re: whats up with this trading halt? This may be relevant to the...

re: whats up with this trading halt? This may be relevant to the trading halt. I found this at

http://darwin.indymedia.org/?action=newswire&parentview=4078

"Hardie reaches for lawyers - Aboriginals refuse to be only Australians excluded from asbestos compensation"



Many of their relatives and forebears are suspected of having
died from asbestos disease, but by accident or design, the
company which operated the mine, Asbestos Mines Pty Ltd, now
called Marlew Mining Pty Ltd, is the one former James Hardie
asbestos subsidiary in Australia not covered by the
compensation deal.

The issue only came to light after the community wrote to NSW
Governor Marie Bashir, a passionate advocate for the plight
of asbestos victims.

It is understood Hardie is worried that should US investors
and consumers discover that the company intends to provide
for all Australian asbestos victims except a group of
Aborigines who actually mined the asbestos, it could spark a
backlash from Americans who would see it as reminiscent of
the White Australia policy and exploitation of indigenous
people.

A federal parliamentary select committee report in 1984 said
the residents of Baryulgil had been let down by the company
as well as the state government and unions. State inspectors
had done little to make the company protect its workers from
dust, conducting inspections rarely and providing enough
notice for the company to clean up and make sure that on the
day the workers wore protective equipment.

The report found the Australian Workers Union had been lax in
addressing appalling working conditions.

"The fact of isolation and the lack of union involvement in
the operations might have contributed to a situation where
industrial safety and hygiene methods were lax by the
standards of more populous and sophisticated mining
communities," the report said.

Local leaders say that 21 years after the parliamentary
report, little has changed, and they fear the ACTU and the
NSW Government will sell them out.

The acting deputy chairwoman of the Coffs Harbour Indigenous
Co-ordination Centre, Sharon Monaghan, said NSW Premier Bob
Carr and ACTU secretary Greg Combet should not sign the deal
unless Baryulgil residents were ensured of having their
claims included.

Hardie spokesman James Rickards said last week Hardie did not
think that it or any of its current or former asbestos
subsidiaries covered by the deal had any liability to pay
claims from the 32 years in which the company mined asbestos
at Baryulgil.

He said while the Hardie group had owned Asbestos Mines Pty
Ltd, it had never managed it, which gave Hardie protection
from liability under "corporate veil" laws. He also stressed
that Hardie had in 1976 sold the company on to Woodsreef
Mining, since renamed Mineral Commodities, after what was
understood to be a backdoor listing in 1987.

Marlew Mining is now in liquidation, but according to
Australian Securities and Investments Commission documents,
Mineral Commodities remains the ultimate holding company.

Mineral Commodities has a capitalisation of about $8 million
and no mining operations in Australia, with its exploration
efforts focused in South Africa.

Company secretary David Lymburn – who had not heard of
Baryulgil or Woodsreef until informed by The Australian –
expressed some initial nervousness about the connection.

"It's a bit like musical chairs," Mr Lymburn said of Asbestos
Mines Pty Ltd. "If you are the one left holding the parcel
when the music stops, what does that mean?"

He said later legal advice indicated Mineral Commodities
would not be liable for Baryulgil claims because it, too,
would be protected under the "corporate veil" since it did
not actually run the company.

Woodsreef closed the mine in 1979 but, Hardie pointedly said
in its statement, continued to mine asbestos for a few more
years.

Link here