Carmichael coal mine: politics, activism and the search for truth

The federal resources
minister, Matt Canavan.

The federal resources minister, Matt Canavan, wielded some big numbers this week as he pleaded with the Queensland media to help save the mining industry from an “unprecedented” threat.

The sunshine state, he said, was under attack from “environmental activists” who have brought court cases against Adani’s Carmichael coalmine. The big numbers came from a PricewaterhouseCoopers report, which found that “legal delays” had already cost Queensland $3.9bn in economic output and 2,665 “lost” jobs and had cost Adani $200m.

This, the minister advised the assembled media “is a story”.

Turns out, they were already onto it. Canavan cited what he called an “expose” in the previous week’s Sunday Mail entitled “Stop with Madness: Greens jeopardise Queensland’s future”. That story, in turn, favourably cited the minister railing against the greens and an accompanying editorial implored the federal government to “step in” and “rid Queensland of these delays”.

Conveniently, that happens to be exactly what the minister wants to do.

As a backbencher he was one of the most vocal advocates of the Abbott government’s so called “lawfare” changes – the amendments to the Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act to remove the right of most environmental organisations and other groups to challenge developments under federal laws unless they can show they are “directly affected”. This, the government argued, would stop the dastardly “green saboteurs”. The senate refused to pass the changes and the early indications after Malcolm Turnbull became prime minister was that they would be shelved.

But Canavan is now the resources minister and is determined to revive them, speaking to the new senate crossbench and insisting the government “remains committed” to the changes.

Read Lenore Taylor’s story in The Guardian - “Carmichael coal mine: politics, activism and the search for truth.”