LETTERS TO THE EDITOR (Issue 4)
From Mr A McCarthy of Tylden Quarries.
Sir,
In the last C.M.P.A. newsletter, Mr. R. Symons from Gippsland expressed his appreciation for the assistance and effort of the C.M.P.A. in achieving a reduction in the increase to his site’s rehabilitation bond from 300% to 20%.
It is indeed fortunate that an organisation such as the C.M.P.A. has arisen from our industry sector, because I doubt we would otherwise withstand the assault being mounted against us by Government and lobby groups on the one hand, through regulation, and the aggressive marketing practices of the major players, on the other.
When I look at some of the proposed regulation, as well as the way the present Extractive Industries Development Act is administered, I have the strong feeling that the ultimate winners will not be the environment, public safety, or even workplace safety. The winners will be the corporate giants who have the financial strength to weather loss-making sales pricing, while at the same time agreeing to, and funding, almost every whim of the Environmental and Work-cover lobbies (within and without the respective government departments), in the knowledge that by these actions, they are driving more than half the industry (our sector) to the wall.
When I began in the quarry industry, more than thirty-five years ago, I assumed I was entering a noble, if not greatly prestigious trade and worked hard to immerse myself in it.
As I contemplate my retirement, some years hence, I am dismayed to find that, what I have always thought of as an honourable business, is regarded by some as a desecration of “Mother Earth”. For this, we “desecrators” must be made to atone, through the largely discretionary imposition of punitive “rehabilitation bonds“, not to mention a tortuously drawn out approvals process, that fosters the ongoing stigmatisation of our industry.
Yet when I look at the traditional rural industries of agriculture and animal husbandry (with which, by the way, I have a great personal affinity), I notice there is wide agreement that, not only is the farm the most dangerous work-place, it has made the greatest contribution of all to land degradation and stream pollution. By comparison our industry workplace safety record is exemplary and the environmental “foot print” of the total of all extractive industry is barely noticeable
Call me paranoid, but I have a strong feeling that we are being used as whipping boys, because the real problems and their causes are in the too hard basket.
It is time regulators and environmental fanatics recognised there is only so much one can take. Even the greatest forebearance has its limits. After that.…………
Yours faithfully, A. McCarthy Tylden 22nd May 2001.
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