25 Mr Mantle wanted to run cattle on the Norvill property for his food and beverage business. One of Mr Mantle's businesses was called "Jimmy's on the Mall", a Brisbane restaurant. Mr Mantle obtained advice about his proposals for cattle grazing on the property from Mr Rawson. Mr Rawson told Mr Mantle that he could clear five acres a year of regrowth scrub. Mr Rawson carried out fencing work on the Norvill property. He installed some cattle yards at the bottom of the property. Mr Rawson purchased some beef cattle for stocking on the property. Mr Mantle told Mr Rawson to clear the land to get the grass capacity up to run cattle. Mr Rawson estimated 90% of the property was to be brought up to a capacity for grazing cattle.
26 Mr Rawson agreed to work for Mr Mantle at a rate of $32.00 per hour, removing camphor laurels, privets and weeds and otherwise cleaning up the property. Mr Rawson said Mr Mantle wanted to put his own cattle on the property. Mr Rawson said he spoke with Mr Mantle about how good the property could be for cattle if the scrub were to be cleared up.
27 Mr Rawson said he commenced work on the Golf Course and cut and poisoned camphor laurels there. In late 2005, he started work on the Norvill property. Mr Rawson said that there were numerous weeds on the property because it had been neglected for forty years. These included camphor laurels and privets.
28 Mr Rawson said that there was so much work to do that he could not set a pattern. Sometimes he could work in one area, but a roaring southerly wind would hit so he would move to another area. Some of the areas were impenetrable. He would be scratched and sore from working in them on one day but the next day he decided that he would pick some easier work to do.
29 Mr Rawson used a chainsaw to cut the trees and weeds. For large trees, he said that he would cut pockets or notches around the trunk and put poison in the cuts. For smaller trees, he said he would cut the trunk off at or near ground level.
30 Mr Rawson invoiced TGM for work done on the Golf Course and the Norvill property. Mr Rawson's invoices refer to work done on eradication of trees or camphor laurels between 22 February 2005 and 17 August 2006. The work done in 2005 was principally on the Golf Course whilst from late 2005 through 2006, the work done was on the Norvill property.
31 Mr Rawson did not contest the prosecutor's evidence as to the total number of plants of each threatened species that had been picked on the Norvill property. Rather, Mr Rawson denied or did not admit picking specific plants, although he did admit picking hundreds of plants. Mr Rawson gave a variety of reasons for his denials or non-admissions of picking certain plants. However, each of Mr Rawson's reasons was proven to be wrong in relation to many plants. Overall, I find Mr Rawson's evidence as to his denials and non-admissions to be lacking in credibility and I do not accept it for a number of reasons.
32 First, Mr Rawson's evidence, in his affidavits and his oral evidence on-site and in court, was consistent in maintaining that the purpose of his work on the Norvill property was to clear large areas of vegetation so as to improve the pasture and productivity of the Norvill property for cattle grazing.
33 In most of the areas in which Mr Rawson worked, Mr Rawson said he intended to remove all vegetation, except for a few trees for shade or aesthetic reasons, to convert the land to pasture for cattle grazing. He intended to, and understood Mr Mantle wanted him to, open up the property like the Teitzel property which was largely cleared. He estimated about 90% of the property was to be brought up to a capacity for cattle grazing. In other areas, such as either side of a creek flowing through the Norvill property, Mr Rawson stated he cut and poisoned vegetation to open up the canopy to let sunshine in and grass to grow or to allow better flow of underground water to the creek to provide drinking water for the stock, both being of benefit to improve the property for cattle grazing. At times, Mr Rawson said, he needed to clear a track to get to or to work on or around a tree, and this involved cutting vegetation. In relation to some trees, such as acacias, he said he removed them because they might in the future fall and damage fencing that he proposed to erect.
34 Mr Rawson admitted to working in each area on the Norvill property where threatened species were picked and admitted picking plants of threatened species in each area. In many instances, plants which Mr Rawson admitted picking were located immediately adjacent to or in near proximity to plants which he denied or did not admit cutting.
35 It would, therefore, be inconsistent with the purpose for which Mr Rawson was engaged to work on the Norvill property and his stated intention to clear vegetation on the property, and the actual work that he did, across the property, for Mr Rawson to have been the person who cut and poisoned only a quarter of the plants of the threatened species in the areas in which he worked but not to have been the person who cut and poisoned the other three quarters of plants of the threatened species in the very same areas, sometimes immediately adjacent to or otherwise in near proximity to plants which Mr Rawson admitted to having cut and poisoned.
36 Secondly, Mr Rawson's non-admissions of picking hundreds of plants were solely based on the fact that Mr Rawson did not inspect those plants, whether because he could not find them or for other reasons. Hence, Mr Rawson never formed a positive opinion about those plants and was not in a position to deny picking them.
37 Thirdly, although Mr Rawson denied picking many plants in his affidavit evidence, when he later gave oral evidence on-site or in court, he admitted picking them. The most common explanation given by Mr Rawson for his change in evidence was that he had been mistaken as to the plant concerned when he prepared his affidavit evidence. In order to respond to the prosecutor's list of plants that had been picked, Mr Rawson borrowed a GPS unit from an acquaintance. Mr Rawson had never used a GPS unit before and conceded that he found difficulty in using it and finding the plants at the GPS co-ordinates specified. He said he was unable to find many of the plants. It became clear at the on-site hearing, that plants that Mr Rawson thought he had found were in fact completely different plants. Although Mr Rawson had denied cutting certain plants, for differing reasons, on a number of occasions on the site hearing, upon seeing a plant Mr Rawson said he had not looked at that plant and must have been looking at a different plant when he prepared his affidavit.
38 For plants located on the Norvill property but towards the boundary of the Golf Course, Mr Rawson used the blanket reason of "on golf course" to justify his denial of picking the plants. On the site hearing, however, it became clear that Mr Rawson was not in fact denying that he cut those plants, but rather believed that he could not be held legally responsible if the plants were located on the Golf Course. Yet again, Mr Rawson was mistaken as to the location of the plants. They were in fact on the Norvill property, not on the Golf Course.
39 Mr Rawson also said that, given he had cut, poisoned or otherwise injured on his estimate 35,000 to 40,000 trees, shrubs or weeds on the Norvill property over an extended period, it was hard to be specific about a particular plant, "one little stick". As Mr Rawson said in a record of interview in answer to a question whether he chopped down trees in an area, "I covered that much country out there, I don't know".
40 The consequence is that Mr Rawson's denials or non-admissions in relation to specific plants were unreliable and cannot be accepted.
41 Fourthly, Mr Rawson denied cutting and poisoning many plants on the basis of the manner in which he observed the cutting and poisoning had been done. Mr Rawson's denials were unconvincing. Types of cuts which Mr Rawson said he never used, such as v-shaped cut, or an angular cut or cutting high on a stem or trunk, in fact were shown to be used by Mr Rawson on trees and plants that he admitted cutting. Furthermore, the prosecutor's evidence (from Allen Goodwin, William McDonald, Rhonda James and Scott Beaumont) established a consistency of cutting techniques employed in cutting and poisoning the plants. I do not accept Mr Rawson's evidence that the cutting techniques used on the plants which Mr Rawson denied cutting were so different to the cutting techniques used on the plants which he admitted cutting that he could not have cut all of the plants.
42 Mr Rawson also expressed a proud belief in the efficacy of his work in cutting and poisoning plants. He denied cutting and poisoning certain plants on the basis that they were still alive, at least in part, when he inspected them in preparation of his affidavit. This may be because the plants had regrown underneath the cut or only part of the foliage had died from poisoning. Mr Rawson stated that anything he poisoned doesn't grow back. This assertion too proved not to be correct. Mr Rawson later conceded that he had only a 90% success rate in killing trees and that there were a number of variables which could affect the success rate of killing a tree. Moreover, many of the large camphor laurel trees he admits to poisioning have suckered profusely from their extensive root systems, posing a threat to the recovery of native vegetation. Mr Rawson also stated that the complete removal of vegetation required reworking in an area.
43 Fifthly, Mr Rawson's speculation that other persons may have cut and poisoned the plants he denied or did not admit cutting was unconvincing and without evidentiary foundation. Mr Rawson's suggestions focussed on marijuana growers, surveyors, Robert Choat (who had milled some camphor laurel) or people who are opposed to TGM and its proposed development of the Golf Course and Norvill property. Mr Rawson said he never saw any of these persons cutting or poisoning plants on the property. Indeed, he said he never saw anyone else cutting plants, never heard a chainsaw operating elsewhere when he was working on the property and never saw any evidence of plants that had been cut and poisoned when he was working on the property. It is implausible that Mr Rawson, throughout the whole period he worked on the land, would not have seen persons cutting plants, or seen cut plants, if some other persons were in fact cutting the plants.
44 The only person Mr Rawson admitted to have ever been with him was a son of Mr Clark who was the manager of the Golf Course land employed by TGM. Although he initially denied his presence, upon being confronted with evidence from Messrs Colvin and McArthur (the ecologists for TGM) that they saw a person answering the description of one of Mr Clark's sons with Mr Rawson, he conceded that the son had been present on a few occasions. However, Mr Rawson denied that the son ever did any of the cutting and poisoning. Whether this denial was the truth or intended to protect the son cannot be ascertained. Mr Rawson's evidence remained, however, that only he, and not the son also, cut and poisoned the plants. On this basis, the son cannot be found to have cut the plants that Mr Rawson denied or did not admit cutting.
45 For these reasons, I find Mr Rawson cut, poisoned and otherwise injured the numbers of plants of the threatened species particularised by the prosecutor.