Perin Davey (NSW, National Party, Shadow Minister for Water) Share this | Hansard source

Yes, in this instance it's the one that wants to stop the mine. This isn't the first time we have seen Indigenous issues and cultural groups being used by environmental activists to try to stop development. We've seen it before. Thirty years ago we saw the Hindmarsh Island secret women's business. We found that that was false, and look at the development that has occurred in that area—and the jobs—ever since that was overturned. Just last year we saw the court finding that Santos's Barossa Gas Project could proceed because the cultural claims being put against the project were false and had actually been fed to the traditional owners by activists. And now, in another example just this year, Woodside, after a decade of working with traditional owners for their Burrup gas exploration project, have found that they're dealing with a previously unknown whale songline.

When you are working with the traditional owners you are working with the registered parties. How can you keep investing in a country when an indeterminate number of voices can come forward with applications? As my colleague Senator Duniam said before, during this process to get this mine over the line, since 2016 there has been active engagement with over 13 registered Aboriginal parties. There was extensive work done to look at the environmental impact of this proposed mine and to look at the Aboriginal cultural heritage impact. There were assessments done—they had archaeologists, anthropologists and environmental scientists have a look at it, and the departmental people, as Senator Duniam said before, all came to assess the site. The Orange Local Aboriginal Land Council worked with Regis Resources since 2016 to work through the concerns that they had and to develop Aboriginal management plans to ensure that the project could proceed, taking them in mind and making sure that Aboriginal concerns were addressed. But all of that means nothing.

Since the section 10 application was lodged in October 2020, some four years after the first application process was commenced by Regis Resources, four years after they had been working with the 13 registered Aboriginal parties, the assessments have continued. It was assessed by the New South Wales government and recommended for approval in 2022, and then it went to the New South Wales Independent Planning Commission, who recommended its approval in March 2023. We have already heard that the minister's own assessor under the section 10 application also recommended that it be put forward for approval.

Yet we have the minister coming out and saying that she had accepted the advice of the Wiradjuri Traditional Owners Central West Aboriginal Corporation, which she could not disclose due to its cultural sensitivity, which does not reflect the transparency we were promised by this government. Then, after the initial backlash, including from other Wiradjuri people, about her decision to accept that advice, she then tried to also justify it with her claims that you can't put a tailings dam on the headwaters of the Belubula River. That is despite her own department giving it environmental approval, which would indicate that there were no concerns about the impact on the flows of the Belubula River, and the New South Wales Environment Protection Authority giving it a stamp of approval, indicating that it didn't have any concerns. On what grounds is she blocking this tailings dam? Is it, as she initially claimed and as the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Heritage Protection Act requires, on cultural grounds? Or is it on environmental grounds, which was her second claim, about protecting the flows and the waters of the Belubula River?

After considerable backlash and questions, she has also come out to say, 'I also listened to downstream landholders, including the goatkeepers and the beekeepers.'

As a farmer myself, I have the utmost respect for the concerns of landholders, but you would have thought that that would have come out in the environmental and planning assessment processes that had been going on for seven years. Has she blocked this tailings dam on cultural grounds? Has she blocked this dam on environmental grounds? Or has she blocked this dam on planning and community grounds? Unless she releases her statement of reasons, we will never know. Is that really good government? As Senator Duniam said, we are the house of review. It is incumbent on us in this place to scrutinise decisions of government. How can we do that when we aren't provided the information?

This has other implications. We know that in Australia the timeline to get approval to do anything is stretching out beyond the capacity of many proponents to participate in and fund it. This approval process had gone on for seven years. That is seven years of investment, investigation and preparation—to then be knocked on the head based on claims that no-one can refute because no-one has actually seen them. That is not due process. This brings reputational damage to our nation. Do you think investors are going to be willing to undertake that level of investment?

In the case of Regis Resources, it cost almost $200 million to get all the assessment criteria and protocol met. And then it was turned on its head and the minister said, 'Well, they should just find another location for the tailings dam.' Well, let's consider 'another location', because there are several factors here. This freehold property that is now under a cultural heritage protection order has been a freehold property for 200 years, during which time it has been actively farmed. It's had tractors driving over it. It's had clearing exercises on it. It's had animals grazing on it. It's been actively farmed for 200 years. Now, 400 hectares of that freehold property is excluded for use by this declaration. Of the remaining area of this freehold property that is owned by Regis Resources, most of the sites have already been identified for a purpose of the mine. That includes ore body, waste rock emplacement, processing infrastructure and the mine itself.

There's the idea that they can go out, survey and get engineering reports for a new site which has not been previously investigated. They did look at other sites during the early stages of the design process. There were four separate areas with a combined potential of 30 options. They were all rigorously assessed, and the company identified that chosen site as being the safest, with the least environmental impacts and the best engineering sustainability. But the minister says, 'Oh, they can go and find another site.' At what cost? And how long will it take to assess another site? Will it be another five to seven years?

No company is going to do that. And then there is no guarantee that another section 10 application won't be made over the next site. So it is absolutely farcical for the minister to try and claim that a new site can miraculously be found for the tailings dam and the mine can proceed and go ahead. Even with the minister saying she would help facilitate a fast-tracking, even with the New South Wales state government, to their credit, saying that they would seek to fast-track, it is not a simple exercise to fast-track these applications when you need to go back to the 13 registered Aboriginal participants and double-check with them. You need to go through the environmental impact assessment again. You need to go through the planning commission assessment again and you need to lodge it through the federal processes.

We will absolutely oppose this declaration without the full statement and without transparency as to exactly why she has decided to block this tailings dam. And she did know. She has correspondence that said that, should the tailings dam be blocked, the project would not proceed. The Prime Minister had correspondence to that end. Knowing that the process can't proceed, the minister has accepted the advice of the Wiradjuri Traditional Owners Central West Aboriginal Corporation. From my experience dealing with the minister for water, I am very heartened that she has at least listened to someone, because as the minister for water she refuses to meet with stakeholders. I dearly hope she actually did meet with members of the Wiradjuri Traditional Owners Central West Aboriginal Corporation and did not just make this assessment based on her verbal representations.