Walking down the rail corridor at Sandgate with some mates, a ladder, and a case of beer wasn't in my plan for Wednesday morning. But here we were, a mere 12 hours after I and nine other community members made the call to stop a Hunter coal train.
I'm a former Hunter coal miner, but when the federal Minister for the Environment, Tanya Plibersek, approved three massive coal expansions at close of business on Tuesday - adding 1.5 billion tonnes of carbon into the atmosphere, and spewing coal dust all over the valley - all I could think of were my grandkids.
