Carmichael coalmine appeal says Adani 'misled' Native Title Tribunal over benefits

Extract from The Guardian

Wangan and Jagalingou people say judge should have found company ‘misled’ tribunal over jobs and economic impact of mine

Adrian Burragubba of the Wangan and Jagalingou people (left) said the decision to issue Adani mining leases ‘took away our right to free, prior and informed consent’. Photograph: Dan Peled/AAP

Joshua Robertson

@jrojourno

Thursday 8 September 2016 13.57 AEST 

A traditional owner of the site of Adani’s proposed Carmichael mine has vowed to keep fighting the project as he lodged an appeal from a federal court ruling that endorsed the state government’s approval of the mining leases.

Adrian Burragubba, who speaks on behalf of members of the Wangan and Jagalingou people, who oppose the mine, lodged an appeal to the full bench of the court on Thursday.

It challenges a decision by Justice John Reeves last month, arguing in part that he should have found Adani “misled” the national Native Title Tribunal in its evidence on jobs and economic benefits created by the mine.

Burragubba said the tribunal’s decision in April 2015 to allow the Queensland government to go ahead and issue Adani’s mining leases “took away our right to free, prior and informed consent”.

“It effectively allowed the Queensland government to override the decision that we made nearly two years ago to reject Adani’s ‘deal’,” he said.

“We said ‘no means no’ and so we will continue to resist this damaging coal mine that will tear the heart out of our country. The stakes are huge. In the spirit of our ancestors, we will continue to fight for justice until the project falls over.”

The Wangan and Jagalingou people are divided on the question of the mine, with Burragubba and an anti-Adani group that includes Australia’s first Indigenous senior counsel, Tony McAvoy, disputing the claim by a pro-Adani faction that the majority now support the project.

Burragubba’s lawyer, Benedict Coyne, said his client mounted the appeal “on strong public interest grounds and in the context of numerous other legal avenues he is pursuing for justice for his people, both domestically and internationally”.

“The case raises very important issues for indigenous and non-indigenous Australians in the context of the native title system and Indigenous people’s rights,” Coyne said.

“There are important legal principles and principles of human rights and justice at stake.”

The federal court appeal – to be run pro bono by Sydney senior counsel Craig Leggatt and other barristers – comes after the court last week dismissed a challenge by the Australia Conservation Foundation to commonwealth environmental approval of the mine.

That case prompted complaints again by Adani and its industry lobby group, the Queensland Resources Council, that the company has been mired in legal challenges as part of a broader anti-mining activist campaign.

Burragubba’s appeal will run alongside a separate supreme court challenge to the state mining leases by Burragubba and other traditional owners.

That case is due to be heard in November.

Burragubba has also flagged further legal actions underway under Native Title laws, saying the Wangan and Jagalingou opponents would “use all appropriate means to stop the destruction of our country and culture”.

“We will not be talked down to by industry or government and their lackeys, and we will challenge any decision that threatens our life, culture and traditions and the social, cultural and economic structures of our group,” he said.

“We are traditional owners who assert our right to self-determination and a future without dependency on mining.”