Let's play our part in ridding Shepparton of plastic bags

Pay five cents for the convenience of using a single use plastic bag! Yes, and that is exactly what they do in the United Kingdom.

And again, yes, that could and should happen here in Shepparton. 

Professor Wouter Pooretinga
from Cadiff University.

Of course, the first question is why? 

Put simply the plastic bags we use, almost casually and then throw away, are resource intensive and cause huge damage to our environment; an environment you and I, not to mention myriad other species depend upon to survive.

Plastic bags and petroleum are intrinsically linked. Nearly ten percent of our oil supply goes to making plastic. It is estimated that some 12 million barrels of oil a year are used in making the plastic bags used in America alone.

Our behaviour reflects that of Americans who throw away about 10 bags a week and just like our U.S. counterparts, we do pretty much the same. That’s a lot of bags. 

Most of the plastic ever produced by humanity still exists, somewhere. 

The success of the UK plastic bag charging program, the disruption it has had on habit and resultant “spillover” effects was recently discussed by a professor of Environmental Psychology from Cardiff University at a University of Melbourne lecture.

Professor Wouter Poortinga was openly excited about the success of the UK program pointing the “spillover effects” that drew people into talking about the reasons for the plastic bag charge, subsequently making them more conscious of environmental matters.

The program to charge for single use plastic bags, introduced late in 2015, has had, he explained, overwhelming support and was now been accepted by most people (95 per cent), who had switched to taking their own reusable bags when going shopping.

The reasons to rid the community of plastic bags, he explained are clearly understood by environmentalists, but even those less conscious of those urgencies, seemed to embrace the idea.

Questioned about why people took up the idea so quickly and enthusiastically, Professor Poortinga said the the money raised from the charge went to charities named by shopkeepers.

He said that it was clear to people that beyond doing the right thing by the environment, they were also helping out, even in a small way, various community charities.

It would be a wonderful project for the Shepparton Chamber of Commerce and Industry to play a part in initiating a plastic bag charging system throughout the city - it’s a classic “win win” situation.

The experience of Prof Poortinga illustrates that it is something welcomed by both retailers and the shoppers. Oh, and of course the environment!

Should we in Shepparton follow the lead suggested by Prof Poortinga, not only would we rid ourselves of the accursed plastic bag, but we could help groups such as the Shepparton-based, The Community Fund.

Idea festival exposes a parallel universe

Much of a recent week was lived in a parallel universe.

It was a world of ideas, hope, imagination, dreams, the impossible, concepts beyond the status quo and although exciting in the extreme, it was tiring.

The latter, of course, was not unexpected for once we step beyond what is familiar and embrace the new, we find ourselves entangled with fresh intellectual rigour and through just being different, it induces both physical and mental weariness.

Contemporary society does not encourage us to abandon the familiar rather; the market system prefers us to have a somewhat narrow view of value, worth and the causes of contentment to ensure the mental poverty of most enriches the elite.

Spending much of the week and the University of Melbourne’s biennial Festival of Ideas is an indulgence; gastronomy for the mind, a reminder of how little we understand, how remote we are from wisdom, knowledge and intelligence and how distant we are from having any real grasp of how, what, where and when.

Some would argue such pursuits irrelevant to their lives for they know who won the footy finals, what’s filling the movie theatres, what’s on the television tonight and what they need to do to ensure the pay checks keep rolling in.

But life is more than that, it is more than bread and circuses for human flourishing is about engaging with an idea that is bigger than you, an idea that both expands and demands more of your thinking and it is an idea that at first seems without rationale, but then becomes the solution.

Many things now are humanity’s staples were once ideas resident on the fringes of society or only thought about in moments of lucid madness.

We need more such festivals and maybe that is a project for the new Committee of Shepparton – Shepparton’s own Festival of ideas.

Ideas, no matter how vague, poorly articulated or inadequately thought through were not, according to the founder of Minds at Work, Jason Clarke, to be discounted or allowed to wither for all should be considered and welcomed to the conversation.

Victor Hugo.

Shepparton is in urgent need of a new idea as the 20^th century inspirational drivers of several decades are dying and maybe a universe in which fresh ideas are abundant will be found at our own ideas skirmish.

Melbourne has its Festival of ideas, Sydney its Festival of Dangerous Ideas and we should have our own agora, that ancient Greece marketplace-like concept where people met talked, considered and determined for their community, the best way ahead.

It was Frenchman, Victor Hugo who said: “One can resist the invasion of armies; one cannot resist the invasion of ideas.”

Let’s initiate that “invasion” and find a new idea for Shepparton.

Malcolm Turnbull's appeal goes beyond politics

Malcolm Turnbull is of the wrong political stripe, but I would vote for him.

That, however, is unlikely for I live in Shepparton and he represents the central Sydney-based seat of Wentworth, and for now, as he has indicated his intent to retire.

Malcolm Turnbull

The 56-year-old former investment banker, and journalist, is a considered and articulate man who values reason more than emotion and has that mysterious panache that frequently attaches itself to leaders.
Turnbull became the leader of the national Liberal Party late in 2008 and just over a year later was defeated by Tony Abbott, who continues in that role – although unaware of the accompanying political intrigue, that change in Liberal leadership makes me wonder about what value the Liberals put on reason and intelligence?
A recent free public lecture given by Mr Turnbull at the University of Melbourne attracted about 250 people, many, no doubt, who would have been students of politics, social dynamics and, of course, those interested in the broader machinations of society.
The present Shadow Minister for Communications spoke for about 40 minutes and although the hour-long session was meant to end at 7:30pm, Mr Turnbull was still answering questions at nearly eight o’clock.
The recently retired head of the university’s Centre for Advanced Journalism, Michael Gwenda, closed the conversation and in thanking Mr Turnbull asked for a show of thanks, igniting applause louder than heard at most similar events.
It was Mr Turnbull’s belief in the seriousness of human induced climate change that led to the end of his Liberal Party leadership, despite the fact that many of fellow party members vouched their support.
Listening to Mr Turnbull speak affirmed, in reverse, the Socrates observation that "the unexamined life is not worth living" for he allows nothing by until he has considered and examined the detail.
Interestingly, I do not stand alone in my admiration of Mr Turnbull for beyond most of those who heard the recent lecture - “Politics, Journalism and the 24/7 News Cycle” – there was a visiting professor who had played a senior role in American public life and spoke a few weeks earlier said: “American politics needs someone like Malcolm Turnbull”.
Australians have had their chance to luxuriate in Mr Turnbull’s intelligence, but generally abused that opportunity and rather than have him lead the Liberal Party, and then, hopefully, the country, they have opted for a regression into what he calls “the game” of politics, rather than the examination of and substance of what it is that makes democracy work and the subsequent implications of benefits for all.
Democracy demands many things, among them good journalism, but beyond that it also critically needs thoughtful and visionary fellows such as Malcolm Turnbull.

Epiphany-like experience seemed somewhat prophetic

Suddenly, I was saddened that this is all going to slip away.

Melbourne's Swanston St in
 the midst of its redevelopment.

The epiphany-like experience engulfed me as I crossed Swanston St walking toward the Wheeler Centre for Books, Writing and Ideas.
It was not a longing for any specific thing, rather the perceived erosion of the cacophonous life and the overwhelming and embracing sense of community that existed as thousands went about their disparate affairs in a wonderful public, shared space.
The Melbourne experience was little more than what I frequently feel in Shepparton - a microcosm of bubbling life in which individual intents are different, but from which intuition discerns co-operation and collaboration.
Melbourne’s spacious inner-city streets, which some claim were the outcome of a misinterpretation of street plan dimensions, a refreshing error, have always had a welcoming and wonderful human-scale about them.
Central Melbourne is emerging from an epoch in which the motor car had almost uninhibited dominion of the streets with the pedestrian pushed to the fringes.
That, however, is changing and Swanston Street is being redeveloped to make it essentially car free and people will again prevail, although Melbourne’s wonderful trams will still course up and down the street.

Roy Neel

As I write the sounds of what could be a dying dinosaur reach my Ashenden St home from the Springcar Nationals at the city’s showgrounds as people engage in an activity, which I can understand, but within a few decades be something people will equate with the final deathly moans of the petroleum era.
The epiphany-like Swanston St experience and the Springnats appear at first glance to be unrelated, but they are not for the purpose of my visit to Melbourne was to hear the Adjunct Professor of Political Science from a Tennessee University and Al Gore chief of staff and former U.S. assistant secretary of state, Roy Neel, talk at the University of Melbourne about a just and sustainable post carbon economy.
Prof Neel gave optimistic and pessimistic views of how the world will unfold between now and 2050 and in either scenario pedestrians will still be in Swanston St, trams will be doubtful and nor will I, anyone else for that matter, be assaulted by the noise of events such as the Springnats.
The unanswered question, of course, will be: “What will the mood of the people be like?” after decades of living in an energy-depleted world with a desolate landscape troubled by massive weather events or living and surviving in a world that is understandable, but substantially changed from what exists.
That sounds, rather apocalyptic, but Neel’s pessimistic scenario was just that and although his optimistic scenario was somewhat better, it demanded understanding that civilization’s survival rested with co-operation and the embrace of the “other”.

Breathe deep on ideas - the oxygen of life

Ideas are the oxygen of life.

Thomas Keneally - the author's
 keynote lecture at the
 University of Melbourne's
Festival of ideas will be streamed
 live into Shepparton.

Cleaning your teeth or putting a man on the moon where both, at first, little more than ideas.

That thought, or idea, expands, becomes intent and then, with effort, reality.

Leaning on that interpretation, ideas are integral to the human infrastructure and as such are the cornerstone of what it is that ignites and sustains love and, by contrast, they are also the starting point of all evil that has troubled humankind for millennia.

Ideas in our contemporary world are considered to be the province of the corporate world and academia, but in reality they are not exclusive to any group or individual, rather the property of all, especially in the disorder of democracy.

It is human nature to think and from those thoughts, random or otherwise, come ideas, but without the courage implementation demands they are little more than notions, like a sail without wind.

Ideas have seen the world crammed with people, ideas have created consumerism exhausting the world’s finite resources, ideas have led mankind down the self-destructive path of violence, it is ideas that have worsened our atmosphere and yet, it is ideas that will see us find a way around this impasse.

Shepparton people will have the opportunity to think about the importance of ideas when two keynote lectures from the University of Melbourne’s second Festivalof Ideas are streamed-live into the city in June.

Contemporary life is structured in a way the empties individuals of the courage it takes to pursue ideas, but learning that others think like you, or are at least adventurous in their thinking, is both fortifying and encouraging.

Like all other communities, the Greater Goulburn Valley has an urgent need for ideas.
Whatever your opinion about the refurbishment of the Murray Goulburn Irrigation system, it was an idea that brought millions of dollars to the area and inveigled a commercial brightness for an industry that had been struggling with a decade long drought.
However, to be successful an idea doesn’t need commercial worth and be lauded for its monetary value for just as easily, and probably more importantly to society’s wellbeing, it could be a purely social idea that improves the lot of all.
Contemporary life sees us locked into consuming daily doings that are rooted in economics and so permits little or no time for the reflection that allows for the conception of new ideas and along with that, space in our lives for the gestation, birth and nourishment of new ideas.
I urge you to allow yourself two hours later this month during which you can invigorate your thinking by listening to, and watching, two of Australia’s most powerful thinkers during Shepparton’s part in the University of Melbourne’s Festival of Ideas.