FROM THE PRESIDENT

In my last message, I mentioned that Perth will be the location of the next NELA National Conference. I am pleased to confirm that the dates of the Conference will be 27 and 28 March 2008. Please put these dates in your diary now.

The conference will be held in Fremantle (many of you will remember that the 2000 National Conference was also held in the Port City) and the Conference Committee is working on a challenging and interesting program. Again, if you have any suggestions or ideas, the WA Conference Committee would love to hear them.March is also a great time to be in Western Australia – our warm sunny days are perfect for heading to the beach, catching a ferry out to Rottnest Island or down to Margaret River for the food and wine.

You may have noticed some changes to the NELA website. A sub-committee of the National Executive has been formed to manage a major technical upgrade of the website with our external consultants. This upgrade will improve the site's flexibility and allow for more information for members to be put on the site. We appreciate your patience as this work is carried out.

Stay tuned for news of the re-launch of the NELA website very soon.Please remember the Environmental Law Roundtable of Australia and New Zealand (ELRANZ). The new website will contain much more information about ELRANZ and I encourage you to consider becoming an ELRANZ associate by emailing the ELRANZ Convenor, John Haydon, at johnhaydon@ecodirections.com.As always, if you have any comments, suggestions or thoughts about NELA please do not hesitate to contact me.

I welcome any and all ideas about how NELA can be a more effective organisation for its members.

Robyn Glindemann

President

NATIONAL ACTIVITIES

National Environmental Law Review

After some publishing difficulties during 2006, we are pleased to report that we are getting back onto schedule and anticipate a combined Winter/ Spring 2006 issue being distributed shortly, to be closely followed by the Summer 2006 issue. We should then be on track to produce the four 2007 editions.Our editor, Wayne Gumley, has a strong editorial team in place for 2007, comprising:Kelly Casey (ACT); Nicholas Brunton (NSW); Larissa Waters (Qld); Rebecca McAulay (SA); Tom Baxter (Tas); Merinda Logie (WA). John Haydon is a regular contributor on ELRANZ matters; Simon Batten looks after national issues and Louise Edwards focuses on international issues.

We thank these members for their commitment to being part of the NELR Editorial team, and encourage all members to contribute any items of interest for publication to Wayne or the committee for consideration.