Conservation officer accuses media of trivia
Wellington reporter The news media have been accused by a senior officer of the new Conservation Department, Dr Les Molloy, of trivialising conservation issues. He described news media interest in the difference of opinion between the West Coast branch of the National Party and National’s Parliamentary wing over the future of South Westland’s native forests as “trivialisation.”
Dr Molloy told a conservation conference in Wellington that far more had been written or spoken about this local dispute than had ever been produced on the fate of the forests themselves. It was incredible, on the other hand, that the news media had failed to probe the Government’s decision to abolish the Crown Estate Commission before it had had a meeting. Instead, the Government had pressed ahead
at an extraordinary pace . with the allocation of millions of hectares of public land to State-owned corporations or to the Conservation Department without any public involvement in the process, he said. It should have been the conservation story of the decade, but the news media had ignored it until the Maori prople had rightly taken their concerns to the High Court, where the issue was now being argued.
Permanent link to this item
https://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/newspapers/CHP19870513.2.162.3
Bibliographic details
Press, 13 May 1987, Page 36
Word Count
199Conservation officer accuses media of trivia Press, 13 May 1987, Page 36
Using This Item
Stuff Ltd is the copyright owner for the Press. You can reproduce in-copyright material from this newspaper for non-commercial use under a Creative Commons BY-NC-SA 3.0 New Zealand licence. This newspaper is not available for commercial use without the consent of Stuff Ltd. For advice on reproduction of out-of-copyright material from this newspaper, please refer to the Copyright guide.
Copyright in all Footrot Flats cartoons is owned by Diogenes Designs Ltd. The National Library has been granted permission to digitise these cartoons and make them available online as part of this digitised version of the Press. You can search, browse, and print Footrot Flats cartoons for research and personal study only. Permission must be obtained from Diogenes Designs Ltd for any other use.
Acknowledgements
This newspaper was digitised in partnership with Christchurch City Libraries.