Doug Cameron (NSW, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Human Services) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I move:

That the Senate take note of the report.

This Senate Select Committee on Health report entitled Black lung: ‘It has buggered my life’clearly identifies that black lung, which is a terrible disease known as CWP, coal workers pneumoconiosis, is a totally preventable disease. It can be prevented by mitigating the dust in a coalmine and controlling the dust before the disease even starts. I want to quote Mr Percy Verrall, who appeared at a hearing. He is dying from pneumoconiosis. He said:

I said to my wife that if I had found out then that I was going to be like this I would have got out of the mine straight away. It has buggered my life.

I know I have only a couple of minutes, but this is what we found. The answers provided to the questions by the committee showed that state and stakeholder submissions revealed a litany of regulator failure and regulatory capture, industry indifference and incompetence, inconsistent risk mitigation and patchy and sometimes compromised health monitoring throughout Australia.

I thought the regulator's evidence to the committee was terrible. I thought the regulator had basically been captured by the industry. The regulator really needs to lift its game. The Queensland government have started doing good work on this but they need to target this regulator to make sure the regulator does the right thing by coalmine workers in that industry. Workers are dying because of regulatory capture. Workers are dying because of poor regulation. Workers are dying from a preventable disease. If the regulator did its work, workers would not be dying in Queensland and elsewhere in this country.

This disease is totally preventable. This disease should not be in this country now. There are ways it can be resolved and the first point to start is the regulator in Queensland, who has failed mine workers in this country. The regulator needs to be completely revamped to ensure that workers can achieve a long life and a healthy life after working in the mining industry. I seek leave to continue my remarks later.

Leave granted; debate adjourned.