Dunedin will play host to the New Zealand Minerals Forum at the end of the month, where the companies who dig up New Zealand and destroy our natural environment for private profit will conspire on how to pillage more effectively while avoiding being held responsible for the damage they do. The forum will be held at the Dunedin Centre, which is operated by Dunedin City Council-owned Dunedin Venues. And this has raised a few eyebrows:
Protesters are already planning to make their voices heard at the event, and yesterday Wise Response environmental group chairman Sir Alan Mark questioned Dunedin Venues' actions.
In a letter to the Otago Daily Times, he asked whether Dunedin Venues had complied with its own policy, set out in its statement of intent, to "exhibit a sense of social and environmental responsibility".
The council also had a policy on achieving net zero carbon emissions in the city by 2050, and the company was supposed to bring any potential conflicts with policies to the council's attention, he said.
Councillors appeared to be unaware of the situation when the event was made public.
An obvious question here is whether Dunedin Venues would rent their venues to the tobacco industry. Because that's the level the mining industry is on in terms of social and environmental responsibility. Except that where the tobacco industry merely profits by literally selling cancer, and has caused a public health crisis which has killed millions, the mining industry profits by destroying the planet, and threatens to make the earth uninhabitable. No company with a real commitment to social and environmental responsibility should have anything to do with them. And no individual should either.
