Australia: Batman Blocks Coal Mine with Tripod

Octo­ber 30th, 2014

Kick­ing off a week­end of action against Whitehaven’s con­tro­ver­sial Maules Creek coal mine, a con­cerned cit­i­zen has scaled a tri­pod, block­ing access to Whitehaven’s Tar­ra­won­ga haul road, block­ing access for trucks try­ing to leave Tar­ra­won­ga coal mine. This comes as peo­ple from around the coun­try con­verge at the Leard Block­ade to defend water, cli­mate and our democ­ra­cy from White­haven coal.

Phil Evans, 33, a cli­mate cam­paign­er with 350.org has today put him­self on the line to draw atten­tion to White­haven dodgy deal­ings and destruc­tion of our water and cli­mate.

Leard For­est Alliance Spokesper­son, and tri­pod activist, Phil Evans says,” I’m here to call ‘trick or treat’ on White­haven coal. White­haven need to be held respon­si­ble for the destruc­tion of the com­mu­ni­ty, water and the cli­mate.”

Due to Whitehaven’s Maules Creek mine, the aquifers are pre­dict­ed to drop by up to 2m. Pre­vi­ous­ly dur­ing drought the agri­cul­tur­al com­mu­ni­ty has not had water for their live­stock and their farms. The Maules Creek mine, as the largest new coal mine under-con­struc­tion in Aus­tralia, will con­tribute sig­nif­i­cant­ly to cli­mate change caus­ing fur­ther droughts for the local com­mu­ni­ty and insta­bil­i­ty of glob­al pro­por­tions.

“We hope the NSW par­lia­men­tary inquiry into the plan­ning process will send the Maules Creek project back to square one, if any of the alleged­ly cor­rupt rela­tion­ships between Aston exec­u­tives and senior politi­cians from both sides have found to influ­ence the approvals process in any­way.” said Mr. Evans.

Whitehaven’s plan­ning, approval and con­struc­tion process­es have been plagued by ques­tion­able deal­ings and clouds of cor­rup­tion. The mul­ti­ple prob­lems of the plan­ning process have been brought to the atten­tion of the NSW par­lia­men­tary inquiry into plan­ning by com­mu­ni­ty groups.

“The state ICAC has raised very seri­ous con­cerns about the undue influ­ence of coal on our democ­ra­cy, but it has not gone far enough. The Leard For­est Alliance is call­ing for work to stop on the Maules Creek project, and an audit of the plan­ning and approval process that allows White­haven to con­tin­ue with this atroc­i­ty. We need a fed­er­al lev­el ICAC and we need to take our democ­ra­cy back.” said Mr. Drech­sler.

“The time of coal get­ting spe­cial treat­ment is over. The cor­rup­tion has got to end. It is up to all of us to reclaim our voice, and democ­ra­cy” said Mr. Evans.

There have been over 265 arrests this year as part of the ongo­ing com­mu­ni­ty lead cam­paign of peace­ful civ­il dis­obe­di­ence against White­haven Coal.

from Front Line Action on Coal