ONE of Australia’s most powerful unions has warned a proposed temporary workers’ camp at Werris Creek would be a social and economic disaster for the region.
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The Construction, Forestry, Mining and Energy Union (CFMEU) claims the 1500-unit camp could cost the area 4500 full-time jobs and $537 million in lost gross regional product.
The figures are contained in a report prepared by CFMEU-commissioned consultants who examined the controversial development’s predicted impact on the local economy.
But proponents of the development have dismissed the report as a distortion of the facts and a desperate last-ditch attempted to sway the Joint Regional Planning Panel (JRPP).
MAC Services Group is seeking planning permission to build 1500 accommodation units to house about 3000 fly-in, fly-out and drive-in, drive-out mine workers.
The $100 million project was approved in late 2011, but a challenge initiated by GrainCorp saw it overturned in the NSW Court of Appeal earlier this year.
An amended application has now been submitted to Liverpool Plains Shire Council and is set to go before the JRPP for determination.
But the CFMEU maintains its report, compiled by SGS Economics and Planning, clearly shows that employing local workers rather than transient commuters was preferred.
CFMEU northern district secretary Grahame Kelly said the flow-on effects of training, support for local businesses and workers’ salaries would be vastly improved.
“This camp will give local mines the option to simply bring workers in from other parts of the state or the country – a way to get around training and employing locals,” he said.
“Where they exist in other parts of Australia, these kinds of worker accommodation villages are associated with family breakdown, strain on local services, loss of income for local businesses and changes to work practices, including longer rosters and shifts.
“Local jobs, training opportunities and investing in community housing and infrastructure should come first.”
Peter Cunningham, the president of the Werris Creek Community Shed, said he believed the vast majority of community members supported the project.
“Our town has got to get something to generate population growth,” he said.
“We hope this is the right way to do that, but it’s certainly the only thing that’s come along.”
