Penny Allman-Payne (Queensland, Australian Greens) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Black lung disease remains a serious and persistent health issue for coal workers in Queensland, including in my hometown of Gladstone. Currently, former coalmine and quarry workers are able to access free screening for mine-dust lung diseases every five years, often via the HEART 5 mobile unit, or the black lung bus, which serves regional and remote Queensland. But that service is not available to former workers who handled or transported coal—people who worked in the railway and the port and power station workers.

Recently, I stood up in Gladstone with Ian, a former Gladstone port worker. Ian has black lung disease and has been a leader in fighting for all coal workers to be eligible for the free black lung screening program. Together Ian and I called on both Labor and the LNP to commit to making former railway, port and power station workers eligible for black lung screening, and to increase testing frequency from five to two years, regardless of who forms government in Queensland in October. This is a very small and reasonable ask. Coal dust is coal dust, whether you're working in a mine, in a coal-fired power station or at the ports or transporting coal by rail.

Coal communities have literally powered the country for decades, often at great risk to their health. If Labor and the LNP want to stand next to coal workers for press conferences and election ads, they should also listen to them when they ask for help fighting this deadly disease.