Peter Stanton

James Peter Stanton PSM (born 1940) is an Australian landscape ecologist, fire ecologist, botanist and biogeographer who individually conducted systematic environmental resource surveys throughout Queensland whilst working for the National Parks department of Forestry (Qld.) from 1967–1974. He carried out his assessments in a wide range of dissimilar landscapes leading to the identification and protection of many critically threatened ecosystems across the state during a period of rapid and widespread land development under the Joh Bjelke-Petersen government.[1][2] For this work he became the first Australian to receive the IUCN Fred M. Packard Award in 1982.[3][4]

In 1973, Stanton undertook a field review of the conservation status of the Wet Tropics area of Queensland spanning two reports which were published by Queensland Forestry in 1974.[5][6] The reports reinforced and extended the 1965 conservation assessments of Dr. Leonard Webb AO and Geoff Tracey AM of CSIRO [7] which had been confined to the lowland areas of the region on account of the extreme development pressures which were placed on the lowlands from the mid-1950s onwards.[8] Stanton's assessments confirmed that "the areas Webb and Tracey had identified were still some of the highest priorities for conservation" whilst also identifying and recommending the protection of a number of additional endangered habitats both within and beyond the lowland areas. The early conservation work conducted in the Wet Tropics by Stanton, along with that of Webb and Tracey, was instrumental to the later protection of many rare and threatened landscapes within the region, including the lowland rainforests of the Daintree and Cape Tribulation area.[9][10]

From 1977 to 1997, he worked as a senior scientist for the Queensland National Parks and Wildlife Service, relocating from Brisbane to Cairns in 1979 where he remained stationed throughout his career. During this period Stanton produced a body of field research which was to significantly inform and support the listing process of the Wet Tropics of Queensland World Heritage area and its ongoing ecological management.[11][12][13] His conservation work in the Wet Tropics and Northern Queensland contributed to Stanton being awarded the Public Service Medal of Australia in 1996 for "outstanding public service to natural system protection and conservation planning" [14][15] and the Australian Centenary Medal in 2001 for "a long and distinguished public service career contributing to conservation of the Wet Tropics".[16]

In 2001, Stanton was also the recipient of the Australian Wet Tropics Management Authority’s ‘Cassowary Award’ for his scientific work and his vegetation mapping of the region which later culminated in the publication of 38 vegetation community maps at 1:50,000 scale entitled "The Vegetation of the Wet Tropics of Queensland bioregion" (J.P. & D.J. Stanton, 2005).[17][18] The project built on previous 1:100,000 vegetation mapping (Tracey and Webb 1975) [19] providing finer and more accurate vegetation mapping accompanied by a series of reports describing the main vegetation types of each mapsheet area, their understory types, disturbance histories and their links to the geology of the sites they occupy.[20]

Since 2003, Stanton has worked with the Australian Wildlife Conservancy as a senior landscape ecologist and Biogeographer.[21][22][23]

Peter Stanton in a paperbark swamp near Tully, Queensland. (1974)

Early life

Peter Stanton was born at Shorncliffe, on the northern outskirts of Brisbane, on 23 April 1940. He was educated at Banyo State High School, where he excelled at languages and athletics, and later at the University of Queensland and the Australian Forestry School (Canberra), emerging with a Bachelor of Science in Agriculture and a Diploma in Forestry in 1962.[24]

His formative years in the field of ecology were as a young child, on the mudflats of Shorncliffe and in the bushland of Bribie Island along with his younger brother, John Stanton (actor).[25] Stanton would later describe the sand island landscapes of his childhood around Moreton Bay as "unspoiled paradises of forest, swamp, flowering heath, giant sandhills, and seemingly endless surf and still water beaches" citing the subsequent broad-scale development of many such environments on the South-Eastern coastal fringe of Queensland in the ’60s as an early motivating influence upon his conservation work.[26][27]

Stanton worked for five years as a Forester until, in 1967, he was transferred to the National Parks branch of the Queensland Forestry Department. His transfer was a result of the interest he had shown in National Parks while working in Mackay, and his nomination of and the subsequent gazettal of Cape Upstart (east of Bowen) as a National Park.[28][29]

Political controversies

During his career within the Queensland National Parks and Wildlife Service Stanton was twice threatened with dismissal by the Queensland Government. In 1983, during the construction of the road through the Cape Tribulation National Park to Bloomfield he was suspended from the position of Regional Director for several months after having stood in the path of bulldozers in order to protect both the lives of protestors and what he considered to be the most significant tracts of rainforest. Due to public outcry as well as threats of broadscale strike among employees of the National Parks and Wildlife Service, Stanton was reinstated to the Regional Directorship at the recommendation of the Public Service Board in 1984 and remained in the position until he returned to full-time scientific field work in 1988.[30][31]

Later, in 1994, Stanton was recommended for disciplinary action by the State Government after he ordered that a smuggler’s vehicle laden with guns, chainsaws, illegal drugs and the seeds of the threatened Foxtail Palm be sent to the Cooktown Police Station. Stanton had advised Department of Environment and Heritage officer Pat Shears, who had confiscated the vehicle inside the Cape Melville National Park, to leave the matter in the hands of the police rather than immediately inform the DEH head office in Cairns. Stanton did not trust DEH senior management and feared that Shears may become the victim of "political interference". The vehicle was soon discovered to be connected to key political figures within the then Labour Government. The events were to culminate in a political scandal that came to be variously known as the Foxtail Palm Affair or the Cape Melville incident. The disciplinary action which had been recommended for Stanton was eventually abandoned in the face of significant public outcry.[32][33][34][35]

Selected works

The majority of Stanton's early and later resource surveys and scientific papers now reside in the collection of the National Library of Australia.

References
  1. Fitzgerald, Ross (1984). A History of Queensland Part 2: ‘1957 to the Early 1980s: Conservative Monopoly’. University of Queensland Press. p. 289-303,. ISBN 0 7022 1734 4.CS1 maint: extra punctuation (link)
  2. Wright, Judith (1977). The Coral Battleground. Thomas Nelson. p. 289-303,. ISBN 0170051668.CS1 maint: extra punctuation (link)
  3. "Packard Awardees". IUCN. February 19, 2016.
  4. WCPA Members Guide January 2008 (PDF). IUCN, International Union for Conservation of Nature. p. 63.
  5. Stanton, J.P. (April 27, 1974). "A report on the Daintree River - Cooktown region". Queensland Department of Forestry – via Trove.
  6. Stanton, J.P. (April 27, 1974). "A proposed system of national parks for Queensland coastal areas (Bundaberg to the Daintree River)". Queensland Department of Forestry – via Trove.
  7. Webb, Leonard (1966). "The Identification and Conservation of Habitat Types in the Wet Tropical Lowlands of North Queensland". Proceedings of Royal Society of Queensland. 78: 59–86.
  8. "State of the Wet Tropics Report 2017-18" (PDF). The Wet Tropics Management Authority. December 1, 2018. p. 46 – via Federal Dept. Environment.
  9. "State of the Wet Tropics Report 2017-18" (PDF). The Wet Tropics Management Authority. December 1, 2018. p. 46 – via Federal Dept. Environment.
  10. Hutton, Drew; Connors, Libby (1999). History of the Australian Environmental Movement. Cambridge University Press. p. 171. ISBN 978-0521456869.
  11. Hutton, Drew; Connors, Libby (1999). History of the Australian Environmental Movement. Cambridge University Press. p. 171. ISBN 978-0521456869.
  12. "State of the Wet Tropics Report 2017-18" (PDF). The Wet Tropics Management Authority. December 1, 2018. p. 46 – via Federal Dept. Environment.
  13. Stanton, J. P.; Godwin, M.D. (April 27, 1989). "Report on the conservation status of the remaining habitats of the wet tropical lowlands of Queensland". Brisbane, Qld. : The Queensland National Parks and Wildlife Service & Dept. of Environment and Heritage – via Trove.
  14. "Award Extract - Australian Honours - James Peter Stanton". Australian Government - Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet. Retrieved 27 April 2020.
  15. The Commonwealth of Australia Gazette 1996 No. S 13. Canberra: The Australian Government Publishing Service. 1996-01-26. p. 3. ISBN 0644 46335X.
  16. "James Peter Stanton". Australian Honours Search Facility: Dept of the Prime Minister and Cabinet. Retrieved 2020-04-29.
  17. Stanton, J.P. & D.J. (April 27, 2005). "Vegetation of the Wet Tropics of Queensland bioregion". Wet Tropics Management Authority – via Trove.
  18. "Wet Tropics Management Authority Honour Roll" – via Wet Tropics Management Authority.
  19. Tracey, J.G.; Webb, L.J. (April 27, 1975). "Vegetation of the humid tropical region of North Queensland" – via National Library of Australia.
  20. "Wet Tropics Conservation Strategy (2004)" (PDF). Wet Tropics Management Authority. April 27, 2004. p. 17 – via Wet Tropics Management Authority Website.
  21. Wildlife Matters (December 2007) p. 3-23, The Australian Wildlife Conservancy, December 2007
  22. Wildlife Matters (October 2004) p. 6, The Australian Wildlife Conservancy, October 2004
  23. Wildlife Matters (September 2019), The Australian Wildlife Conservancy, September 2019
  24. Stanton, J. P. (James Peter); Borschmann, Gregg (Gregg John), 1955- (Interviewer) (1994), Peter Stanton interviewed by Gregg Borschmann in the Environmental awareness in Australia oral history projectCS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)
  25. Stanton, J. P. (James Peter); Borschmann, Gregg (Gregg John), 1955- (Interviewer) (1994), Peter Stanton interviewed by Gregg Borschmann in the Environmental awareness in Australia oral history projectCS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)
  26. Stanton, J. P. (James Peter) (2003), Care and catastrophe: fire and the Australian bush, 66, Victoria: Arena, p. 41
  27. Stanton, J. P. (James Peter); Borschmann, Gregg (Gregg John), 1955- (Interviewer) (1994), Peter Stanton interviewed by Gregg Borschmann in the Environmental awareness in Australia oral history projectCS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)
  28. Stanton, J. P. (James Peter); Borschmann, Gregg (Gregg John), 1955- (Interviewer) (1994), Peter Stanton interviewed by Gregg Borschmann in the Environmental awareness in Australia oral history project, retrieved 3 September 2020CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)
  29. Curtis, Syd (Herbert Sydney); Borschmann, Gregg (Gregg John), 1955- (Interviewer) (1994), Herbert Sydney Curtis interviewed by Gregg Borschmann in the Environmental awareness in Australia oral history project, p. 92, retrieved 3 September 2020CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)
  30. Stanton, J. P. (James Peter); Borschmann, Gregg (Gregg John), 1955- (Interviewer) (1994), Peter Stanton interviewed by Gregg Borschmann in the Environmental awareness in Australia oral history project, retrieved 3 September 2020CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)
  31. Wilkie, Bill (2017). The Daintree Blockade. Australia: Four Mile Books. pp. 44, 137, 138, 139, 192, 193. ISBN 0994631804.
  32. Curtis, Syd (Herbert Sydney); Borschmann, Gregg (Gregg John), 1955- (Interviewer) (1994), Herbert Sydney Curtis interviewed by Gregg Borschmann in the Environmental awareness in Australia oral history project, pp. 101–146CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)
  33. O'Regan, Robert; et al. (1994). A report of an investigation into the Cape Melville incident. Brisbane: Criminal Justice Commission. pp. 28–29.
  34. O'Regan, Robert; et al. (1994). A report of an investigation into the Cape Melville incident. Brisbane: Criminal Justice Commission. pp. 29–30.
  35. Conley, David (1995). "Cape Melville affair coverage: what is news?" (PDF). pp. 139–141 – via Semantic Scholar.


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