Townsville Community Voices

I came to Townsville 33 years ago & fell in love with Northern Australia and intend to see out my life here. Townsville then was a quiet provincial city, small, but large enough to cater for very diverse interests. At the time it was a city where a large proportion of people lived in what we would now call an ecologically sustainable way with backyard veggie gardens and fruit trees feeding the family, bicycles being a major form of transport and old Queenslander houses that did not need air conditioning.

We have now tripled in size and, with three more triplings, another century would see us bigger than Sydney is now. Our housing & transport is now heavily energy dependent. Big city problems of smog and crime are emerging and will increase with the push for growth. Our growth enriches property investors but makes housing unaffordable for the young. Huge polluting, energy guzzling heavy industries are planned for the shores of the Coral Sea on the South bank of Ross River. This is growth gone mad.

Across the world excessive growth in human numbers and demand now threaten to outstrip our energy and food supply and cause severe climate change. Townsville, heavily dependent on mining and tourism and at the end of a long supply line from southern Australia has an economy that is particularly at risk from oil price shocks and we are physically at high risk from the more extreme cyclones that are predicted.

If elected, I will therefore work to stop development which does not enhance the welfare of existing residents and stop development which harms our wonderful environment. I will also do as much as a councillor can, to make sure that work and income are equitably shared. It is obscene that a substantial minority suffer in poverty whilst others have excess wealth and consumption but despite this, are unhappy with “affluenza”. My favourite slogan is that perpetual growth is the ideology of the cancer cell. A vote for me is a vote against cancerous growth and for a stable and sustainable Townsville.

Personal Details

I am a medical doctor and mathematician and work in both of these professional areas.
I am married with two stepchildren and two children from a previous marriage.
I have always been interested in politics and have at various times been a member of the Communist Party and The Greens. I am now not a member of any political party but have joined the Community Voices team because I share their opposition to the development at all cost mindset and their belief in a more equitable Townsville with a more transparent council.
For many years I have been a member of two conservation groups in Townsville – NQ Conservation Council and Sustainable Population Australia and I am currently president of the NQ branch of the latter organisation.
Apart from family, work and politics, my interests include bushwalking and growing exotic fruit trees.