In April I visited the Mt Morgan Mine site near Rockhampton in QLD. Following briefings from locals, I warned that people had grave fears about the potential for the old tailings dam to contaminate the river system. This risk had been seemingly neglected by the Queensland Labor government.
My criticism of the Queensland State Environment Minister Kate Jones was not appreciated by the Queensland Minister for Employment, Skills and Mining, Sterling Hinchliffe, who at the time said that I was “irresponsible, scaremongering and blatant politicking” and that it was all under control with the “completion of a $1.8 million upgrade of the water treatment plant”.
Today it seems that Minister Hinchliffe has changed his tune, announcing a $24.2 million funding package to fix the problem. He said that, “historic mines such as Mt Morgan and Mt Oxide are a legacy of old mining practices and need safe management.”
Far be it for me to say to Minister Hinchliffe, I told you so, but thankfully now they are doing something.
As I said back in April, it is problems like these facing the environment that we can fix and should fix immediately and leave alone the ones that are simply a spurious means of balancing the Labor party’s books by taxing the air we breathe.