Farmers and Greens – developing alliance to keep coal mining out of the Liverpool Plain

On Monday and Tuesday of this week Alison Orme from my office and I toured the countryside outside Gunnedah to meet with farming communities opposed to mining exploration. Our first stop was at the seven week long blockade by farmers  of the Duddy's property, Rossmar Estate.

Early on in this campaign locals made the wise tactical decision to not allow BHP Billiton to undertake exploratory drilling on their property. Experience shows that in by far the majority of cases exploration leads to full-scale mining operations.

The Duddy's, Clift’s and other locals have been campaigning to save this land since April 2006 when the NSW Government issued BHP Billiton (via its shelf company Coal Mines Australia Ltd) a five-year coal exploration licence.

When the Mining Warden Court followed their usual pattern and issued an emergency injuction to allow BHP Billiton to drill on the Duddy's property the country version of a picket line kicked off.

From 7 am to 5 pm Monday to Friday the locals gather together, position their vehicles strategically on the road, and for the past seven weeks they have successfully kept the BHP Billiton drilling rigs at bay.

This is where we met George and Tommy. They are part of the 175 locals who are on the blockade roster.

Our tour across their property further reinforced our understanding that this is no place for longwall coal mining. This rich agricultural land, compared by many to the fertility of the Nile Delta, is an asset for the world and these farmers are serving the best interests of this nation and future generations in holding these mining companies at bay.

This is the land immortalised in Dorothy Mackellar's poem “I love a sunburnt country”.  It is rich agricultural land – NSW's food bowl.

Irrespective of the assurances from Mining Minister Ian Macdonald and Nikki Williams, NSW Minerals Council CEO, that agriculture and mining can coexist, the evidence is well and truly in that longwall mining damages and pollutes above ground and underground water systems.

BHP Billiton made $17 billion profits last financial year. They could forgo mining  in this area and it is not going to damage their bottom line.

And Shenhua Energy, a Chinese government owned country, should not be allowed to explore for coal on the neighboring Watermark area.

We ended our visit in Gunnedah joining hundreds of farmers and their supporters at a protest outside the Gunnedah Coal Conference With an estimated recoverable coal reserve of 1,290 million tonnes in the Liverpool Plains region this conference has become an annual event as the coal industry scrambles to extend their operations with no regard for local impacts or climate change implications.

This conference has also become an event for local farmers and their supporters to highlight why mining and agriculture in this area cannot mix. I spoke at this year's rally along with local farmers, the local federal MP Tony Windsor and Upper House Nationals MP Trevor Khan.

The rally strengthened our common resolve to step up the campaign for an independent catchment wide study of the aquifer structure and surface water of the Namoi Valley. Clearly the impact mining will have in this region on the local water regime needs to be understood.

The Liverpool Plains Land Management Committee has already mapped out and costed such a study at $8 million. Considering the NSW government accepted $100 million from BHP Billiton to explore for coal in this region they clearly have the money to pay for this study.

Flying back to Sydney over the Hunter was a stark reminder of how important it is to stop the expansion of the mining industry. The scars of open cut mining around Musswelbrook and Singleton have ripped apart the flood plain of the Hunter Valley.

The coal mining industry must be contained. Premier Nathan Rees has a lot on his plate but he should take notice of the growing alliance of farmers and the Greens.  Our combined determination will not tolerate the destruction of another fertile flood plain.

He would be wise to place a moratorium on coal exploration in the Caroona and Watermark licence areas until the independent catchment wide water study is commissioned.