Peter Cundall arrested in pulp mill protest

Former Gardening Australia host Peter Cundall has been arrested outside Tasmania’s Parliament House during a protest over the Gunns pulp mill.

The ABC presenter was part of a protest group today calling for a royal commission into the approval of Gunns Ltd’s proposed Bell Bay pulp mill in northern Tasmania.

The 82 year old was taken into custody with other protesters after refusing police directions to move away from the steps of Parliament House.

AAP notes he looked nervous before settling into the role and he was escorted to a waiting bus to the cheers of a mostly middle-aged-plus crowd.

Cundall, who lives in the Tamar Valley, has been a long-standing objector to the construction of a Pulp Mill which he says will cause economic and environmental damage.

But there are also questions of democracy that infuriate the gardening guru.

”I’m here because I’m opposed to the corrupt mechanisms, and it was corrupt, that [Tasmania’s] Pulp Mill Assessment Act went through Parliament,” he told reporters.

”It was a terrible thing that basically a proponent of the mill can actually make major donations to a party or both parties, and help to actually write the legislation, and it is then passed through Parliament, with the members of Parliament not allowed to oppose it or amend it.

”That to my mind is corruption and that’s why I’m here and that’s why I’m going to stay here.”

Don Burke was also drawn into the debate last year after being hired by Gunns’ chairman John Gay as something of a ‘green monitor.’

Cundall, who stepped down from 39 years of presenting on ABC TV remains a radio presenter.

Almost a year ago he was named Tasmania’s Australian of the Year and presented an award by Premier David Bartlett.

Source: The Age / AAP