Antinuclear

Scott Cameron’s Submission to Senate finds process for selecting nuclear dump is misleading and faulty

Scott, Cameron Submission to Senate Inquiry: Selection process for a national radioactive waste management facility in South Australia This process started for my family over 2 years ago when our neighbours nominated their property directly alongside our farm to host a National Radioactive Waste Dump. As soon as we were aware we began researching to learn as much about the waste and the facility to educate ourselves and form an opinion. It was clear from the beginning that we were not given all the information and we would need to find it ourselves.

I have had many concerns about the lack of transparency throughout this process and it has caused a lot of stress and anxiety among many members of our community.

a) The financial compensation offered to applicants for the acquision of land under the Nominations of Land Guidelines;

This has been called a voluntary process, I don’t believe it can be called a voluntary process when the nominator stands to receive a payment of four times the value of their land. It is unclear what the value of their land actually is and information in relation to additional payments including access agreements has not been made available to the public.

c) How the need for ‘broad community support’ has played and will continue to play a part in the process,

Kimba was already removed from the process once after our first community Orima survey returned results of 51% not opposed to the facility. Minister Frydenberg declared there was strong opposition and not broad community support to go through to stage 2 of the process. Minister Matthew Canavan stated in the senate that he would need a figure in the vicinity of 65% to take Kimba through to the next stage. When I met with Minister Canavan at parliament house in October 2017 he confirmed that he had made this statement in the senate and it was touch and go for if he was going to take Kimba through to stage 2 with Kimba’s next vote returning results of 56% support for moving forward to stage 2. The Minister still hasn’t put a figure on what % he would require for the next community vote which I believe will be held this year. I believe broad community support should be 75 – 80%, this is a vote to host this facility permanently, it is not temporary it actually involves changing State Legislation which currently prohibits the development of such a facility anywhere in South Australia.

500. Whether and/or how the Governments community benefit program payment affect broad community and Indigenous community sentiment;  The $2 million dollar community benefit fund can only be seen as a bribe for people to vote to go through to the next stage. Throughout the process the Governments offered our community many bribes including better mobile phone and internet service, local television service, upgraded roads. As well we could have better Hospital and School Facilities. These are all things that all regional communities around Australia should be entitled to through the millions of dollars we pay in tax each and every year. We have also been told that if we were to host this facility we would become a ‘Federal Town’ whatever that means. I would have thought all towns across Australia should be treated equally with the same importance as a ‘Federal Town’

e) Whether wider (Eyre Peninsula or state-wide) community views should be taken into consideration and, if so how this is occurring or should be occurring; The Eyre Peninsula is a very unique farming area that is separated from the rest of the state. All grain from Eyre Peninsula is delivered, blended and exported out of Lower Eyre Peninsula. Therefor Kimba’s grain is mixed with every other town’s grain on EP, the affect that this could have on our exports hasn’t been taken into consideration at all. Other towns on EP have had no consultation and the Minister has disregarded submissions from industry reps and broader EP residents that were made to him throughout the consultation process. It was stated on the Department of Industry Innovation & Science website that Submissions would be made public however they later changed their mind and never made them available for public viewing

f) Any other related matters. The Department of Industry Innovation and Science have continually claimed to be open and transparent with the Community however I have found them to be inconsistent and often misleading with their information. Throughout this process they have given out different information on the jobs and money attached to hosting the facility. They have adjusted the boundaries several times. At first we were told in a public meeting by Member for Grey Rowan Ramsey that neighbours would have right to veto, he in fact told me on the phone that if I didn’t want it then it won’t happen. This then changed to a vote for neighbours living within 10kms. Since this second round of nominations it started by separating the neighbours into 10kms and 5kms groups, this then changed to immediate neighbours only and people living less than 5kms if they don’t share a fence line they are not considered neighbours. This is quite different to Hawker where neighbours can be 30km away. The Department website states that there were originally 28 sites nominated around Australia and they were to be published. However these sites have never been released to the public. Living in a small country town and alongside a nominated site I have been accused by local business owners that they believe the reason why I am opposed is because I actually nominated my farm and missed out. This has caused me a great deal of stress all of which could have been relieved if the Department released the sites as they said they would. I know that 2 Liberal party politicians were involved in land nominations both in Kimba and in Hawker and it would be interesting to see how many other Liberal associates have nominated around the country.

April 9, 2018 - Posted by Christina Macpherson | AUSTRALIA - NATIONAL, Federal nuclear waste dump