Farmers accuse Queensland Government of favouring generous coal company

Queensland farmers accuse Campbell Newman's Government of favouring a mining company which has donated hundreds of thousands of dollars to the Federal Liberal Party and Queensland's ruling Liberal Nationals.

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EMMA ALBERICI, PRESENTER: Landholders on Queensland's Darling Downs are accusing Campbell Newman's government of being too close to a mining company which is seeking approval to expand a coal operation into prime farming land.

In recent years the Federal Liberal Party and Queensland's ruling Liberal Nationals have received more than $700,000 in donations from the miner New Hope and its parent company, including thousands more revealed this week.

The company insists it's behaved according to the rules, but landholders say they can't match the corporate firepower of the miners.

Mark Willacy reports from Acland, on the Darling Downs.

MARK WILLACY, REPORTER: It stands as a monument to a disappeared community. Acland is a town that now exists in name only. These houses and the land they sit on now all belong to the New Hope mining company.

Other than the lone holdout in the town who refuses to leave, the only people who remain are the farmers who live around the Acland coalmine and the abandoned community it is named after, graziers like Tanya Plant. But now farmers fear their days could also be numbered.

TANYA PLANT, GRAZIER: There has been a lot of underground water taken by the mine and you know the water supplies around here are very fragile and very precious. You know, like now in drought a lot of our dams are dry and we're very reliant on the underground water.

MARK WILLACY: The New Hope company now wants to significantly expand the Acland mine and its water take.

To do that, the company will not only have to overcome local opposition, but it will also need State Government approval. Before being elected two years ago, the Liberal National Party raised concerns about the proposed expansion's impact, prompting the company to slightly downsize its ambitions but as many land holders point out, under the revised plan, the mine's output will still rise from 4.8 million tonnes of coal a year to 7.5 million tonnes.

TANYA PLANT: They're looking to close a lot of the roads around here and isolate people and you know it's not how I envisaged this area progressing, and how I expected it to be when my children grow up here.

(EXTRACT FROM FOOTBALL GAME)

COMMENTATOR: And Israel Folau becomes the first Wallaby.

MARK WILLACY: Like many corporate players, New Hope isn't adverse to putting on a bit of hospitality for those whose political portfolios are of interest to it. Last year the company opened up its corporate box for a rugby test. Among its guests were Queensland's Energy Minister Mark McCardel and Environment Minister Andrew Pall. As required, both ministers logged this hospitality on their official register of interest.

When quizzed about the minister's night at the rugby, Mr McCardel's office told Lateline that he has no role in deciding the future of the $900 million expansion. Saying that was up to Queensland's Co-ordinator General. Minister Pall's office didn't respond to repeated queries.

But New Hope's generosity hardly stops with the odd rugby game. In the last few years it and its Australian parent company, Washington H Soul Pattinson have donated more than $700,000 to the Federal Liberal Party and Queensland's ruling Liberal National Party, with the latest donations revealed this week.

NICKI LAWS, GRAZIER: That has to influence policy. No one is going to give away that sort of money without expecting something for it.

MARK WILLACY: Nicki Laws is a farmer and vet who lives near the Acland mine. She now leads grassroots opposition to it. Today she has come to see fellow grazier Tanya Plant to discuss the proposed mine expansion and the State Government's links to the miner New Hope.

NICKI LAWS: What makes them want to sidle up to these guys at the rugby and be seen with them and to have any doubt cast upon what they're doing.

MARK WILLACY: In a statement to the ABC, New Hope defended its hospitality to politicians, saying it merely does what other companies do, adding that everything is disclosed.

It's not just the mining companies' political donations and corporate hospitality for politicians that has outraged critics of this mining project. It is also the fact that once this mining expansion gets up and running, it will suck up nearly nine billion litres of water every year and that in a region that is drought declared.

New Hope has assured those around the mine, like Tanya Plant, that more than a third of this water will be waste water, but that has done little to convince farmers of the value of the expansion.

Back in the old township of Acland, now owned by the mining company, the houses are empty, the streets deserted. Now it's feared the surrounding farming community could be next, the victim of choking coal dust, the mine's thirst for water and its need for more land.

TANYA PLANT: What am I, about the fourth or fifth generation farmer there and you really feel that tie to the land and that obligation as a custodian of it, and you feel great sadness and reluctance and I think a sense of failure if you were handing it over to not be protected and looked after.

MARK WILLACY: The ABC approached the Queensland Government for an interview about land holders' concerns, but we received no response.

Mark Willacy, Lateline.

EMMA ALBERICI: And the New Hope Corporation told Lateline that the Federal and Queensland public registers provide the facts in relation to this issue.