South Australian will have no say about radioactive waste transport through their State
South Australians will be given no say on the transportation of radioactive waste through the state as the National Radioactive Waste Management Act overrides all state laws. SA laws regulating the transport of hazardous materials will have no effect. South Australians will have no say over the mode of transport or the route taken or the timing of waste transportation through the state.
SA must win nuclear battle with feds, Independent Weekly (SA) Jim Green , 27 March 2012
www.indaily.com.au/#folio=10 EIGHT years ago South Australians won a famous victory, forcing the Howard government to abandon its plan to establish a national radioactive waste dump in SA. The victory was all the sweeter because of the schoolyard-bully tactics of the Howard government including its use of compulsory land acquisition powers and its indifference to public opinion and to South Australian legislation banning the imposition of a nuclear dump…..
The current [nuclear waste] debate has important implications for SA. A federal government-commissioned report outlines four possible transport routes between the Lucas Heights nuclear site in NSW and the proposed NT dump site. Two involve trucking waste long distances through SA (one through Adelaide) and a third involves train transport through SA including Adelaide. The report also flags the option of spent nuclear fuel reprocessing waste being shipped from France and the UK to Port Adelaide then being trucked north.
South Australians will be given no say on the transportation of radioactive waste through the state as the National Radioactive Waste Management Act overrides all state laws. SA laws regulating the transport of hazardous materials will have no effect. South Australians will have no say over the mode of transport or the route taken or the timing of waste transportation through the state.
Yet Minister Gail Gago didn’t seem the least bit fussed when asked about the Federal Government’s dump plan and the implications for SA in Parliament on March 14. She merely said: “It is anticipated that the Commonwealth would enter into discussions and keep the state fully informed of any future transport of significant quantities of radioactive waste through South Australia.”
Back in 2004, then Premier Rann said “80 per cent of South Australians were opposed to the radioactive waste dump and particularly opposed to radioactive waste from the Lucas Heights nuclear reactor in Sydney being brought across our borders and along our roads.”
The SA Labor government ought to voice strong opposition to the federal government’s dump plan and the National Radioactive Waste Management Act for a multitude of reasons, not least the unnecessary imposition of radiological risks along the transport routes and the disregard for SA laws.
South Australians should also be concerned about the precedent set by the Federal Government’s approach. If it is acceptable to override state laws in order to impose a dump for low- and intermediate-level waste, then why not do the same if and when Australia has stockpiles of high-level nuclear waste to deal with? Why not do the same for other forms of toxic waste?
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