The Lock the Gate Alliance congratulated the Greens for releasing a policy for the overhaul of the regulatory system governing mine site rehabilitation across Australia, and called for cooperation across party lines in dealing with the decline of coal and the post-mining clean-up. The Alliance cited recent nation-wide polling that found 77% of Australian’s wanted mines fully rehabilitated and 88% held the industry fully responsible.
The Lock the Gate Alliance congratulated the Greens for releasing a policy for the overhaul of the regulatory system governing mine site rehabilitation across Australia, and called for cooperation across party lines in dealing with the decline of coal and the post-mining clean-up. The Alliance cited recent nation-wide polling that found 77% of Australian’s wanted mines fully rehabilitated and 88% held the industry fully responsible.
“The Greens have correctly identified that effective rehabilitation is bound up with the changes underway in coal markets and that the current minimalist approach to mine rehabilitation is out of step with public opinion. The public does not accept the current practice that allows mining companies to leave behind permanently scarred landscapes littered with large open pits and sites contaminated by mining waste,” said Lock the Gate’s mine rehabilitation campaign coordinator Rick Humphries.
“The Greens are ahead of the political curve on this issue, but if they work together with the Labor Party and its policy for structural adjustment for coal mining communities, we could see an end to the recklessness and uncertainty that is currently gripping coal affected regions,” he said.
“The states are failing in their duty of care to protect the environment and their taxpayers. Inadequate rehabilitation leaves both an environmental and tax payer debt as country is left in an unusable condition with contamination issues likely to remain in perpetuity.”
“The Greens’ call for a national inquiry, national standards and a review of the cost of mine rehabilitation and how this cost is reported are sensible and necessary given the size of the abandoned and failed mine rehabilitation legacy in this country which amounts to billions of dollars,” he said.
“The Greens have a position that is well aligned with public opinion. It will be our job to get backing for these reforms within the major parties and the cross-benches in the new Federal Parliament, and secure structural adjustment for mining communities, as well as environmental rehabilitation. With public opinion running so strongly in favour of reform, sooner or later reform must come,” Mr Humphries concluded.
