politicians in cougar energy's sights

Source - http://www.couriermail.com.au/business/politicians-in-cougars-sights/story-e6freqmx-1226174047675

INDIVIDUAL politicians may be sued in the multimillion-dollar legal action by resources company Cougar Energy.

The lawsuit filed in the Supreme Court at Brisbane names three senior bureaucrats - John Bradley, Terry Wall and James Reeves - as defendants as well as the State Government.

But others, including ministers, could yet find themselves before the courts. Company chairman Malcolm McAully said formal applications had been made for many more documents relating to the decision to halt the firm's underground coal gasification project near Kingaroy in July last year.

"Once we have all that information, we will certainly consider whether there are any other claims against other parties, obviously including government personnel," Mr McAully said.

The most likely target is Stephen Robertson (pictured), who was Minister for Natural Resources, Mines and Energy at the time.

Cougar alleges it was shut down for political reasons.

The Government issued a media release at 11.05pm on July 15 last year saying Cougar would be ordered to keep the plant closed until there was an assurance groundwater supplies were safe and warning rural property owners within 2km not to use bore water for human or livestock consumption until tests confirmed there was no further contamination.

Cougar says the release was issued, even though officials already knew high levels of the chemical benzene found in monitoring bores were the result of a sampling mix-up, and despite assurances the media release would not go out.

The lawsuit says Mr Wall told company executives that "higher powers" had decided otherwise.