Kym Richardson (Kingston, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise today to raise an issue which is vitally important to many of the residents in my electorate. In 2003 Exxon Mobil closed its refining facility at Port Stanvac in my electorate of Kingston. The site is heavily polluted, as you would expect most oil-refining facilities to be, particularly those that were established, as this one was, in a time when environmental impact studies and regulations did not exist. Shortly after the announcement of the closure was made by the South Australian Labor government they did a deal with Exxon Mobil to enable them to mothball the refinery rather than to clean up the site. That deal gave Exxon Mobil a deadline of July 2006 to make a decision about the site. What the state Labor government did not tell the people of South Australia was that their dirty deal with Exxon Mobil granted them a right of extension of three years, after which they would have a further 10 years to clean up the site.

After the South Australian Treasurer, Kevin Foley, made the announcement of the extension, I called a public meeting for all residents whose homes are in the vicinity of the refinery. There was in excess of 100 people at the meeting. Justifiably, there was much public outrage about the situation. At the meeting, the state government’s representative and Exxon Mobil justified their abandonment of residents of the southern suburbs by arguing that it might one day become profitable for Mobil to reopen the refinery. Who are they kidding? It was insulting to residents of the southern suburbs. They are not stupid. They feel abandoned.

There is a large body of scientific evidence which suggests that the pollution at the site is seeping into the underground watertable and the Gulf St Vincent, yet the state Labor government has chosen to ignore the situation. At the same time, expansions in the southern suburbs have resulted in a shortage of suitable industrial land while the Stanvac site sits empty and abandoned.

The message of the meeting was clear: residents are outraged, as I am, at how badly the state Labor government, which was elected to represent them, has let residents of the southern suburbs down. The foreshore area at least should be immediately returned to the state and remediation to the environment and the coastline commenced to allow the open coastal shoreline to be retained. This issue is of vital importance because the southern suburbs, too long abandoned by the state Labor government, deserve better.