The Howard Government offered a multi-million dollar subsidy to
shale oil company Southern Pacific Petroleum (SPP) on the condition
that SPP take legal action against Greenpeace, according to an
internal Department of Industry, Tourism & Resources (DITR)
email obtained by Greenpeace under Freedom of Information (FOI).
Greenpeace climate campaigner Gareth Walton said “Just days before
a Federal election that John Howard himself said would be about
trust, we have learnt that his government used taxpayers’ money to
incite an oil company to sue Greenpeace. I think most Australians
will be appalled by this abuse of power and the blatant attempt by
the government to silence a non-profit organisation.”
“Instead of making decisions in the public interest, the Howard
Government has been using taxpayers’ money to further its own
political interest and the interests of a greenhouse-polluting
industry,” Walton said. “Shale oil has always been a dirty
industry, but this deal shows it’s a whole lot dirtier than even
we thought.”
Referring to a 2002 decision by Federal Cabinet to provide SPP, the
developer of the controversial Stuart Shale Oil Project in
Queensland, with a sales grant worth nearly $55 per barrel of shale
oil or up to $36.4 million annually, the DITR email states:
The DITR email is available here
Contacts
Communications Officer: Tim Hollo on 0411 032 375
Campaigner: Gareth Walton on 0407 008 917
