Speech to the Parliament of New South Wales by The Hon Charlie Lynn MLC on 4 May 2006
Debate resumed from 2 May 2006.
The Hon. CHARLIE LYNN [4.32 p.m.]: The acknowledgment of traditional owners of the land seems to have been introduced around the time of the republican and reconciliation debates during the Keating Labor Government era. Left-wing academics, inner-city urban dwellers and doctors’ wives were among the comfortable middle-class voices calling for changes to our flag and our system of parliamentary democracy. They also wanted us to say sorry for historical wrongs over which we had no influence. As it turned out, the only thing that changed was the Government.
I would hope that these ideological warriors of the Left will come to understand that the wider Australian community will accept such changes to our systems, symbols and institutions only when they are treated as equals in the debate, not as a group of uneducated westies or rednecks. My view is that concentrating on so-called progressive issues for our indigenous people has done them more harm than good. The “feelgood” factor for the chattering classes in comfortable inner-city environments does not translate into worthwhile sustainable benefits for indigenous people in remote and isolated areas. It has taken the emergence of indigenous leaders such as Noel Pearson and Warren Mundine to get some balance back into the debate and to earn the respect of the wider community in the process.
The annual KTA junket to Brisbane for a ‘Tour Operators Forum’ on 27 November 2019 should be cancelled and the venue switched to Port Moresby according to long-term Kokoda trekker, Major Charlie Lynn.
‘The agenda for the forum is currently irrelevant to the reality of the Kokoda trekking industry’ said Lynn.
‘It is worth noting that there has never been an identifiable outcome from any previous KTA Forum conducted in Australia over the past 10 years – apart from setting the date of their next forum!
‘Of more concern is the fact that if a motion is passed at a forum that the KTA does not approve of – even one passed unanimously by 63 PNG trek operators and leaders concerning the exploitation of their local guides anc carriers – the KTA will not action it or even publish the Minutes because of their fear of a backlash from the vocal Australian Tour Operators Association.
‘As a result the KTA now operates in a parallel universe to the reality of the Kokoda trekking industry.
‘They have not published an audited financial statement for 10 years so we have no idea where the K12 million in trek fee income has gone.
‘They have not published a newsletter for the past five years so nobody has any idea what they do.
‘All we know is what they don’t do!
‘They don’t have a booking system for campsites. They don’t have a trek itinerary management system so nobody knows who is on the trail at any time. They don’t have an economic development plan for local villagers to earn additional money from trekkers. They don’t have a trail maintenance plan – or a campsite development plan. They don’t offer any protection for the welfare of local guides, carriers and campsite owners. They refuse to provide assistance to villagers needing urgent medical treatment. They don’t maintain a database. They don’t have a single management protocol in place. They don’t answer emails. Etc. Etc. Etc.
‘Recently the KTA ‘donated‘ K350,000 to a ‘friendly‘ Australian NGO but they refuse to provide any financial assistance to a young Kokoda schoolgirl who needs an emergency lifesaving operation on her heart.
‘When the Acting CEO was recently challenged as to why they had only answered 3 of the 21 emails we had sent them this year he advised that he was under no obligation to have to do so!
‘This surely takes unaccountable bureaucratic arrogance to a new level. We would have thought a customer who will pay them almost K200,000 in trek fees in 2019 might have received a more favourable response’.
‘We therefore have no option but to use our blog and social media to provide a response to their proposed agenda for their annual junket to Brisbane.
‘There are 13 topics on the proposed agenda and 7 hours available to present/discuss them. This allows only 32 minutes for each one which is clearly insufficient. It seems that the agenda has been designed to provide as many free flights to Brisbane for their mates as possible.
If the forum was to be held in Port Moresby, as it should be, it would allow time for discussion in issues that concern the primary stakeholders of the Kokoda trekking industry i.e. landowners, local trek operators, guides, carriers and campsite owners.
If the KTA refuses to reschedule the forum to Port Moresby it should be cancelled and the funds allocated to saving the life of the young Kokoda schoolgirl whose plight is becoming more serious by the day.
‘If the Brisbane Forum does proceed then all KTA officials and their guest speakers should have to fund their own travel and accommodation as it was never intended for trek fees to be misused for such junkets – they were introduced to ensure local villagers along the trail received their fair share of benefits from the Kokoda trekking industry.
‘This is clearly a corruption of that intent and it should therefore be cancelled’ said Lynn.
Following are our comments on their
proposed agenda:
ADVENTURE KOKODA RESPONSE TO DRAFT AGENDA FOR THE KTA TOUR OPERATORS FORUM IN BRISBANE ON 27 NOVEMBER 2019
AGENDA ITEM NO 1: Review of KTA financial and management systems by Deloittes:
Licensing and permitting system
Financial and Statutory reporting
Financial processes (including procurement and acquittals)
Systems and software
Staff capability and training
Chart of accountsAudit Reports
COMMENT The failure of the KTA to publish an audited Financial Report to account for more than K12 million received in trek fees over the past decade would normally attract the attention of a Government oversight body such as the IPA but they seem to be immune from such scrutiny.
If Deloittes
were commissioned to conduct a ‘review of KTA financial and management systems’
they should distribute a copy of their report and allow for interested parties
to respond. The KTA do not need to use our trek fees to fly a team from Port
Moresby to Brisbane to tell trek operators about it.
AGENDA ITEM No 2: Community development projects (including the Oro water project)
COMMENT: Our company, Adventure Kokoda has led 29 groups across the trail in 2019 however:
We a not aware of a single Community
Development Project that has been initiated by the KTA.
We are aware that not a single $$ has been
invested in any campsite development for the paying customers i.e. trekkers –
and that there is still not a single toilet that meets the most basic of
hygiene standards.
We are aware that not a single bridge
across the trail would be classified as ‘safe’ for trekkers and that there are
a number of sections of the trail that would be classified as ‘dangerously
unsafe.
We are aware that not a single creek or
significant feature has been identified with the indigenous name or signposted.
This
should therefore be a very brief session which could be contained in a
PowerPoint presentation and sent out to trek operators.
AGENDA ITEM No 3: Update on the KTCG&GHA (including the ablution project)
The ‘ablution project’ – which both the KTA and Kokoda Initiative have ignored for the past decade – is destined to fail because it has not yet dawned on them that the most important people to consult in this regard are those who pay to use them i.e. trekkers.
Unfortunately the KTA is unable to conduct a survey of
the 50,000 trekkers who have crossed the trail over the past 10 years because
they do not maintain a database – in fact they don’t even have one to maintain
– and therefore do not have a single contact detail of any trekker!
The two campsite surveys they refer to were conducted by people who had never trekked with a group of trekkers and were therefore unable to observe the disgraceful reality of the situation. They were also not qualified for the task they were given. Any reference to them should be regarded as irrelevant.
It is obvious that the presenters of this topic at a a
forum would know less about the subject than the audience so it would be a
waste of time to include it on the agenda.
The proposal to trial toilets at three campsites in
Menari is obviously a bureaucratic delay tactic to avoid confronting the
reality of the urgent need for hygienic toilets across the trail.
The Kokoda Initiative could use the modern toilets they built at the Isurava Elementary School with a ratio of one toilet per four students aged between 3 – 6 years! Similar toilets – with a privacy screen – would be ideal for trekkers.
The real need is for a strategic approach to the
development of campsites along the trail to meet the immediate and long-term
needs of trekkers. We should now be
aware of the demand for such sites and the peak trekking periods during the
year.
Each campsite should be discreet and not co-located
beside other sites – they should be sited to avoid unnecessary impact on
villages and should be designed to host different sized groups.
Each campsite should have a two kitchens, two dining
huts and two drying huts – one for trekkers and one for their PNG support crew.
They should also have adequate huts for the PNG crew to sleep in; level/grassed
sites for trekkers tents; and hygienic ablution blocks that comprise an area
for trekkers to change clothers before and after their shower. All ablution
blocks and toilets should have privacy screens.
This topic cannot be covered adequately at a forum. It needs a discussion paper seeking submissions from trek operators and a great deal of consultation as part of the process of developing a strategic plan to enable the Kokoda trekking industry to realize its potential.
In the meantime at least three toilets based on the
design used at the Isurava Elementary School (with a privacy screen added)
should be built at the following locations in time for the 2020 trekking
season:
Owers
Corner
Goldie
River
Goodwater
(Imita Base)
Va
Ule Creek
Ioribaiwa
Village
Ofi
Creek
Nauro
Agulogo
Menari
Brigade
Hill
Efogi
Launumunu
Naduri
Kagi
Bombers
Diggers
1900
Crossing
Crossing
1
Templeton’s
Crossing
Eora
Creek
Abuari
Alola
Isurava
Memorial
Isurava
Village
Hoi
Kovello
Kokoda
Plateau
Kokoda
Airfield
AGENDA ITEM No.4 Law and Order update (any progress with Sogeri Police or community police?)
This topic
can be addressed in a newsletter or email to trek operators. The only issue
relevant to this topic is the failure of the KTA to address the exploitation of
guides, carriers and campsite owners by a majority of licensed trek operators
and the increasing number of ‘private’ groups and unlicensed trek operators on
the trail.
AGENDA ITEM No.5 Code of Conduct discussion and finalization.
The KTA Code of Conduct is a joke – and has been for the last decade. It will remain so until checkpoints are established at Owers Corner and Kokoda along with a couple of random points along the trail to ensure all trekkers have trek permits; that the welfare of guides and carriers is protected; and that campsite owners are receive proper payment for the number of trekers and PNG support crews.
KTA
management has consistently ignored reports of exploitation of guides, carriers
and campsite owners and there is no indication that this will change.
A Motion
passed by 63 PNG trek operators at their own KTA Forum in Port Moresby in
November 2017 has never been actioned. They did not even have the courage to
table the Motion at the following KTA Forum in Cairns because of intimidation
by the Australian Tour Operators Association and have refused repeated requests
to publish the Minutes of that Forum.
The KTA has no credibility on this issue and any discussion in a ‘fourm’ environment would be regarded as a waste of time.
AGENDA ITEM No.6 New ranger model and relationship with QPWS
Roles and responsibilities
Management and reporting systems
Training and capacity building
Recruitment
The
current ranger system introduced by the Kokoda Initiative/KTA was predicted tpo
fail because of the lack of consultation with trek operators – and it has.
Any
proposed new model will also be destined to fail if it ignores input from
legitimate trek operators and involves organisations such as QPWS who are not
familiar with trekking or the culture of the people along the trail.
This topic should be addressed in a discussion paper and circulated for comment as the basis for any policy development.
longer term work on bridges and Track stabilization
This topic falls under ‘I’ll believe it when I see it’ category – there has been no coordinated track maintenance plan for the past 10 years under the watch of the KTA and Kokoda Initiative.
Feedback from trek operators regarding the environmental degradation of the trail; unsafe bridges and dangerously unsafe sections of the trail have been consistently ignored.
Some good work has been undertaken in recent years however it is piecemeal and does not seem to be part of any plan.
This topic should be addressed in a discussion paper and circulated for comment as the basis for any policy development.
AGENDA ITEM No.8 Site access agreements with landowners, and landowner identification
Trekkers pay K350 each for site access to the Kokoda Trail. If there is any issue with landowners in regard to access to certain sites this should be resolved by the KTA because that is what they are paid to do.
Landowners
are certainly frustrated by the fact that neither the KTA nor the Kokoda
Initiative have held any substantive village based meetings-workshops along the
trail for the past decade.
Landowner
identification should already have been part of the ‘Social Mapping’ work
carried out by Kokoda Initiative consultants. If this has not happened one is
entitled to ask, why not?
This topic
should be addressed in a discussion paper and circulated for comment as the
basis for any policy development.\
AGENDA ITEM No.9 Special site management agreements (military heritage protection)
The failure of the Kokoda Initiative to engage an accredited Military Heritage Architect to develop a Master Military Heritage Interpretation Plan since they assumed responsibility for the Kokoda Trail a decade ago is negligence of the highest order.
The Kokoda
Trail has degenerated into a memorial junkyard under their watch and this has
contributed to the 46 percent decline in trekker numbers since they arrived
from Canberra.
The only
solution is for the PNG Government to reclaim ownership of the trail and make a
direct request to Prime Minister Scott Morrison to fund the Master Plan.
Any
discussion on this topic in a forum would therefore be a waste of breath.
AGENDA ITEM No.10 NEC Decision update 1. Legislation 2. Tourism Plan 3. KTA Management committee
This topic can be addressed in a newsletter or email to interested parties.
AGENDA ITEM N0.11 Training for porters and guides
This topic reflects yet another disturbing level of ignorance of the reality of the Kokoda trekking industry by KTA management.
The
recruitment, training and development of guides and carriers is the
responsibility of individual trek operators. Those who invest in these aspects
will benefit – those who don’t will struggle.
If the KTA were sincere in the development of local guides and carriers they would introduce a registration system for them together with a log book for them to record the number of treks they have done; their role on these treks; and their trekking company.
The role of
the KTA is to protect them from exploitation by low-rent trek operators and
thus far they have clearly failed in this regard.
AGENDA ITEM No.12 NMAG update on sites (including Etoa)
According to military history records there was no battle known as ‘Etoa’ during the Kokoda campaign – and no Battle Honour was ever awarded in that name. The correct name of the Battle Honour is ‘Eora Creek’.
The Eora Creek battlefield has never be ‘lost’ as earlier claimed by those ignorant of both the military history of the Kokoda campaign and the trail itself.
There should be no further funding wasted on this folly until a Master Military Heritage Interpretation Plan has been completed by an accredited Military Heritage Architect.
The Kokoda Trail will never realize its potential as a World Class pilgrimage until such a plan has been developed.
AGENDA ITEM No.13 CEPA update on community consultations and gazettal
This can be provided by email to interested parties or via the publication of a newsletter.
‘Our daughter’s health is our priority and the further delay of her operation has been a concern for us which is becoming desperate, thereby resulting in our plea for your assistance’ wrote Mrs Doreen Dumu, a nurse at the Kokoda Hospital on 29 January 2019.
Her 14 year-old daughter, Freda, has a serious heart condition – Tetralogy Fallot which is a serious congenital heart defect. The surgery she requires is not available in PNG and the cost of the operation and rehabilitation in Australia is in excess of $100,000.
I first approached our friends in the Children’s First Foundation who did their best to assist but the cost of the operation was beyond their resources in view of their current commitments.
I then tried Rotary Oceana Medical Aid for Children (ROMAC). They were also keen to assist but there seems to be an issue with Children’s Hospitals in NSW accepting patients from the Pacific.
I wrote to the Minister for Health to see if he could check it out on our behalf but did not receive a response.
I then contacted the Kokoda Track Authority (KTA) and suggested that they require every trek operator to submit the name and contact details of each of the trekkers they would be leading across the trail during the Anzac period on an Exel Sheet – a practice that should have been put in place a decade ago to capture the contact details of the 45,000 Australians who have trekked Kokoda over the past decade.
This would have allowed the KTA to contact each of the 600 Australians who trekked Kokoda during the Anzac period to seek donations for Freda’s operation.
For reasons known only to the KTA they did not respond. (more…)
PNG has two choices for wartime tourism – it can continue to operate as a Third World destination with Third World management systems and Third World campsite facilities – or it can develop a marketing strategy aimed towards becoming the wartime destination of choice for First World international trekkers.
Executive Summary
The CEO of PNG Tourism requested feedback from Kokoda trek operators on issues discussed at a forum conducted by the Kokoda Track Authority in Brisbane on 28 November 2018.
One of the key topics covered at the forum was the subject of marketing Kokoda.
This response is based on the collective views of Adventure Kokoda trek leaders who have a combined total of 130 years professional army experience and who have led more than 520 expeditions across the trail over the past 28 years.
The response examines the potential of a wartime tourism industry based on the development of a successful management model for the Kokoda Trail. It examines the factors relevant to the Kokoda trekking industry over the past decade and suggests a marketing strategy based on Anzac Day, Kokoda Day, the development of Owers Corner, a Military Heritage Master Plan; and social media.
The response concludes that PNG can continue to operate as a Third World tourism destination with Third World management systems and Third World campsites/toilets – or it can develop a marketing strategy to become the wartime destination of choice for First World international trekkers.
It’s not about money – Kokoda is already sustainable. It’s not about meetings, forums and workshops – nothing has been achieved from these for more than a decade. It’s about vision, understanding, leadership and commitment.(more…)
This morning I had the honour of attending the official launch of Major General Gordon Maitland’s book ‘The Story of Australia’s Flags which was hosted by the Department of Veterans Affairs in Sydney. It follow on from his previous publication ‘Honours and Awards of the Australian Army. Both are published by Playbill Military Productions and are essential references to anybody with an interest in the customs and traditions of our Australian military forces.
In his dedication to his book Major General Gordon Maitland wrote:
‘Australians formally announce themselves by flying our flag or singing our National Anthem.
‘Sometimes we may do so more informally by flying a flag bearing an image of one of our unique fauna or by singing Waltzing Matilda.
‘Another favourite song is: ‘We are one, but we are many, and from all the lands on Earth we come, we share a dream and sing with one voice – I am, you are, we are Australian’. It was written by Bruce Woodley and Dobe Newton in 1987 and is owned by Telstra. I am biased and would prefer ‘flag’ to ‘dream’.
‘No doubt my upbringing contributed to my bias for I am of that generation which, at school, recited:
I honour my God; I serve my King; I salute my flag.
‘Like many of our wonderful ways it has been lost by progress [?] (more…)
This is a must read for anybody interested in the international circumstances that led to the War in the Pacific in 1941. Following is the speech by the Governor of Westerns Australia, His Excellency Malcolm McClusker AC CVO QC, when he launched the book at Curtin University:
The first Wednesday of September each year is Battle for Australia Day. It commemorates all of the battles, great and small, fought against Japan by the United States and Australia, to repel Japanese aggression.
Bob Wurth’s book, the Battle for Australia, is a gripping account of that perilous time in Australia’s history. As our Governor-General of Australia wrote in the Foreword, it fills an important gap in our knowledge of that critical period for, 70 years after the bombing of Darwin and the invasion of New Guinea, we are still learning about what happened and just how beleaguered Australia really was – to an extent which was certainly not fully disclosed at the time, for fear of causing panic.
The sub-title to the book, “A nation and its leader under siege”, is very apt; for this book is not only a fascinating account of the military history of the war in the Pacific, when Australia truly was “under siege”; but it is also an insightful political biography of Australia’s war time Prime Minister John Curtin. He too, was “under siege”, as Bob Wurth makes clear.
The John Curtin Prime Ministerial Library is therefore a very fitting venue for the launch of this book, which not only points out Curtin’s achievements, but also his frailties, flaws and failings. (more…)
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