Battle of the Bill
Filming Approval Bill 2004
(July 2004)

The article in last month's Hut News described the situation to 30 May 2004 - a few days before the Filming Amendment Bill 2004 was due to come before the Parliament. The Bill was debated in the Upper House on 2 and 3 June, and finalised in the Lower house on 4 June. A total of thirteen amendments were agreed.

The good news is that the amendments provide strong constraints for filming in wilderness areas. Films like "Stealth" are clearly excluded from wilderness areas.

The bill now also contains additional environmental criteria which the Minister must take into account when issuing a filming approval. Protection for recovery plans for threatened species was also added.

The bad news is that third party appeal rights were diminished.

Legal challenges to the validity of a filming approval can only be initiated within 14 days of the issuing of a filming approval. Legal challenges arising from breaches of the conditions of a filming approval can only succeed after the Department of Environment and Conservation has been given 30 days to remedy the complaint.

The 14 day and 30 day conditions did not previously exist. They have come into being despite the Minister's assertion that "third party appeal rights will exist as they were before". The 30 day rule means that, in future, if the conditions of approval are breached and the environment movement wants to remedy the situation, this new 30 day rule requires that 30 days must elapse before the Court can issue an injunction or other direction to stop the damage. The likelihood is that filming will be finished before 30 days have elapsed. In the Stealth case the filming was scheduled to take between one and two weeks.

Our website contains a copy of the draft bill, the approved bill and a schedule which compares the draft and the approved bill.

The Stealth issue has again demonstrated the strong commitment to our natural environment held by Blue Mountains residents. The successful campaign to protect Butterbox Point was a co-operative effort between residents and environmental groups, including Colong Foundation for Wilderness, National Parks Association, Blue Mountains Conservation Society, members of the Wilderness Society, Greens MLC Ian Cohen, Democrats MLC Arthur Chesterfield Evans, Environmental Defender's Office and many other individuals.

Thank you to everyone who was involved in the campaign - attending meetings and rallies, blockading, writing a letter, sending a fax, lobbying politicians, handing out leaflets, talking to people …
This tremendous effort could only have happened in the Blue Mountains!