Government’s letter to conservation groups has ominous implications | Lenore Taylor

New reporting rules seem to represent a big win for the campaign by the mining sector and conservative politicians to stifle environmental advocacy

The environment department has recently begun sending letters to conservation groups registered as eligible for tax deductible donations, as they do every year. But this year the correspondence is different, in a disturbing way.

In the past the groups, which include all the big names such as the Australian Conservation Society, The Wilderness Society, Lock the Gate, Greenpeace etc, as well as small local conservation organisations, were simply asked to reveal the total expenditure from their public fund. This year they have also been asked to break down their expenditure into the amounts spent on "on ground environmental remediation", "campaign and advocacy", "research" and other administration.