Australian Story, page-10

Have just watched the episode of Australian Story and it was entirely the predicatable sloppy biased effort that I expected.

To sum it all up - its the story of a farmer adjacent to the Maules Creek coal mine.

The episode opened with some what looked like staged "blast footage". The first thing I noticed in the introduction to the property on prime agricultural farmland was how drought stricken and dry the property was, then we were treated to more footage of blasting that may or may not have had permission to be filmed, or was possibly obtained by trespassing on the mining lease. The episode then went on to discuss how the farm was purchased in 2009 for $1.26M, much effort was expended about how the sale proceeded without any of the lawyers picking up that there was already a ML application in progress - and as a matter of fact - Aston Resources had already published their community newsletter in July 2010 announcing their intentions in the area.

Much attention was also drawn to the planned subdivision of this rural property which I question. Australian Story then asserted that a process of negotiation was started about the purchase of the property were ongoing in 2013 and amounts of $1.7M were discussed but nothing was settled - this would have been a capital gain of at least $0.5M over 3 years.

The episode then went on to discuss noise issues with the resulting admission that WHC are still operating well under the 35dB limit. Then we were treated to a very soft interview with the EDO's Sue Higgins who made a number of very clever and difficult to prove assertions. After some more unapproved drone footage of a blast at some mine site (not sure if it was actually at Maules Creek) but pretty sure that drone operations at active blast zones have to be approved by the mining lease holder. We then saw stock footage similar to the footage earlier on but this time was labelled 'File Vison' so possibly see the hand of the ABC Legal team coming into play here.

The episode then went on to say that WHC and the property owner went into discussions about purchase of the property by WHC except that this time the price tag had risen to $17.8M! I can only assume that this stunt was under the advice of the NSW EDO office and WHC declined the offer to pay $17.8M and negotiations are still ongoing between WHC and the property owner. Other issues covered are ingress of feral pigs into the landowners property from the State owned Leard forest reserve nearby - this was also pointed out by the WHC spokesperson.

Winsome Denyer on research production credits - has a BA in Arts (Journalism) with no scientific qualifications that I can see.

Story reads a bit differently with all that extra info in it doesn't it?