Environment Minister Tanya Plibersek has been accused of ‘rewriting history’ after denying she stopped a gold mine dead in its tracks by making a controversial ruling on Indigenous heritage.
Earlier this month, Ms Plibersek decided to protect land deemed to have significant Aboriginal heritage value from being dug up for a wastewater dam required for the proposed McPhillamys gold mine near Blayney in central west NSW.
Mine developer Regis Resources said scuttling the plans for a tailings (mine byproducts) dam at the headwaters of the nearby Belubula River made the whole project financially unviable by setting it back five to 10 years.
However, Ms Plibersek said claims she had killed off the mine were ‘misinformation’.
‘Let’s be very clear here, I have said that the gold mine can go ahead but that the company needs to find a new site for the tailings dam,’ Ms Plibersek told the Daily Telegraph on Wednesday.
Her argument did not impress Sydney radio station 2GB morning talkback host Ben Fordham.
‘For nearly two weeks it’s been reported across the country that Tanya Plibersek had blocked the gold mine from happening,’ Fordham said.
‘She didn’t correct it. She seemed to be proud of the fact.
‘In fact she was boasting on social media about using her powers as environment minister to protect an Aboriginal heritage area.’
On the weekend Ms Plibersek gave an interview to the left-leaning Saturday Paper about her decision that appeared under the headline ‘Tanya Plibersek halts goldmine on Indigenous heritage grounds’.
In that interview she again said Regis only had to find another nearby dam site to pursue the project.
‘There’s actually nothing to stop the mine going ahead,’ she said.
‘They just need to find a new location for the tailings dump that is not on a culturally significant site for Wiradjuri people.
‘They’ve got 2500 hectares of land they already own. I’ve made a declaration over 400 hectares of that. They’re free to use the other 2100 hectares.’
Fordham scoffed at this attempt to portray the dam decision as just a modest setback for the project.
‘This is a ridiculous argument,’ Fordham said.
‘The gold mine can not go ahead until the site of the tailings dam is secured and approved by bureaucrats and that takes years.’
Fordham questioned why Ms Plibersek had declared the area of cultural significance when the NSW government thought otherwise.
‘The NSW department of planning comprehensively considered Aboriginal heritage on this site and after three years of consideration the independent planning commission ruled “the department considers that that the project’s impacts on Aboriginal cultural heritage are acceptable under NSW government policy”,’ Fordham said.
‘So, is Tanya Plibersek saying she doesn’t trust the NSW government?’
There has been division among local Indigenous bodies over the gold mine.
The Orange Local Aboriginal Land Council, which are the statutory Indigenous body governing the area, support the mine and all its works going ahead.
However, the application to preserve the site came from the Wiradyuri Traditional Owners Central West Aboriginal Corporation, which Ms Plibersek partially accepted.
Last week Roy Ah-See, descendant of the Wiradjuri Nation and former chairman of the New South Wales Aboriginal Land Council, raised questions over the credentials of Wollongong-born artist, Nyree Reynolds, who submitted a statement of significance document calling on Ms Plibersek to block the proposed entrails dam on the Belubula river.
NSW Labor Premier NSW Premier Chris Minns said on Monday he was ‘disappointed’ by Plibersek’s decision with the mine set to create 200 jobs and contribute about $200million in royalties for NSW.
The state’s Minister for Natural Resources Courtney Houssos continues to work with Regis Resources to find an alternative site for the tailings dam.
Fordham accused Ms Plibersek of ‘tying herself in knots with all this spin’ trying to deny she stopped the dam dead in its tracks.
‘Chris Minns isn’t having a bar of it, Anthony Albanese is running a million miles from it,’ Fordham said of her claims.
‘Tanya Plibersek is on her own.’