Massive handouts to cronies, shameless flouting of legal process and the ability to override an elected parliament - no, I'm not talking about Saddam Hussein's Iraq. I'm talking about Paul Lennon's Tasmania.

At the heart of the rot on the Apple Isle is Gunns Ltd, Tasmania's largest private landowner and Australia's largest hardwood forestry company. When it comes to destroying native forest, desecrating Aboriginal cultural sites and polluting waterways, Gunns is a world leader. And what Gunns wants in Tasmania, Gunns gets.

The recent approval of a new woodchip mill to be built in northern Tasmania is a case in point.

From the beginning of the process, taxpayers' money was being thrown at Gunns to subsidise their pulp mill project. The federal government provided them with $5 million in direct handouts, in addition to a $60 million upgrade to the Tamar Valley highway intended to service the proposed site (allocated before the mill was even approved). The state government has been similarly generous, spending $6 million on establishing the Pulp Mill Task Force - effectively a public relations vehicle to promote the mill.

When the Resource Planning and Development Commission (which assesses proposed projects for environmental and social impact) raised concerns about the project during its assessment, the Lennon government responded by forcing two of its members to resign. One of their replacements accused the Tasmanian Premier of misleading parliament and described the process as fundamentally flawed.

When the Commission ruled, despite intimidation, that the Gunns mill application was "critically non-compliant" with their guidelines, Gunns pulled out of the process altogether and the State government instead fast-tracked the approval through the issuing of permits directly to the company. Gunns' lawyers participated in the development of the permit conditions, while the Tasmanian parliament was denied any right to amend or revise the conditions. Details of the deal, including the bargain basement price at which they are getting access to native timber, have not been disclosed.

Nor is this is the first time Gunns has used its enormous corporate power to override parliament and the limited environmental protections that exist. In 1989, Gunns Chairman Edmund Rouse was jailed for bribery after he attempted to pay Labor MP Jim Cox to cross the floor, in an effort to prevent the formation of a Labor-Green Accord government in Tasmania which might have posed a potential threat to Gunns.

But Gunns' fears proved unwarranted. Soon after its election, the LGA government established the Forest and Forest Industry Council, ostensibly to resolve the conflict between Gunns and environmentalists, but many environmental groups soon withdrew from it in protest at its pro-forestry company agenda.

In the early nineties, and with the Liberals back in power, the state government passed laws against protesting, including massive fines for any individuals attending protests. The laws were so draconian that they eventually had to be repealed because they infringed the National Competition Policy by giving the Tasmanian forestry industry, dominated by Gunns, an unfair advantage over that of other states.

Such antics demonstrate the utter contempt both corporations and elected governments have for even the limited democratic structures of our society. Time and time again, when things like the right to protest, Aboriginal land rights or even the right to parliamentary accountability of corporations get in the way of bosses making money, they are trashed.

Elected governments cooperate with this agenda because the alternative is to jeopardise potential investment in their state or nation. The Gunns pulp mill, for example, if it goes ahead, will be the largest private project ever undertaken in Tasmania, involving $1.6 billion of investment. Generating more profits for Tasmanian capitalism therefore overrides any obligations on the part of the state government to do with protecting forests, animals, human health or people's rights.

It is not, as some argue, that there are votes in destroying the environment. The pulp mill is overwhelmingly unpopular, with two-thirds of voters opposed to its construction and nearly the same number reporting that it will affect the way they vote. Eleven thousand people demonstrated against it in Launceston earlier this year - one of the largest demonstrations ever seen in Tasmania. In his own electorate, Premier Lennon's popularity has slumped to a humiliating 24 per cent.

And if adequate retraining and resettlement allowances were provided, instead of the millions spent subsidising Gunns, there is no doubt that forestry workers and others dependent on the industry could be won over too.

A concerted movement against the mill which involved strikes, demonstrations and picket lines against Gunns and the government could stop the mill. But without such a movement, the unelected, unaccountable, profit-driven bosses who run Gunns will ultimately decide the fate of Tasmania's old growth forests, simply because they control the wealth that governments want to see invested in their patch of the world.

This highlights why electing better people to parliament is not enough to protect our rights or the environment. Those who control capital ultimately wield a power above and beyond that of elected governments.

For a world that's truly democratic, we need democratic control of industry, which means workers collectively making the decisions about how paper is produced and how native forests are used and enjoyed, not boards of directors. Only then will there be the potential for decisions being made that are in the best interests of human beings, not the bosses' bottom line.

Such control involves a fundamental challenge to the capitalist system and the ideas that justify it. The sooner that starts to happen, the better.

FOUR REASONS TO OPPOSE THE PULP MILL

1 Aboriginal cultural sites facing destruction

At least 18 sites of Aboriginal cultural significance are threatened by the construction of the mill; the obligation on Gunns to consult with Aboriginal custodians before construction has been removed by the state government.

2 Impact on the environment

The mill will dump 64,000 tonnes of carcinogenic effluent into Bass Strait every day, including dioxins and furans which accumulate in the food chain. It will use 80 per cent native timber from Tasmania's majestic old growth forests. It has been exempted from national air pollution limits by the state government, and Gunns has also requested permission to exceed the limits for nitrous oxide emissions. 

3 Human health jeopardised

The Australian Medical Association opposes the construction of the mill due to the impact it would have on human health through the release of highly carcinogenic organochlorides into the waterways and air, as well as the smell which, even when treated, can cause headaches and nausea among people living within a 20 km radius of the mill.

4 Endangered species threatened

The construction of the mill will raise the likelihood of the giant Tasmanian wedge-tailed eagle becoming extinct from 65 per cent to 99 per cent, and will threaten the existence of the world's largest freshwater crayfish, not to mention the impact of the destruction of swathes of bushland habitat on countless native birds and animals.