FEDERAL LABOR DECLARES ITSELF AGAINST HIGH COUNTRY CATTLEMEN

16/06/2005 - After remaining mute for weeks, Kim Beazley’s Labor Party has revealed it is siding with the Victorian Labor Government against rural Victoria.

Labor’s environment and heritage spokesperson, Anthony Albanese, has poured scorn on the heritage personified by the mountain cattlemen who, for 170 summers, have been grazing cattle in the relatively small area of the Victorian high country.

Mr Albanese issued a media release condemning my decision to request the National Heritage Council begin an emergency consideration of the threat posed to the undoubted heritage values of the mountain cattlemen by the Victorian Labor Government’s decision to tear up their grazing licenses.

Mr Albanese said that this decision:
"..threatens to bring the entire national heritage into disrepute."
(Anthony Albanese media release, 14 June 2005)
Under the emergency listing process the Australian Heritage Council is required to provide advice to me in 40 days. That advice will encompass the environment and heritage considerations in relation to high cattle grazing in the alpine areas.
Mr Albanese claims to be the ALP spokesperson for environment and heritage. Mr Albanese doesn’t deserve to have "heritage" in his title.