18 May 2007

Royal Canberra takes what it wants and bugger the rest of us

| johnboy
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The Canberra Times reports that, like their members, the Royal Canberra Golf Club considers itself to be above the petty restrictions which encumber scum like the rest of us.

In particular they are ignoring water restrictions and pumping as much water out of the lake as they want, in the ten months of the financial year the fat cats have made off with double their allocation and can’t be bothered responding to the NCA’s communications on the matter.

The NCA is going to try and change the laws to bring them to heel but I, for one, call for all the members to be rendered down Fremen style to repay the water they have taken from the community.

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maybe we should remember that water is not ours as such, and to stop enviromental flows is to deprive anyone downstream of us of water.
when bleating about your lawn etc, think of where adelaides water comes from.
just use less water.

Enviromental flows: read the friggin paper folks! ACTEW has been reducing enviromental flows big time over the last few years.

I like the lets tax them the land rates based upon size. But it wont work becasue they would have to tax all of the golf clubs the same.

Best idea is to have ACA or TT contacted.

Already have a tank connected to internal plumbing.

Corin, Bendora and Cotter dams have been getting ok flows – but they aren’t big enough.

Hey, Nemo. No good building another dam if it’s never going to fill! Dams don’t create water, they just block its natural flow.

Stick a tank in if you want to build a buffer and have a clear conscience.

I’m sick of water restrictions. Let the club take the water from the lake.

There have been no new dams in Australia in the last 25 years. We need to stop whinging and start putting in the infrastructure.

Round-up the lot, re-zone it and flog it to some greek developer in a double-breasted suit. Fuggem! They can set up a new golf course out at Burra or somewhere.

Meanwhile, those in the know go to the Federal, a far more beautiful course and a lot less wankers.

Couldn’t we just let the golf club continue, but appropriate part of their land for green playing fields for our kids? They have far more than they need and, anyway, they should be relocated outside the city.

If the appropriation doesn’t work, withdraw the massive rates subsidy they are presently given. A 1,000 sq metre block in Yarralumla would pay about $2,000 in rates; I don’t know how big the golf course is, but you could squeeze a few 1,000 sq m blocks on there.

Actually should say 450 yard drive

I’d love to drive on a hard, bare fairway – Coober Pedy is the only place I have achieved a 450 foot drive. No water on those greens either, just tons of old sump oil.

If my lease said I could use as much water as I liked out of the lake then I would as well. Mightn’t be the right thing to do ethically but legally they are cruising. NCA have not a leg to stand on.

barking toad4:27 pm 18 May 07

jb, true that Royal Canberra is well equipped with lawyers.

But not all are too smart.

When the old clubhouse caught fire, it was one of those lawyers that called the fire brigade.

Much to the disgust of the members at the course at the time. There was some concern that the hoses might arrive in time to put it out.

does no-one here care about the poor golfers? have you tried hitting a two iron off a bare lie?? come on, people – golf is more important than all this quibble over a couple litres or so of that water stuff… or where would all the jokes go?

fore!

Lets just wait for the report to be released that the last 24 hours of downpour has had absolutely no effect on our dams, on account of the water falling in the wrong place or some other stupid remark.

When will the sensible question be asked – why aren’t the dams in the right place then ?

Indeed. That I want stopped.

the Murrumbidgee that we’re releasing our drinking water into to maintain environmental flows.

Really bad interview by the Golf guy – basically “I know the NCA say we can only have this much, but we don’t think that’s right so we’ll just do what we want”

Lets try that from an ‘average joe’ point of view… “yes officer, i know the speed sign said 60km/h but that dosen’t work for me so I thought I’d take it up to 150km/h”

It’s not like either parties using lake water are going to drain the lake dry.

I don’t think its an issue as we are not extracting it for household consumption (it gets fouled by Queanbeyan and Fyshwick on its way down), and otherwise it’s just going to end up down the Murrumbidgee at some point.

which would be why the NCA wants to try and change the law, although the compensation will be a doozy.

Sadly Royal Canberra is rather well equipped with lawyers.

I thought the letter of the law actually states that they and the uni can take whatever they damn well please.

It’s in the article, others including the GG pump from the lake, but they differ from the golfers by abiding by their abstraction limits.

Isn’t pumping from the lake the way the Governor General keeps his garden green, lush and luxuriant also?

Who else has water use rights from Lake Barely Drippin’?

“These blokes need some damage control, quick.”
They’re not overly concerned what we or anybody else thinks about them. That’s the nature of places like this.

Yeah, cut the fence and spray the place!

Damage control? You mean round up on all 18 holes? And the two on each member?

Indeed, the bloke from Royal Canberra sounded cocky and arrogant on 666 this morning.

Whether it is accurate or not, the idea that the top end of town is playing golf on lush green grass, while elsewhere in town local sporting clubs are unable to play their chosen sport due to the sorry state of the local ovals, is not a great image.

These blokes need some damage control, quick.

change the laws and frack ’em

Yeah we’ll start feeling like we are living in Arrakis if we don’t get more of last night’s rain every week between here and Xmas…

I listened to the bloke from the golf club talking to Ross Solly on 666 this morning – didn’t seem to have a clue or a plan. His take-home message was just “we disagree with what the NCA said we could have and they never replied to our letter, so we just keep on using whatever we want…”

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