Thursday 15 October 2015

Farmer's death prompts senator Glenn Lazarus to renew call for CSG mining halt

Extract from ABC News

Updated about 2 hours ago


A farmer's suicide in his home state has prompted Queensland senator Glenn Lazarus to demand a halt to coal seam gas (CSG) mining projects until the human impacts can be established.
Western Downs landholder George Bender took his life on Wednesday.
He was involved in a long-running dispute with resources companies, one of which reportedly wanted to put 18 wells on his farm near Chinchilla.
In an interview on Macquarie Radio, independent senator Lazarus said he had known Mr Bender for some time and was "gutted" by his death.
"Not only does this community have to live with this scourge of CSG coal seam gas mining on a daily and nightly basis, now they have to deal with one of their most-respected and most-loved community members taking his life.
"What really gets me so frustrated is the governments of the day just don't care what they're doing to Australians and Queenslanders ... just honest hard-working people that want to work the land.
"They've given them no rights to say 'no' and they just don't care that these people are living in an absolute nightmare and they don't care because these governments are being given donations."
Senator Lazarus said the situation had become "un-Australian".
"These mining companies are bullying, they're berating, they're threatening these people on a daily basis," he said.
"They go on ... until they break them.
"We've brought these hard-working, hard men to tears they're just so frustrated they have nowhere to go, they have no-one to back them up."

List of demands

Senator Lazarus said he did not want Mr Bender's life to have been in vain and had come up with a list of demands to put to government and resources companies.
"I need a royal commission into the human impacts of CSG mining which I've been calling for for months and months now.
"They [landholders] don't have anywhere to go - we need a resource ombudsman to be established so they have somewhere to go.
"And let's just take a deep breath and pause further CSG mining projects until we can establish the human and environmental impacts."
Senator Lazarus said he would be putting his calls to Federal Parliament and would be knocking on the door of newly appointed Resources Minister Josh Frydenberg.

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