South Australia Wine Press Club post-vintage lunch, which I had been invited to address for many consecutive years to appraise the vintages just finished, Bill Moularadellis stood up at the lectern and said not one Australian vine should be uprooted because his company wanted every grape it could get.

Bill, who has recently been appointed to the board of Wine Australia, the industry’s governing body, is the managing director of his family’s Riverland winery, Kingston Estate. Wine Press Club Chairman, Brenton Quirini, of Empire Liquor, who introduced Moularadellis to a full house in the National Wine Centre, had just taken on the distribution of Kingston Estate. The event felt like a re-launch of the brand, with the wines being poured liberally to the throng of businessmen, bankers, and wine industry identities.

I quite liked the Sauvignon blanc.

Some readers may recall Kingston temporarily losing its export licence in May 2000, after I’d written about it using, amongst other things, silver nitrate, a clarifying agent used legally in some countries, but banned in Australia. Respected wine consultant Dr Tony Jordan, who works for the French giant Louis Vuitton Mőet Hennessey, is also on the board of Wine Australia. He suggested to me at the time that there was a good argument to permit the careful use of silver nitrate here; Moularadellis was fully co-operative during the investigations and soon had his licence reinstated.

GOOD-QUALITY SHIRAZ PICKED BEFORE THE 2011 WEATHER WENT AWRY

While it took some time for the Kingston Estate brand to rehabilitate, in the Adelaide market particularly, its was then our ninth-biggest wine exporter, contributing $12-15 million worth of Australia’s $1.2 billion total export.

There was no hint of anything other than enthusiasm for Bill and his wine at the Wine Press Club lunch. But when it came to his suggestion that not one vine should be uprooted, I spoke, shall we say, contrarily. I had suggested we were in a terrible glut of wine internationally, and Australia would suffer, pointing out that about a third of the wine grapes grown here were not required by winemakers. I explained there were three massive presumptions our wine industry’s success had depended upon, and these were hubristic, false, and finished. Over. Kaput.

This unholy trinity of presumptions included an ongoing weak Aussie dollar (it was stupidly undervalued, given our natural resources); a tax regime illogically, unfairly and enormously biased towards the makers of inferior swill (incurring staggering environmental, social and economic damage); and an endless supply of impossibly cheap water (which we knew was no longer there until we had the second-wettest vintage in Australian history – which is not, shall we say, normal).

REASONABLE-QUALITY HAND-PICKED GRENACHE

I had suggested that viticulture as we knew it - in the vast Murray-Darling Basin - was over, and would never return to its glory days of five years back. The world has too much wine; Australia has insufficient water to sacrifice in ratios like 1000:1 to grow and make wine which sells more cheaply than Evian water.

I suggested that contrary to the opinions of the industry councils, which seemed to believe their punch-drunk business should shrink by around 20 per cent, I felt that 40 per cent would be more realisitic, and looked set to occur whether it was organised or not. In the most likely latter case, I said a disorganized deconstruction would be very messy, and entire inland communities would need lots of money, relocation, restructuring and assistance.

Recently, I received a fascinating email from Bill Moularadellis’s brother, Jim, who calls himself Chief Enthusiasm Officer (CEO) of pre-eminent bulk wine brokers Austwine, a 20-year-old “grey market” merchant this year celebrating its 500 millionth litre of bulk wine traded. Jim has written the Moularadellis family version of Vintage 2011.

PURE BOTRYTIS STRIKE ON A SHIRAZ BERRY. A LOT OF FRUIT LOOKED REASONABLE ON THE VINE, BUT WHEN IT WAS TOUCHED, THE BOTRYTIS SLIME BENEATH THE SKIN SAW THE BERRIES FALL APART photo JAMES HOOK

Put broadly, Jim agrees with my contention that while the vintage crush total was a much bigger figure than anybody predicted, given the oversupply and rotten vintage, the 1.6 million tonnes crushed includes large amounts of juice which was reduced to concentrate to bolster other batches of fruit which could not ripen. And much of the rest of the crush will make wine so rotten it cannot be cleaned up sufficiently for sale anyway. So the 1.6 million tonnes is not an indicator of how much potable wine was made, but an indicator of how much bad fruit was picked.

Let me reiterate: vast fields of rotten, mouldy, brown pus was indeed picked. I watched it picked, and watched winemakers in many regions struggle to know how to deal with bins of machine-harvested mildewed and botrytised grapes that turned to slurry before they reached the crusher.

All this uncertainty is forcing up the price of bulk wine in store from previous vintages – bulk wine whose poor quality had prevented its sale, even at much lower prices, until this ocean of much worse wine arrived at the hoppers this year.

Jim Moularadellis writes that this confusion has brought about a situation where the expected price has artificially levelled, so that vendors are asking the same price for bad wine as others expect for less buggered wine. Since vintage, there has been much chatter about price, but few actual sales. This, he thinks, will correct itself as the year progresses, as more wineries realise that whatever they do to clean up the mouldy swill they picked, whatever they spend on whatever chemicals, colorants, bleaches, thickening essences or reagents, the wine simply will not make the drinkable grade.

Jim concludes that good quality supply of all the staple varieties is very tight and lean, and remarks particularly on the sudden spike in demand for Moscato. (This is the variety BRL-Hardy had wanted to plant on Adelaide University’s 206ha viticultural research property at Glenthorne Farm in order to fund the establishment there of further wine and grape research facilities, but was refused by the university – Deputy chancellor, Brian Croser, reportedly preferred Chardonnay.)

Then, to finish his sad song of wine gone wrong, Jim says:

“2012 vintage promises more of the same due to the likely modest level of vineyard removals, at least average winter rainfall on top of already moist soils and a persistently high Australian dollar.”

MOULDY MACHINE-HARVESTED GRENACHE

In other words, he’s not expecting the wine tax imbalance to be corrected. Nor, for that matter, was he expecting the current powerful move toward higher base alcohol retail prices by people like Woolworths, led by Coles, a swelling band of politicians, and the health lobby. Any such inevitable correction will very quickly see an increase in the removal or abandonment of unprofitable and marginal vineyards, believe me. There’s one of the three presumptions – which I call stupid – being blindly clung to.

Here’s another: Jim agrees that the dollar will stay “high” but seems to think it’s artificially so; he seems disappointed. I think it’s normal, given our natural resources, which will take some time to extract. I heard this morning one analyst suggesting the dollar will stay roughly where it is for twenty years.

So where are we? In spite of all the deserted and uprooted vineyards, and the vast amount of the 2011 crop being used for concentrate, it is now evident that the Australian wine lake is about the same size it was a couple of years ago. The biggest difference is the quality: it’s worse. Around 40-45 million cases worth of wine was made from fruit which should have been cut to the ground and left; those vineyards should go.

BOTRYTIS-INFECTED RIESLING IN THE BAROSSA 2011 photo DAVID LEHMANN ... CLICK HERE FOR LOUISA ROSE'S REPORT FROM YALUMBA

But many growers who couldn’t sell their rotten crops this year don’t have the money to uproot vineyards or even prune them. So they sit there with the husks of the 2011 fruit intact, acting like perfect incubators for disease which will bloom and infest healthy neighbouring vineyards unless 2012 is back to the Big Dry that preceded the second wettest vintage in history.

However, given the weather we’ve had since vintage, anything can happen. It’s perfect in McLaren Vale as I write: those who can afford to prune have done it; the whole region’s sprouted and the weather’s perfect. Yesterday a mate complained that for the first time in his life he’d got sunburnt whilst pruning; earlier in the year I saw grape pickers wearing wet weather gear usually reserved for pruning in the winter.

As for the South Australian Wine Press Club: I wasn’t invited to summarise 2011. I think they invited Tony Love.

MACHINE-HARVESTED SHIRAZ ROTTEN WITH MILDEW AND BOTRYTIS

To read Jim Moularadellis's full report, click here.

UNI LEARNS THE MEANING OF SOLEMN DEED

GLENTHORNE: NOW FOR SOME VITI RESEARCH - PHOTO by LEO DAVIS

STATEMENT from the offices of the Premier Mike Rann and Hon Paul Holloway, Minister for Urban Development and Planning
Tuesday, 24 March 2009

GLENTHORNE FARM DEVELOPMENT REQUEST DECLINED

The State Government has today declined a request from the University of Adelaide to set aside a section of Glenthorne Farm for housing.

Premier Mike Rann said the University had requested that some of the farm near O’Halloran Hill in Adelaide’s south be redeveloped to fund its Woodland Recovery Initiative.

“The Government has declined that request and has instead offered to work with the University to find alternative sources of funding for its aim of reafforesting the property to create native
woodland,” Mr Rann said.

“Glenthorne Farm has a special relationship with the community in the southern suburbs as well as the winemaking industry at McLaren Vale.

In 2001 Glenthorne Farm, the former CSIRO research facility at O'Halloran Hill, was handed over to Adelaide University by the State Government for use as a vineyard and winemaking facility.

The former State Government purchased the 200-hectare property from the Commonwealth in 1998 after CSIRO’s decision to quit the site.

Minister for Urban Development and Planning Paul Holloway says the proposal put to the State Government by the University failed to meet the terms of the deed and land management agreement signed at the time of the transfer in 2001.

“The State Government's view remains that the land was transferred to the University on the basis that there would be no housing on the site and that it would become a teaching and research centre for the wine industry,” Mr Holloway says.

“The University proposes to reafforest 150,000 hectares of woodlands in the Adelaide Hills face, a concept which has some merit.

“I have written to the University vice-chancellor offering to work with his staff to identify Alternative funding through research grants that can finance the woodland recovery initiative without requiring any of the land to be sold off for housing.

“The State Government supports the retention of open space within the metropolitan area.

“We remain committed to ensuring that the pressure to develop land within the urban growth Boundary is balanced by the retention of sufficient public open space for community use.”

News Release

www.premier.sa.gov.au

for background to this strange odyssey of humans vs. hubris type Glenthorne Farm in the search box top left corner

GREED THORN PRICKS UNIVERSITY LOGIC

ADELAIDE UNIVERSITY ASSOCIATE PROFESSOR DR. DAVID PATON: GREAT PROFESSIONAL GREENIE, BUT FACED WITH THE THOUGHT OF $100 MILLION WINDFALL, CAN'T SEE THE HOUSES FOR HIS TREES

There was a photograph here of Dr. David Paton, which I took from the University media releases website. The University has asked me to remove it on copyright grounds. I have asked the University to supply me another file photograph.

Later that same day: I have just recieved the following response from the University Media Officer, David Ellis:

"Thanks for your response. I'll definitely look for another pic for you, but I'm not sure we have that many of him, unfortunately."

So, while we wait for the mighty University of Adelaide to find a photograph of their most prominent environmental scientist and pre-eminent media player, I trust you'll be happy with this one: this bloke may act as if ALL the media works for his advantage, he may play some of the press with with a musicianship challenged only by the fiddler with a tommy-gun in his violin case, he may even be an dishonest greedy nut, which is of course highly unlikely, but he's obviously got a handfull of balls!



Why Give Land To These Flash Harries?
Need To Read Deeds Escapes Boffins
by PHILIP WHITE

“The University is committed to putting at least 100 hectares of woodland habitat back onto this system” Dr. David Paton greenly advised Channel 9’s Kelly Clappis on A Current Affair on Tuesday night.

He forgot to say it was a farm, not a system: a beautiful farm which had been given to his University eight short years ago for vital viticulture research.

“And that's going to be the exemplar that shows what you can do on an individual farm” he finally said, “and then we're going to take what we do at Glenthorne and put it across a range of other properties along the Mount Lofty Ranges.”

What the desperate-looking Paton didn’t tell the television viewers of South Australia was that his example to other farmers is first to put 1000 houses on the land his University was given.

So, officially, we now know: bugger the vines. Every ten houses pays for one hectare of forest. Especially if you get the land for nuthin'.

Bullshit.

Check out the vast reforestation of the Willunga escarpment and the Front Hills to Sellicks.

That was done by well-organised volunteers. Thirty kilometres of new bush. Two or three kilometres deep on very steep country. Organised by winemakers.

Paton failed to explain the Glenthorne land was given to the University, in perpetuity, for $1, on the grounds that they would NOT put houses on it, pick up $100 quick million, and put in a few flashy trees and a bit of scrub and promise to do more.

He also failed to say that the University had pledged eight years ago, in a solemn Deed with the government, that it was obliged to reforest much of this property anyway.

The University was given Glenthorne Farm by the South Australian Government, which bought it from the Commonwealth Scientific Research Organisation in 1998 through the prescient insistence of McLaren Vale winemaker Greg Trott.

Senator Robert Hill, now Australia's permanent ambassador to the United Nations, then Federal Minister for Environment, helped stitch the deal.

The CSIRO was determined the site should not be developed for housing. Its Division of Health and Human Nutrition was the main user of the property since 1947.

It was used for many trials, including those involving the effects of medical x-ray nuclear radiation and standard hospital isotopes on mammals, many of which are buried on the property in at least three known pits.

But there are also beasts from the British nuclear tests at Maralinga, and possibly Airstrip and Emu Field buried there.

Many of these tests involved the spread of discrete plutonium dispersed by conventional, non-nuclear explosions, and its effect on the general environment and mammals living within that spread.

I am aware of this because I was the government officer in charge of the storage of the tens of thousands of the stream and surface samples which were taken after these tests.

The research findings of such early British tests are still vitally referred to in the case of terrorists spreading plutonium with a non-nuclear explosion, or when a plutonium-armed nuclear weapon fails to properly explode.

“I think that er some of the sheep I think from Maralinga were buried on the property, um, there’s been some surveys done looking for um you know, high spikes in radioactivity er radioactive material coming off the property at present” Paton recently told the ABC, seemingly ignorant of the fact that plutonium cannot be detected by a Geiger counter.

“Nobody’s found where they are. Nobody actually knows where they’re buried so it may just be rumour.”

If the professor had worked in anything to do with the nuclear business, he would know what rumour meant.

And maybe he does.

“But there are concerns, um, let’s say, out there, about these things and the University, if it was going to go ahead with doing anything, um you know, we’d argue that that why is the thing being used as a farm if there’s radioactive material interred.”

So why is his University renting the farm to a farmer? How much recompense might this farmer be due? Why does Paton insist on a one thousand house subdivision?

Once cleansed of such cold war residues, which is a reasonable goal, presuming human honesty about the whereabouts of such shit, Trott wanted the land used for drought-resistant vineyards and wine research, reforesting, and human recreation.

I was Trott’s advisor, who introduced him to Senator Hill. We worked on this for years. We all thought the job was done; the land secured, according to the Deed. Uh-huh.

Now Trott’s dead, but we’re fighting the whole bloody battle all over again.




In 2001, the State Government gave Glenthorne Farm to the University of Adelaide for $1, subject to a solemn deed signed by Mary O’Kane, the University Chancellor, and Di Laidlaw, the Minister for Planning.

The University’s new 1000 houses proposal is arrogance of the highest degree.

Labor politicians sit back, wondering where the votes may eventually fall. But they won’t fall. They won’t be dropped. They’ll be very, very carefully cast, and the way it looks, independents and Greens could likely hold the balance of power.

Where else in the world could you have land purchased by the taxpayer for $7 million, sold to the university for $1 to be kept forever for vineyard research and open space, bushland, and recreational ground for southern residents, only to be subdivided by the lucky recipient for villa rash to raise a quick $100 million, from the same taxpayers, under the promise that the money will be used for reforesting the distant South Mount Lofty Ranges, where other, much wealthier taxpayers live, over the next 100 years?

And then there's two thirds of the property left? For further devilry?

Sanctioned by the smug rote silence of the Labor government?

It IS bullshit!

The Mount Lofty Ranges just happen to include 147 ha of beautiful open bushland bequeathed to the University by Peter Waite in 1914.

This is the site the University should be using for Ranges reforestation and research. It's immediately adjacent to its vast horticultural laboratories, greenhouses, walking trails and tour bus parks at the Waite Research Institute. And it's not on coastal flats. It's in the Ranges. Where Ranges bushes grow.

It is not lowland semi-arid maritime, like Glenthorne.

And, if you must sub-divide a bequeathment, these Ranges blocks are worth ten times the arid bleakness of Glenthorne! Twenty!

“In 2001, the State Government sold Glenthorne to the University of Adelaide subject to a Land Management Agreement with the State of South Australia” Paton told A Current Affair reporter Kelly Clappis, failing to say it cost the University $1.

“Over the years the University has considered a number of options for the property” he sagely advised, in arrogant ignorance of the commitments of the Deed.

“One proposal was to develop a vineyard on the site, however extensive analysis revealed this not to be a viable option”.

Paton, and his pompous offsider, Martyn Evans, consistently fail to table evidence of such consultation.

It has certainly failed to reach the extensive analysis status. The local winemakers, within whose boundary Glenthorne sits, were never consulted.

DRINKSTER believes the University has only just managed to send Evans to a meeting of the McLaren Vale Wine Grape and Tourism Association, which invited him to his first consultation.

Insiders say Evans’ testy manner left quite a bit to be desired, if only on an intellectual level.

This would match his annoyed hubris on his one and only meeting with me.

Fact is, the Paton and Evans want $100 million urgently for their troubled University, and this is the only way they can think of getting it.

“Today, with increasing government and community recognition of the potential impacts of climate change, the University of Adelaide has identified an exciting opportunity to establish the Woodland Recovery Initiative at Glenthorne”, Paton told Channel 9.

But, as I keep saying, had our great University been on top of the issues of climate change and viable viticulture, which is indeed its primary research responsibility, the Murray Valley, its great river, and our lucrative wine export business would be flourishing, not rotting with sulphuric acidulous mud where a healthy estuary once thrived, neither ripe with thousands of farmer bankruptcies and merciless encroaching salinity.

Dr. Paton, indeed, would have no reason to be wailing about the shocking condition of the Coorong and the Murray Mouth, which brings him and his University huge public access in the media.

In fact, if the university wanted say, $5 million a year, it could do no better than offer the wine industry informed, reliable advice on the drought-resistant new varieties it had trialled and proven, as planned, at Glenthorne.

This is where the cynic might suggest the research facilities of our great University have been usurped by the giant transnationals which depend upon constant over-supply of rote varieties, and a continual sickening downward spiral of quality and price, in order to beat third world producers to fill the discount bins of the Old World and the USA.

Paton and Evans both claim it was the Winemakers Federation Of Australia that signed the Deed (which it most patently did NOT - I have a copy of the Deed) and then advised that Glenthorne was unsuitable for viticultural research.

But at the same time, both men claim to have never seen the Deed, as it is “confidential”.

I wonder if they’re worried about the legal ramifications of their determined drive to subdivide?

The Deed quite clearly states “The University covenants with the Minister that it will, subject to obtaining all necessary statutory approvals, do all reasonably necessary things to ensure that the Land is preserved, conserved and used for Agriculture, Horticulture, Oenology, Viticulture, Buffer Zones and as Community Recreation Area, and is available for Project Research Activities, University Research Activities, Education Activities and operating a Wine Making Facility”.

The University has done nothing like this. In eight years.

I suspect the University is in breech of its deed by pursuing the idea of a housing development on Glenthorne. The very notion of widely seeking public approval for housing development without ministerial approval, in writing, was clearly forseen and forbidden in the Deed, which expressly states that “The University, as the person nominated by the State, has agreed to purchase the Land from the CSIRO , to preserve and conserve the Land for other related activities and not use, develop or permit the Land to be used or developed for urban development...

“... the University covenants with the Minister that it will, subject to obtaining all necessary statutory approvals, do all reasonably necessary things to ensure that the Land is

“4.1.1 preserved, conserved and used for Agriculture, Horticulture, Oenology, Viticulture, Buffer Zones and as Community Recreation Area, and

“4.1.2 is available for Project Research Activities, University Research Activities, Education Activities and operating a Wine Making Facility.

“4.2 The University covenants with the Minister that it will not at any time hereafter:

“4.2.1 use or permit the Land to be used other than as provided for in subclause 4.1 unless such other use is approved in writing by a Minister acting as agent of the Crown,

“4.2.2 undertake or permit Development or seek to undertake Development of the Land for uses other than those specified in subclause 4.1 unless such other use or Development (excluding Urban Development which will not be approved) is approved in writing by a Minister acting as agent of the Crown.”

Confronted with this, Paton told the ABC’s 891 morning announcers in December:

“Oh look that er, that’s in a that’s in a Deed document to which I’m not privy to and the details for, um, I think something I mean which is meant to be kept confidential, or at least I thought it was meant to be kept confidential – so I haven’t seen it – look if there are those issues then fine, perhaps the University has stepped over the line here, but I think that the issue here is, the key issue, that, the if the community changes its mind about how it wants to see an area used, then um we need to take that on board, and not be sitting back on something that was decided, under duress, back in 1998 or so when there was er hurried arrangements between the Federal and State governments and the University to, um find a solution for Glenthorne.”

The Glenthorne deal was hardly hurried. The University sat on it for two years before signing the Deed, on 24 May 2001. The authority of the University Council had been given on the 26 July 1999.

The edgy Martyn Evans, before two highly respected University academics and a state politician, told me "We've had QCs crawling all over this and we've not breached anything" at a lunch and tasting at the Wine Research Institute at the Wine Research Institute before Christmas.

Dull sandwiches were left unchewed: nobody poured a wine.

No ministerial signature has dribbled from a Labor biro; nor legal advice provided this curious member of the public about any possible breach of the Deed.

This what a harried Doc Paton told A Current Affair only yesterday:

“The University is very aware that the current Deed says there should be no housing on it, and that a reasonable portion be open space. Our concern is we have no other mechanism by which you can fund this program except by looking at that as an option.

“At present the University is simply exploring those as options.

“Over the years the University has considered a number of options for the property.

“One proposal was to develop a vineyard on the site, however extensive analysis revealed this not to be a viable option.

“Today, with increasing government and community recognition of the potential impacts of climate change, the University of Adelaide has identified an exciting opportunity to establish the Woodland Recovery Initiative at Glenthorne.”

Climate change? Surely this is the sort of thing Trott had in mind when he sought a permanent viticultural research station, and had the land passed to the University for $1.

It was obvious in 2000 that the Hills would need revegetating, but nobody at University mentioned this. Trott, of course, envisaged the compulsory revegetation of the creeklines and headlands and saw this written into the Deed.

Indeed, excuse the pun, Trott was instrumental in seeing the Willunga escarpment revegetated, and did all he could to see such enlightened effort continue, whilst being aware that few who did the work would appreciate the results until they were many years older.

But back at that point, the University could obviously see there was an urgent, desperate need to be researching viticulture techniques that resisted drought and required much less irrigation than commonly applied in those days.

Since then, without the University’s help, McLaren Vale has switched handsomely to recycled housing water, and continues to do so, and uses less. But new varieties? The whole wine business urgently needs help! The broke-arse transnationals aren’t gonna pay for research – they’re retreating from the drought-ridden Australia, quick.

Much easier to grow bottom shelf goonbag plonk in countries with no environmental regulations and workers you hardly have to pay.

In today’s ABC program, The World Today, Winemakers Federation of Australia CEO Stephen Strachan admitted:

“The vintage is very early this year. The fact is that if it's not climate change, it's climatically related because we've had very dry conditions that's advanced the … has advanced the crop.

“I think that it's quite inevitable that we are going to go through some restructure”, he blithely advised.

“I think that business size, economy of scale, all of those sorts of issues will come into play as we go through this next era for the industry. And I think that the rising cost of water will also be a big part of that equation.”

No kidding.

He’d be an expert to suggest that the wine business, and its primary teaching university, did not urgently need a property, near the vast laboratory resources of the University of Adelaide, on which dryland viticulture, new drought-resistant varieties, and low-irrigation biodynamic and organic grapegrowing techniques can be tested and trialled? Surely this was always the University’s research responsibility anyway?

No?

Check the University of Adelaide’s latest churn of spin at hubris.com . Notice it doesn’t once mention the little matter of, um, cough ONE THOUSAND HOUSES.

The neighbourly polling the University did also failed to mention these, whilst its telephone pollsters would speak only to respondents under thirty.

We shall see which Labor politicians understand this, and we shall vote accordingly.

The member whose seat covers Glenthorne, Kris Hanna, is already a popular independent.

Hubris, see. You might be god, but then you’re dead.

HONEST BOFFIN TAKES POLISH FROM POLL

-->Another Leo Davis photograph of the beautiful Glenthorne Farm, complete with sheep. Given to the University for viticulture research, the farm is now under threat of housing development...

PHILIP WHITE was invited to discuss Glenthorne Farm with the University's star environmental scientist, Dr. David Paton, on ABC radio. Apart from being a textbook example of how NOT to release an highly contentious poll, it indicates how dangerous it is for the University's communications managers to insist on wheeling their most popular and revered scientists out to make these announcements and defend them. The trouble with great scientists is they tend to tell the truth, and the trouble with wheeling them out like this is they must feel their great reputations wobbling as they speak....

Releasing The Radioactive Sheep

Matthew Abraham: Coming up in a moment: Glenthorne Farm. We’ll talk to the Adelaide University Professor who has big plans for the site.

David Bevan: Glenthorne Farm is one of the last remaining large open spaces in the southern suburbs. If you’ve ever driven up around O’Halloran Hill along South Road and you look to your right as you’re heading south, you look to your right, there’s a big open space there.

Well it was given to the Adelaide University on trust, but the University says ‘well look, let us sell off a portion of it”, and “it’s a relatively small portion, for housing, and with that money, we can then do great things to preserve woodlands right across the Adelaide Hills.

They put out a survey to ask what people in the area consider, and Dr. David Paton, associate professor from Adelaide University, can tell us the results. Good morning David.

Dr. David Paton: Good morning David.

DB: David, what is the result of the survey? How many people did you survey, and what are they telling you?

DP: Well initially we put out 10,000 surveys –these are pamphlets which talked about the large-scale initiatives and also what we proposed to do with Glenthorne and we got good response. We got some 800 of these printed surveys returned; we also had a company, we had Harrisons ran a random phone service for people say within the vicinity of Glenthorne and they surveyed 400 people and both of those came back with something like 69% of those people supported the woodland recovery initiative, and that’s a very strong support for that program, there was also an um ...

DB: Can we, just quickly, before you do that, can we break that down, because it sounds like we’re mixing in there a questionnaire that went out as a leaflet –

DP: That’s right –

DB: ... and the two of them in there –

DP: ... the two almost gave an identical result, which was a surprise to everybody, so –

DB: And okay say 69%. And what is that consisting of?

DP: ... and that was probly something in the vicinity, well 31% were, did not believe that woodland recovery in this issue was not a sensible thing to be doing at present despite that being the only solution for species loss within the Mt. Lofty region.

DB: Right –

DP: ... which amounts to that.

DB: Yeah. And 69% support or –

DP: ... 69% had a very very strong support or some support –

DB: What was the breakdown on that?

DP: Ah, I think is was probly something in the vicinity of 45-24, something in that vicinity.

MA: ... and and how many didn’t care less?

DP: .. ahh, that’d be 31%.

DB: Okay. Now is that support for woodland recovery or is that –

DP: That’s the support for the woodland recovery initiative initially, that’s a big one, and now we come to -

DB: What about the question of housing? How do you support us selling off part of Glenthorne Farm?

DP: Okay. 64% were in support or neutral to the proposal that the University put forward to use some of the land to generate the income to do the large-scale program –

DB: And what was the breakdown of that?

DP: Oh probly something in the vicinity of 44-45% in support of the the farm being used in that way and 20% or so that were were neutral.

MA: And so that the neutrals can go either way. You could also lock them in with the opposed. So you could say you could say that more than 50% were opposed.

DP: You you may say that. The key here to bear in mind is that that the project that the University’s about is that it’s not just something that’s good for the state and this is just the local community within a close vicinity to Glenthorne, so a broader survey is almost certainly going to push those numbers elsewhere if you wish to go to a broader survey –

DB: David, you’ve you’ve spent your life trying to get figures, statistics, to reflect reality and and nobody would question your credentials on that as a biologist ... w, w, do you agree that if you take a cold hard look at the survey in terms of support for housing, you’ve got less than 50% of people actually saying they support selling off part of Glenthorne Farm for housing –

DP: You can also use the other one which is something in the vicinity of 35% or so that were not in favour of ah housing being put onto the property. Now you’ve got to put that in mind with 31% of the people not interested in the woodland recovery issue so the people who were probably against that and I don’t have the figures here in front of me are those who don’t believe that we should be concerned about wildlife losses within the State.

MA: Mmm. Mmm. Er, David we’re going to continue this conversation in a moment ah with Philip White right after the news so you may choose to stay with us; there may be a response that’s needed.

PROMO AND NEWSPORTWEATHER

MA: Just before the news we were talking with Dr. David Paton um from Adelaide University. Now he wants, the Adelaide University want to effectively be released from a er a deed that governs Glen Thorne Farm, the large area of open space at the top of Taps there near the old drive-in and ah they want to sell some of it for housing and use that money to develop woodlands um throughout the Adelaide Hills.

Philip White is the wine writer with The Independent Weekly. He has, um, quite an intimate knowledge of the Glenthorne Farm deed. Philip White good morning ... do you?

Philip White: I was fascinated by –

MA: Oh, sorry, sorry Philip, I just just er, we, good morning to you and what are you fascinated by?

PW: I’m fascinated by the audacity of the University here, and I, I think that is gonna be more of a Victoria Park than a Cheltenham.

Um, the University deed that it signed actually prohibits it undertaking to seek development of the land without Ministerial approval. Now the Government has refused to sign such a thing so far ... ah, I can’t see this government taking the risk of er, of letting this housing go ahead –

MA: So are you saying that just by doing what it is doing at the moment, and that is consulting the community about selling the land, it is breeching its deed?

PW: Yeah, I’m not a lawyer but 4.2.2 of the deed says that it prohibits the University to undertake or permit development or seek to undertake development of the land for uses other than those specified da da da da without the writing – er, without approval by the Minister in writing. And that hasn’t occurred.

AB: Now you’ve sent us a copy of that deed, and that is indeed what is says. Um have you got a response from the Minister? Has he actually said –

PW: The local Member, Leon Bignall, in McLaren Vale, er has said, has said that no such signature has been provided.

DB: So will there be some sort of legal challenge, Philip White? Because you’re talking legalese here aren’t you?

PW: Yeah, but I don’t know. If that’s – I’m just amazed at the audacity of it. And, but I think that, well, you know, there’s some light at the end of this tunnel. I don’t see the government affording another Cheltenham.

And just a fortnight ago we had Minister Holloway, the planning guy, saying there would be no more development of housing in McLaren Vale or the Barossa. Now Glenthorne is inside the Geographical Indicator boundary of McLaren Vale. The boundary was actually drawn around Glenthorne with the University’s knowledge - to include that in the McLaren Vale appellation for viticulture.

DB: Mmm. Okay. So where does this go next? Will you and the people that you are a part of Philip, who are opposing this development, will you be getting together soon; will you be considering some sort of court action, or are you just going to keep up a political campaign?

PW: Well I think you can feel, a, a brewing brew-ha-ha with the McLaren Vale winemakers who certainly have never been consulted with this, over this.

The University sort of indicated that the wine industry pulled out of the deed because of er, various reasons, one of which – this is a good story – ask Dr. Paton about the radioactive sheep.

SILENCE

MA: Well, er, he’s listening. You’d better tell us David Paton –

DB: Suppressed laughter; giggling.

MA: Are there, are there sheep glowin’ in them thar hills? Radioactive sheep?

DB: giggling: Dr. David Paton:

DP: There is some, some rumour I think that er some of the sheep I think from Maralinga were buried on the property, um, there’s been some surveys done looking for um you know, high spikes in radioactivity er radioactive material coming off the property at present. Nobody’s found where they are. Nobody’s actually knows where they’re buried so it may just be rumour.

But there are concerns, um, let’s say, out there, about these things and the University, if it was going to go ahead with doing anything, um you know, we’d argue that that why is the thing being used as a farm if there’s radioactive material interred.

MA: Well why would you be using it as a housing estate if there was –

DP: Exactly.

MA: Sheep that would possibly have, plutonium? Er plutonium waste?

DP: I have, I have no idea what the actual material is and as I say nobody actually seems to know where they are if they were actually were buried on the on the property where they actually are so other than doing surveys that’s all we can do at this stage but at present the surveys have been done so um levels below um or level two that’s normal backgrounds you’d expect for these sorts of areas so obviously it’s fine at this stage -

DB: So David Paton is it correct to say Adelaide University has gone looking for radioactive sheep but hasn’t found any?

DP: Eh-heh. We’ve had other other organisations which are looking at looking at using the site for say the desalination pipeline, they’ve done broad surveys across the er the er property to determine whether or not there’s a risk for them to put the pipeline across so, er I don’t think they’d be thinking about doing that if they weren’t comfortable that there was no risk.

MA: Course, er, plutonium would not show up in background radiation, would it? It has a very long half-life – about 1,600 years – but, ah, a plutonium particle cannot penetrate for instance a piece of cigarette paper; the thickness of a cigarette paper, but if if, it, it gets into your body in any way it will give you cancer. It will.

DP: Look I can’t actually talk about the actual processes - the other people have been doing that - but if there’s a farm going that’s being used as a commercial farm, which it currently is being used for, then you’d argue that that’s a risk as well.

MA: Yeah.

DB: Mmm. What about the other point that Philip White has raised a number of times and that is that under the deed the university shouldn’t even be sounding people out regarding a development, without first getting Ministerial approval?

DP: Oh look that er, that’s in a that’s in a deed document to which I’m not privy to and the details for, um, I think something I mean which is meant to be kept confidential, or at least I thought it was meant to be kept confidential – so I haven’t seen it – look if there are those issues then fine, perhaps the University has stepped over the line here, but I think that the issue here is, the key issue, that, the if the community changes its mind about how it wants to see an area used, then um we need to take that on board, and not be sitting back on something that was decided, under duress, back in 1998 or so when there was er hurried arrangements between the Federal and State governments and the University to, um find a solution for Glenthorne.

MA: Brenda from Hackham has called. Um, hullo, Brenda.

BfH: Good morning. I’m absolutely furious about the University’s suggestions for Glenthorne Farm. Glenthorne Farm is the lungs of the south. Why should we have more housing down here to beautify the woodlands in the Adelaide Hills, where they’ve got their trees already? The houses that would go on there would be the same as the houses down at Seaford on small blocks that don’t even have enough room to grow a decent solid tree! I think that if this goes ahead the words “In Trust” should be deleted because they have no more value.

DB: Ah, Brenda from Hackham, thankyou. And look thankyou Dr. David Paton for coming on and also to Philip White, wine writer for the Independent Weekly. David Paton is associate professor at the Adelaide University.

...and here it is:

DEED BETWEEN THE MINISTER FOR TRANSPORT AND URBAN PLANNING

and

THE UNIVERSITY OF ADELAIDE

essential ingredients

RECITALS

B. For many years the CSIRO has used the land for purposes of agriculture and as an agricultural research facility.

D. The CSIRO has only agreed to sell the Land on the proviso that the Land will be preserved and conserved for agriculture and other related activities and will not be used for urban development.

E. The University, as the person nominated by the State, has agreed to purchase the Land from the CSIRO , to preserve and conserve the Land for other related activities and not use, develop or permit the Land to be used or developed for urban development.

4. OBLIGATIONS OF THE UNIVERSITY

4.1 The University covenants with the Minister that it will, subject to obtaining all necessary statutory approvals, do all reasonably necessary things to ensure that the Land is

4.1.1 preserved, conserved and used for Agriculture, Horticulture, Oenology, Viticulture, Buffer Zones and as Community Recreation Area, and

4.1.2 is available for Project Research Activities, University Research Activities, Education Activities and operating a Wine Making Facility.

4.2 The University covenants with the Minister that it will not at any time hereafter:

4.2.1 use or permit the Land to be used other than as provided for in subclause 4.1 unless such other use is approved in writing by a Minister acting as agent of the Crown,

4.2.2 undertake or permit Development or seek to undertake Development of the Land for uses other than those specified in subclause 4.1 unless such other use or Development (excluding Urban Development which will not be approved) is approved in writing by a Minister acting as agent of the Crown.

4.4 The University covenants with the Minister that it will not at any time hereafter sell, transfer or otherwise dispose of the whole or any portion of the Land unless it shall first procure from the purchaser or transferee a binding undertaking either to be bound by this Deed or to enter into a Deed with the Minister on the same terms as are contained in this Deed.

8. ASSIGNMENT

The University covenants not to assign its obligations under this Deed without the prior written consent of the Minister.

THE COMMON SEAL OF THE MINISTER FOR TRANSPORT AND URBAN DEVELOPMENT was affixed and signed by Di Laidlaw, Minister, in the presence of Tim Quinn, witness, on 22 May 2001.

THE SEAL OF THE UNIVERSITY OF ADELAIDE was signed by Susan Graebner, Officer who affixed the seal, and witnessed and signed by Mary O’Kane, Custodian of the Seal, on 24 May 2001.

BY authority of the Council given on the 26 July 1999.

.

Green Boffins Boil Southern Blood

by PHILIP WHITE

Southern blood is boiling since the University of Adelaide announced its plan to subdivide for housing 63ha of the 208ha Glenthorne Farm, on O’Halloran’s Hill in suburban Adelaide.

I have listed below a few of the more pertinent points made in the Deed the University signed with the then Minister for Transport and Urban Planning, Di Laidlaw, on 24 May 2001.

As you can see, this excellent document contains no ambiguity whatever, and gives to rise to many questions.

It repeatedly states that there should be no housing estate on Glenthorne Farm.

Surely the University’s stance indirectly implies that the reforestation of Glenthorne Farm and the South Mount Lofty Ranges is dependent upon the University being given approval to break this solemn Deed and plant a thousand houses?

Surely men of the calibre of the prominent ecologist, Associate Professor David Paton must realise that in promoting the spread of villa rash they lose immediately the respect they have long enjoyed in much of the environmentally-aware community?

This writer, for one, can’t quite believe that he has little choice but to enter public battle against an environmentalist he has long been in awe of.

If you study OBLIGATIONS OF THE UNIVERSITY 4.2.2 (below) and consider that the Deed guarantees that the University will NOT “undertake or permit Development or seek to undertake Development of the Land for uses other than those specified in subclause 4.1 unless such other use or Development (excluding Urban Development which will not be approved) is approved in writing by a Minister acting as agent of the Crown”, you might be forgiven for suspecting such an approval, for seeking to undertake development of the land, in writing, has already been given by Minister Paul Holloway? No?

It couldn't be. Could it.

.