Larissa Waters (Queensland, Australian Greens) Share this | Hansard source

Thank you, Mr Acting Deputy President, for enforcing the rules. As we know, this system that lets property developers steamroll over local residents is the same system where it looks like $1 billion in public money will be handed over to this multinational mining company. This, of course, is the same system that lets political donations influence policy outcomes and locks out the community. Adani, the banks, the insurance companies and the big end of town, who have made the donations and got the well-paid lobbyists and well-connected former politicians, are all part of this system.

On the other side, we have people power and this growing and broadening campaign to stop the world's largest coalmine being facilitated with public money, handouts, free groundwater and a royalties holiday of almost one-quarter of a billion dollars. The people power against this perfect example of how the system works for vested corporate interests is growing, and I am confident that we will succeed because not only is the global coal market diminishing—we have seen the price now in such decline that economic commentators are calling it structural decline—but we have just seen the death of half of the Great Barrier Reef. So it is clear that the economics of this project will not stack up. That is why the company has got its hand out for a $1 billion mates rates loan from the federal taxpayer.

It is clear that the environmentals of this project would be absolutely disastrous not only for our reef but for our broader environment and for our very way of life. We have already seen the havoc that extreme weather events wreak upon all of our states, and in particular Queensland with more intense cyclones. We have seen the ravage of bushfires become more intense and more frequent around the country. We cannot go sleepwalking into climate change any longer. We know the impacts that it is having. We know what is coming down the line if we continue to fuel this dangerous and systemic problem.

Yet we have both sides of politics, who have received $3.7 million in donations from fossil fuel companies over the last 10 years—including from the Adani group of companies—championing this enormous coalmine right when the rest of the world is taking climate change seriously, pledging to cut emissions and making that transition to clean renewable energy, which not only keeps the lights on but actually generates more jobs. This is why I fail to see the logic of both big parties backing this project when we have so many more clean, long-lasting, job-creating opportunities in clean energy not just nationally but in Queensland, and not just in Queensland but in the very region where this mine is proposed. In the pipeline of projects that are funded already, and are rolling out as we speak, are 3,200 jobs. They are in large-scale wind and solar in the region where the big parties would support Adani opening up the largest coalmine. This coalmine will not generate the 10,000 jobs that the company initially bragged about. They had to eat their own words and say, 'In fact, no, it will only be 1,464 jobs.' So double the number of jobs can be created in clean energy projects in that very same region of Queensland that actually have funding and that are going to happen and are going to proceed. So why are both of the big parties still wanting to throw federal taxpayer money behind such a destructive project? Well, it is the donations, isn't it? There is no other reason for it. The $3.7 million of donations from the fossil fuel sector, including from the Adani companies, to both sides of politics must be what is driving this decision—because there is no other good reason that they would back this project.

It is a climate-destroying project that does not generate anywhere near the number of jobs that clean energy does and it has black lung disease associated with the jobs that it may or may not generate. We have seen in Queensland in the last couple of years the resurgence of pneumoconiosis, black lung disease, which is an extremely dangerous disease. I was at a briefing by the Lung Foundation Australia that perhaps Senator Macdonald, rather than chortling, should have been at to increase his awareness of this pernicious disease. It is atrocious that we are abrogating our occupational health and safety duties to our workers—our right to keep these workers safe at work—and sending them into coalmines without appropriate protection and dust suppression techniques. These are toxic, dirty jobs that are hurting the health of workers. They are jobs that are already being shed as the industry transforms and as global economics puts coal in the waste bin of history and transitions to clean, green, sustainable and long-lasting energy. Again, there can be no reason why this project is receiving the support that it is from both of the big parties except for the donations and a system that lets vested interests pay money and get the outcomes that they want.

But what I want to particularly focus on today is the reason that this bill is so important. This bill would say, 'Let's have a look at the corporate environmental history and the corporate tax history of companies before we give them public money.' This is an eminently reasonable position and it is one that I hope will receive support from both sides of this chamber. What I will do now is go through the litany of examples of highly inappropriate corporate conduct by the Adani Group of companies and ask both sides of politics: do you really want to give this company a billion dollars in a mates rates concessional loan, after the Queensland government has just given them free groundwater and a quarter of a billion dollars of a royalty holiday on the coal that they will dig out which, when burned, will worsen the climate for all of us and probably write the death warrant of the Great Barrier Reef?

The list is long, so I will use my time to read it into the record. In August 2016, the Adani Group was fined nearly $1 million in India's specialised environment court for its role in chartering an unseaworthy ship to transport coal. That was the sinking of a coal ship in Indian waters, for which they were fined. The Indian government's Directorate of Revenue Intelligence, or DRI, is currently investigating a number of the Adani Group entities, including Adani Enterprises Ltd, which is the ultimate holding company of the Adani Mining group—the proponents of the Carmichael mine—for illegally overvaluing imports of coal and capital equipment in order to siphon funds offshore, a practice that creates what is called 'black money'. There are now investigations into fraud and trade based money-laundering. There are two separate investigations into allegations of trade based money-laundering by the Adani companies. The first investigation is into the fraudulent invoicing of coal imports and the other is into a scam involving false invoicing for capital equipment imports.

The list goes on. In January 2016, the National Green Tribunal fined Adani Hazira Port Private Ltd, which is a subsidiary of one of the Adani companies, almost $5 million for undertaking development works at a port in Hajira without an environmental permit. The tribunal found that those works destroyed mangroves and impeded the fishing activities of local communities by interfering with their access to the river and the ocean. So they were fined for not following environmental guidelines in building a port, and we have just given them operation of the limb of the North Queensland Bulk Ports at Abbot Point, to do, potentially, exactly the same thing, with no guarantee that they will respect the conditions that our government have put on that permission.

In 2011, after a three-year investigation, the ombudsman of the Indian state of Karnataka found AEL to have been actively involved in large‐scale illegal export of iron ore. In 2015, in considering whether to approve the Carmichael mine, the federal environment department asked Adani Mining for the environmental history of its executive officers, and, in its response, Adani Mining failed to disclose that one of its directors and the CEO of the Adani Group's operations in Australia was previously an executive officer of an unrelated company when that company caused serious water pollution in Zambia. That company later pleaded guilty to criminal charges for the pollution and for its failure to report the incident. But Adani did not think that was worth telling the environment department, even though they had asked.

On tax-dodging, an analysis of company filings shows that up to $3 billion from Adani's planned Carmichael coalmine would be shifted to a subsidiary owned in the Cayman Islands, if the controversial project goes ahead. An overarching royalty deed gives a shell company the rights to receive a payment of $2 a tonne, rising yearly by the inflation rate, beyond the 400,000 tonnes mined each production year for two decades. The company with this entitlement is ultimately owned by an entity registered in the Caymans, controlled by the Adani family. In plain English, the upshot is that if the mine goes ahead they receive a $2-a-tonne payment—so, up to $3 billion—via a company they own in the Cayman Islands, a tax haven.

These are just some of the revelations that have come to light after some fairly basic research was undertaken by a variety of organisations, including Environmental Justice Australia, in Victoria—just a few examples of the allegations of tax fraud, bribery, corruption and clear environmental breaches by Adani and various companies in the group.

Why do we still not have a test in our laws that says we will consider the history of someone that is putting their hand up for a mates rates concessional loan? Why would this government and the opposition willingly turn a blind eye to the suitability of the recipient of a very large concessional loan—$1 billion of public, or taxpayer, money?

Why would they not want to look and see this? And this is probably just the tip of the iceberg. This is what has been uncovered by some basic research. There are whole departments here that could, if their powers were clarified, be looking into these issues.

That is why this bill is so important. Not only does it say we have to look at these issues under the Northern Australia Infrastructure Facility, the $5 billion that Adani wants a billion of; but in our environmental laws we should look properly at this. We should look at the corporate environmental history and look behind that corporate veil to see the real record of the people involved in these companies and the companies themselves before we decide if we are going to give them environmental permission to build the world's largest coalmine and to ship it through the Great Barrier Reef. We have had so many near-misses in the reef and we have already had some very big accidents, including with coal ships. Do we really want a company that has shown a disrespect for environmental laws in other jurisdictions trusted with the future of the Great Barrier Reef and, not only that, to build the world's largest coalmine that, when its coal is burnt, will see the end of the reef? That is what the scientists are saying.