This is also a story about the history of the Australian Greens party. Our roots go back to community activism of the 1960s and 1970s.

Green bans changed the political weather four decades ago. The decision of the Builders Labourers Federation to down tools when developers threatened urban bushland started a great movement.

In 1969 after Jack Mundey, Joe Owens, and Bob Pringle became leaders of the NSW branch of the Builders Labourers Federation, they issued a statement that builders workers “had the right to express an opinion on social questions relating to the building industry”.

Prompted by this, a group of middle-class women who comprised the "Battlers for Kelly's Bush" asked the BLF for help to prevent the destruction of the bushland for luxury housing.

There was a spirited debate when the BLF executive considered the request, with some members saying, "We haven't got any builders labourers living in Hunters Hill. Why should a piece of bushland there be our concern?"

The Battlers called a public meeting which was attended by more than 450 people who overwhelmingly passed a motion to seek help from the BLF. The BLF then imposed the first Green Ban.

Kelly's Bush was saved. It was not developed into luxury harbour side apartments for the privileged few, and to this day remains urban bushland for all to enjoy.

This campaign set the precedent for cooperation between unionists and community activists.

Among those who found the Green Bans inspirational in the 1970s was Petra Kelly, a German political activist visiting Australia.

She took the name “Green” [Gruen} and philosophy home with her and used them when in 1980 she became one of the founders of the German Greens [Die Gruenen], a political party promulgating the four basic principles of ecological sustainability, grass roots democracy, social justice and non-violence.

The first Greens Party in this country was formed in Sydney 1984.

Jack Mundey is a proud member of the Greens.

Source: - "Green Bans", by Senator Lee Rhiannon

People, come March 2015 and you have to vote, have a good long, long, hard think about not who you are voting for, but what you are voting for. Do you really want a NSW Liberal Government, so many MPs who have resigned, and do you really want that. Iain Fyfe, Greens candidate for the state seat of Goulburn, is a good man, is an honest man, is a family man, is a Green man. Throw Goward out, throw the Liberals out.

Rod Therkelsen

Convenor Burrinjuck Greens.