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Australia: controversial report on nuclear waste arouses suspicion and opposition

ts “heavy handed” overriding of Territory and Aboriginal heritage protection laws, and the reliance on secret documents

Inquiry dumps on Northern Territory, Northern Territory News, TBEN LANGFORD, May 7th, 2010 T HE Senate inquiry into laws which could put a nuclear waste dump in the Northern Territory has recommended the new legislation be passed.But the inquiry’s report was immediately criticised as “an unbalanced and closed-minded justification for a foregone conclusion” by one of the committee members.

The majority report of the Senate Legal and Constitutional Affairs Committee said it was “not its role” to look at whether Aboriginal traditional owners had been properly consulted to get their consent for using the land.

It said the dispute over consent should be worked out in court or though “a mechanism that is competent to resolve such disputes between groups of traditional owners”.

But it said it did not have enough evidence to make decisions on the issue.

The committee did not have access to a secret anthropological report from the Northern Land Council on who has control of the land.

It was inquiring into laws introduced by Resources Minister Martin Ferguson which set up Muckaty Station near Tennant Creek as the site for the dump.

The new National Radioactive Waste Management Bill is closely modelled on Howard Government legislation which the Rudd Government had promised to overturn.

The Government-dominated committee is chaired by Territory Senator Trish Crossin and is made up of three Labor Senators, two Liberal and one Green.

Its report said the minister should organise consultations with all parties affected “following the selection of a site”.

Greens Senator Scott Ludlam wrote a dissenting report which said the report was a foregone conclusion and criticised the way permission to use Muckaty had been handled.

Senator Ludlam criticised the Bill for its “heavy handed” overriding of Territory and Aboriginal heritage protection laws, and the reliance on secret documents for the nomination of Muckaty.

“(The Government) has set itself up for a divisive and entirely avoidable confrontation with a community unwilling to host the nation’s radioactive waste,” he said.

“A significant number of Aboriginal people with traditional obligations to the lands in question do not believe their views are being accurately represented by … the Northern Land Council.

“Their repeated and eloquent invitations for Minister Ferguson to visit their land have been ignored, over a period of several years.

“This deeply flawed Bill has been strongly criticised throughout this inquiry by the majority of submitters, and has no place on the Australian statute books.”

He said the minister was given too much discretion with too little transparency, with the power over site selection completely in his hands and no process to deciding on a site.

Other than more consultation, the committee made no major recommendations on amendments to the Bill. It said an objects clause should be inserted as should an explanation of the minister’s “absolute discretion” on site selection. A

Inquiry dumps on NT | Northern Territory News | Darwin, Northern Territory, Australia | ntnews.com.au

May 8, 2010 - Posted by Christina Macpherson | AUSTRALIA, politics | antinuclear, AUSTRALIA, nuclear, nuclear secrecy, nuclear weapons, radiation, radioactive, uranium