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Dulce et decorum est

by Bernard Corden 1 Comment

When the rich wage war, it’s the poor who die

Jean-Paul Sartre 1

imageThe Karijini National Park in the Pilbara region of Western Australia is an impressive tourist destination surrounded by enchanting ochre escarpments with deep intermingling emerald green gorges. However, the spectacular scenery disguises a miasma of broken dreams and sorrow, which shrouds its adjacent ghost town at Wittenoom. It has achieved notoriety as a harbinger of death and disease through reckless mining of crocidolite over many decades. 2–6

During 1937, Lang Hancock from the neighbouring pastoral station at Mulga Downs began primitive blue asbestos mining and milling activities at Yampire Gorge. Many unemployed and vulnerable migrants flocked to the region and were callously deceived and exploited by a fecund and socially autistic moneygrubbing mercenary. The conditions were appalling and many itinerants slept in tents almost a kilometre from the mine. Senior supervisors and other employees were offered basic accommodation via a dozen neighbouring cabins. The entire venture was a filthy hellhole and almost 200 peons were betrayed by a beguiling ruthless charlatan. The operations were eventually acquired by Australian Blue Asbestos, a subsidiary of CSR Limited but the inhumane Dickensian conditions prevailed. 7–14

The mine consisted of several stopes and a crushing plant. Miners crawled along narrow tunnels in stifling heat amidst clouds of choking asbestos dust without any ventilation or respiratory protective equipment. It took almost 20 years before miners were provided with a suitable supply of fresh air. The ore was transferred via an open topped conveyor to the crushing plant, where it was pulverised and blue asbestos fibres were extracted from the residue. Mill operators worked extended shifts amongst swirling dust clouds and portable floodlights were installed to increase visibility, even during daylight hours. The finished product was transported in unlined hessian or jute bags via open topped trucks to Point Samson. It was stored in warehouses and manually loaded onto ships for distribution to local or overseas manufacturing facilities. The post war housing construction boom created an increasing demand for building materials and the company with assistance from the Western Australia state government provided additional infrastructure and established a township at Wittenoom. It was supported by an inhumane federal government policy and compulsory relocation scheme for unemployed migrants. 15–18

Production significantly increased to meet global and domestic demands and the population swelled to almost 20,000. This consisted of itinerant employees, service providers and their families, which included almost 4,500 children. A rock hole in the river flowing through a nearby gorge became the local swimming pool and mine tailings were used to create a beach and sandpits for children. Waste asbestos was used for landscaping parks and gardens, school playgrounds and parking lots around the town. Other innovative applications included the grading of access roads and footpaths. It was also used for maintaining the local racetrack and green keeping at the golf course. 19–21

The prevailing conditions hardly improved although exposure significantly increased and it merely became a matter of time before serious health effects emerged. Over 2,000 former employees and residents at Wittenoom died from asbestos related diseases and the toll will almost certainly escalate due to an inherent latency period. The incidence rate for malignant mesothelioma in Australia is a significant public health issue and epidemiological studies suggest up to 750 cases will be identified each year. The consequences could be even more serious because many itinerants returned to their country of origin and the subsequent health effects are unknown. 22–26

It is incontestable that the company and governments were aware of the associated health risks. Even before the 1930s, an indisputable body of scientific evidence verified a causal nexus between asbestos exposure and respiratory diseases. A federal government health department publication from 1922 identified asbestos work as a hazardous occupation. Indeed many migrants were allocated to the Pilbara region under a federal employment scheme and effectively sent to the gallows. 27–28

The appalling conditions at Wittenoom were initially raised by Dr. Eric Saint from the Royal Flying Doctor Service back in 1948. These were reiterated to senior management during site visits in the late 1950s by Dr. Jim McNulty AO, an occupational physician with the state government health department. It was followed in 1961 by a stern letter from Dr. Bruce Hunt, a specialist from Western Australia, to the company physician Harry Maynard Rennie. However, the organisation threatened to cease its operations if statutory restrictions were applied. The government under its liberal premier Sir David Brand and resources minister, Sir Charles Court offered no resistance and capitulated……All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing. 29–37

Despite repeated warnings the recklessness continued unabated and the devastating consequences soon emerged. A thoracic physician at Sir Charles Gairdner hospital in Perth was astounded by escalating respiratory diseases amongst former Wittenoom employees. A succession of acrimonious legal battles was inevitable and a lawyer’s picnic opened in courthouses across Australia during the 1970s. The beguiling sludge on CSR’s website bequeaths a consciousness of corporate social responsibility but the company’s acronym is the only skerrick of evidence. Social licenses to operate are a patina of mendacity underpinned by a festering culture of deception. This was reflected via an adversarial and amoral internal memo from Norman Irving, the CSR personnel manager back in 1977…….Even if the workers die like flies, they will never be able to pin anything on CSR. 38–40

Civil action against CSR from former Wittenoom employees began in the 1970s and the organisation relied on an enigmatic corporate veil to evade accountability and minimise its liabilities. The company name was sanitised to Midalco (formerly Australian Blue Asbestos, a subsidiary of CSR). It was discreetly stripped of any significant assets and provided with minimal insurance cover. The legal process was quite complex and involved penetrating an intricate labyrinth of corporate deception and establishing a causal nexus between asbestos exposure and mesothelioma. After several prolonged battles a pyrrhic victory emerged via the Heys and Barrow case, which established a legal precedent. The defendant’s legal team adopted a brutal scorched earth policy and ruthlessly exploited the plaintiff’s limited life expectancy. Despite the botox, haute couture and Kallis pearls, an illegitimate daughter of Satan with about as much compassion as Myra Hindley, resorted to inhumane delay, deny and die tactics. These sociopathic traits usually include the fleeting promise of sex really soon and were reflected in subsequent dalliances with numerous flamboyant racing identities, which excluded Nathan Tinkler or Clive Palmer. One erstwhile paramour and politician breached legislation by referring to indigenous Australians……As the most primitive people on Earth. During one parliamentary sojourn the senator admitted concealing a .38 calibre pistol amidst allegations of smuggling almost $25,000 into Iraq on behalf of energy resources giant, Woodside Petroleum. He was also pictured toting an AK47 assault rifle amongst Kurdish militants. In 2007, the uncouth malapert was replaced in the senate by a former mistress, the harridan minister for jobs and innovation and retired from politics in 2008……Qui cum canibus concumbunt cum pulicibus surgent. 41–62

It was the late firebrand Welsh politician Nye Bevan who described politics as a blood sport but the elected representatives provide plenty of ammunition. In 2011, Barnaby Joyce, Julie Bishop and Teresa Gambaro received an exclusive invitation from Gina Rinehart at Hancock Prospecting and her business partner Dr. G V K Reddy. A company private jet flew the trio to the lavish wedding of Mallika Reddy in Hyderabad. Return flights to Australia amounting to $12,000 were claimed as an overseas study allowance at the expense of unsuspecting taxpayers. Several months later the GVK energy conglomerate acquired a majority stake in the Hancock Alpha coal mine in Queensland’s Galilee basin for $US1.26 billion. 63–74

This unhealthy alliance of corporate gangsters with state interests has intensified with the emergence of rampant unfettered neoliberalism. The social impact is quite devastating and is evident via increasing psychosocial issues and industrial diseases such as mesothelioma, silicosis, leukaemia and black lung. It also illustrates there are serious ethical concerns when society allows itself to be driven by the market economy. Indeed, a fundamental tenet of work health and safety legislation is to secure the health and safety of people at work and it also binds the Crown. 75–81

Despite a quest for moral high ground via superficial philanthropy, it is obvious the extreme wealth, power and influence of the Hancock dynasty is underpinned by a genetic indifference to duty of care and soteriology. Any contrived event like Wittenoom, which may culminate in the agonising deaths of up to 60,000 Australians by 2030, can only be described as criminal negligence. It was even sanctioned by many honoured dignitaries within federal and state liberal governments and subsidised accordingly. This amoral corporate greed, recklessness and indifference is tantamount to androcide or democide. The death toll from asbestos related diseases in Australia will eventually exceed its First World War casualties. Those horrific events at Gallipoli inspired a tradition of annual remembrance but most asbestos victims usually encounter subterfuge or a conspiracy of silence…….When the rich wage war, it’s the poor who die. 82–89

Mining and milling operations at Wittenoom officially ceased in December 1966 purely for economic reasons. A media release from Sir Charles Court, a state government minister, was somewhat prophetic…………………..This is not the end of Wittenoom. It is the beginning of a new phase in its history. Over 2000 asbestos related deaths and catastrophic environmental damage have corroborated his comments. 90–93

Nevertheless, numerous Hancock group employees continued working amongst the mine tailings and contaminated gorges until 1994. The organisation pleaded ignorance over the health risks and claimed activities were endorsed by statutory authorities. In December 2006, the state government dissolved Wittenoom’s status as a township and its power supply was disconnected from the grid. It was eventually degazetted, removed from official maps and classified as a contaminated site. 94–96

In May 2018 a private members’ bill covering live animal exports was presented by another disgraced former cabinet minister in the Turnbull coalition government. The member assured lower house representatives that emotions had not clouded her judgement but the case for live sheep exports fails on both economic and animal welfare grounds. It was also an industry with an operating model built on animal suffering. Maybe these concerns should be directed towards the resources, manufacturing and construction sectors with an increasing focus on the prevalence of debilitating industrial diseases. This includes disorders such as mesothelioma, black lung and silicosis, which is emerging as the most significant occupational lung disease since asbestosis. 97–103

The vituperative recklessness and contumelious irresponsibility displayed by corporate gangsters at Wittenoom has bequeathed a catastrophic legacy of devastation and disease. It was exacerbated by entrenched insouciance from elected dignitaries and sycophantic public serpents afraid to speak the truth to power. Over three million tons of tailings containing up to 5% of blue asbestos are surrounding Wittenoom. Slate coloured slag heaps from the redundant mines obtrude incongruously against red ochre ridges and fluorescent green valleys of the scenic gorge. Its riverbeds and creeks are polluted with blue asbestos from mine tailings, which cascade through tributaries past the condemned township during wet season torrents. Erosion from stream undercurrents feeds asbestos contaminated material into the Fortescue River catchment. It can circulate through gorges, floodplains and pastures towards inhabited environs and potable water supplies. The contaminated dumps are a legacy of reckless and irresponsible mining that began during the 1930s and ended in 1966. Almost 30 years later a state parliamentary inquiry recommended…..The government take instant and determined action to have CSR and the Hancock group of companies remediate the sites and renovate the damage they have caused. Even following remediation it is extremely unlikely the state government will allow permanent residence in the region. 104–108

 

The tailings still remain and the independent report from 2006 provides a comprehensive summary of the public health and environmental risks. It states residents, pastoralists and construction contractors may be at a high risk from exposure to respirable fibres. In the dry season, approximately 100 vehicles use the access roads and almost 40 tourists visit the township and its adjacent gorges daily. During the wet season up to 200 indigenous people participate in ceremonial rituals around sacred sites. Contractors involved in remediation work and geologists and pastoralists also visit for work and temporary assignments in the immediate environs. 109–115

The privatising profit and socialising loss dichotomy has emerged and the responsibility for restoration is left to the state government. Unlike wealth in trickle-down economics, the cost inevitably cascades onto taxpayers. The state inherited the risk when the companies were unable to afford remediation expenses and decided not to renew their leases. Meanwhile, it continues to procrastinate and is extremely reluctant to take any meaningful action as the environmental and public health risk increases. The remediation and restoration could be funded via the commonwealth Proceeds of Crime Act 2002. It includes provisions to recover assets generated from a crime and benefits derived from an offence or other illegal activities. It is extremely unlikely the Western Australia or federal governments would take such action. Nonetheless, many elected representatives are quite willing to accept beguiling invitations to extravagant overseas weddings and corporate shindigs and rort their expenses. 116–119

Mining and other incidental activities at Wittenoom casually disregarded any concerns for the local indigenous community and most aborigines were categorised as untermensch. During a television interview, the despicable Lang Hancock effectively advocated genocide using statutory sterilisation. It is implausible that consideration was recently given to erect a statue in Perth venerating the devastation created by this fecund and uncouth malapert. Back in 1954 at a White House function with the Johnnie Walker wisdom running high, Sir Winston Leonard Spencer Churchill proclaimed….It is better to jaw-jaw than war-war, despite sanctioning the carpet bombing of Dresden less than a decade earlier and that old lie resonates……..Dulce et decorum est pro patria mori 120–129

 

Dulce et decorum est – Wilfred Owen

Bent double, like old beggars under sacks,

Knock-kneed, coughing like hags, we cursed through sludge,

Till on the haunting flares we turned our backs,

And towards our distant rest began to trudge.

Men marched asleep. Many had lost their boots,

But limped on, blood-shod. All went lame; all blind;

Drunk with fatigue; deaf even to the hoots

Of gas-shells dropping softly behind.

Gas! GAS! Quick, boys!—An ecstasy of fumbling

Fitting the clumsy helmets just in time,

But someone still was yelling out and stumbling

And flound’ring like a man in fire or lime.—

Dim through the misty panes and thick green light,

As under a green sea, I saw him drowning.

In all my dreams before my helpless sight,

He plunges at me, guttering, choking, drowning.

If in some smothering dreams, you too could pace

Behind the wagon that we flung him in,

And watch the white eyes writhing in his face,

His hanging face, like a devil’s sick of sin;

If you could hear, at every jolt, the blood

Come gargling from the froth-corrupted lungs,

Obscene as cancer, bitter as the cud

Of vile, incurable sores on innocent tongues,—

My friend, you would not tell with such high zest

To children ardent for some desperate glory,

The old Lie…….Dulce et decorum est

Pro patria mori.

 

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