Nature lobby happy

Press, 11 February 1981, Page 6

Nature lobby happy

PA Nelson The Native Forests Action Council cannot.think of anyone better for : the job of Minister of the Environment than Dr I. J. Shearer according to the president of the council Miss Gwenny Davis. She said yesterday.-That the council was also pleased Dr Shearer had been made Minister of Science because the D.S.I.R. part of the Minister’s responsibility was linked to environmental matters. b J..-/'. She said Dr Shearer was articulate about and sympathetic towards environmental matters. She expected him to take the job seriously and do it well.. ■ , i The council expected the' appointment and could not) understand the previous arrangement where Mr V. ‘■S. Young was Minister of Lands and Forests and Minister of the Environment. . Development - orientated matters did not fit well with environmental matters she said.

Mr Young was more Min; ister of Forests and Lands

than of the Environment i said Miss Davis. ‘Professor John' Morton of Auckland a- former chairman q'f the Nature Conservation Council said last evening.' that Dr Shearer’s appointment was surprising but most welcome. “If Mr Muldoon is really beginning to take notice of the environmental lobby he has certainly been very kind to conservatives on this 1

i occasion” said Professor Morton. .Mr .-Mpldbon said last week the had ■ been''“very very kind” to conservationists by'calling a ; moratorium -on logging in ; the Pureora forest. Professor Morton said er. r vironmentalists would be f looking' to - Dr Shearer to make his : voice heard in the I Cabinet on? environmental issues. ■'?.<