Trashing Sydney's Botanic Gardens

In an article last year, I condemned the privatization of the Centennial Park and Moore Park by the Trust which administers it.

The Trust [itself, a curious choice of words] is hell-bent on making the Parks pay their way. And thus we get rock concerts and all kinds of things in Centennial Park, parts of which are now for hire. This now includes hire of picnic spaces, according to notices at the park gates. So do we have to pay, now, to have a picnic in the Park given to the people of Sydney in 1888?

We are now seeing the same process applied to Sydney's Botanic Gardens. Let's look carefully at the announcement:

The Royal Botanic Gardens Trust has unveiled the draft of its 25-year redevelopment for the Gardens and the Domain, which includes a multimillion-dollar five-star hotel.

A walkway at Mrs Macquarie's Point will connect visitors with the water, while redevelopment of its historic buildings will provide them with new facilities and amenities.

The plan - a first in the 200-year history of the park - also includes a children's garden, with new walkways and educational centres also planned.

"When people consider the draft Master Plan, it's important that they understand that the Domain is outside the Garden gates," said Kim Ellis, Executive Director of the Sydney Parklands and Botanic Gardens.

"This draft Master Plan provides us with the framework to secure our future as a premium Sydney cultural landmark, world's best, Sydney's own," he said in a statement. [Emphasis added]

Here is the pattern:

1. A wide-ranging "draft plan" is announced, with all kinds of promised benefits

This, it is emphasized, will "protect the Gardens", according to Sunday's TV news. Or "secure our future", as we see above. We are told that we must "understand" that it will be wonderful and beneficial, and so forth. Pretty pictures and reassuring words are blazed forth in the uncritical Sydney Sunday press. Shades of George Orwell and a world in which sheer truth is denied and covered up with fine-sounding, reassuring phrases. Underneath all the pretty pictures is buried the truth – that we are seeing another public asset of green space privatised. This will all make money for- whom? Ah- it turns out: people who run hotels or casinos (or both). And of course the government, through taxes, imposts and charges.

2. Objections are forthcoming, and there are many justifications, including surveys that were done and opportunities for consultation. There are many plausible reasons given for what is really a privatization of public space. There will be a hotel built on the edge of the Gardens, but the public will be "allowed" to go onto the roof. And so on.

3. There are objections made, and surveys (in the Sydney Herald, for instance) show that 85% of readers surveyed oppose the plan. People in the "comments" section of the Herald online state that Mrs Macquarie's Chair is already on Sydney Harbour. So who needs a walkway to connect it with the water?

4. Governments wash their hands of the process, talking about financial hardship, though it's very well known that governments have their own sources of revenue. As the Sydney property market goes ever upward, and suburb after suburb exceeds the million-dollar mark for median prices paid, more stamp duty must be paid to the NSW Government. It's an ever-increasing revenue source.

5. Anyone who doesn't like the "draft" plans may make written objection. And so time is gained, and people forget their anger in the press of their weekly struggle to pay bills.

6. The usual result is that that the "draft" plan will be accepted with meaningless, minimal changes. And another public space is lost. Once the principle is established, the details can change: there could be entry fees charged for the Gardens. Such a fee has already been raised in regard to Centennial Park, only to be ridiculed. But such ideas, once rejected, can reappear without warning, as we saw with the introduction of the GST. "Never, ever" became "well we need to …".

The fact that a certain Kim Ellis is now directing the Gardens as well as the Centennial and Moore Park Trusts seems to be too much of a coincidence. As for surveys, any researcher worth his salt knows that with a bit of massaging, statistics can be made to say almost anything. One wonders if any university-accredited person has ever laid his or her critical eyes on such a survey.

The same pattern seems to be happening at national level, according to the Herald. National Parks, Uluru, and so on all have to pay their way.

With good reason, former Prime Minister Paul Keating has condemned the planned changes as outrageous. It is doubtless true that we get many tourists here, backpackers, businessmen and so on. And what do they value? They will tell you in their own words: "the Nature"….."the fresh air"…"the wonderful space"… Clearly, tourists bring money with them and governments benefit. But there is a broader point.

The whole idea of having a public good, a common wealth of natural resources, seems to be an inconvenient truth that people want to disregard.

Where is the patriotism among so many people in business and in government who seem to think nothing of taking away from our common wealth? And – as we saw once again with the Sydney Water fiasco – people from major parties are happy to plunder public resources to get more fees, salaries, etc for themselves and their mates? And then in court, on oath, forgetting about all the nasty things they did to pay themselves more!

It is a sorry mess that we are seeing happen right before our eyes. Australians are trashing the very qualities that make it such a precious place. To us, and to our visitors. Shameful and disgraceful.