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Adjournment Speech

Date:
23rd September

Subject:
Asbestos


" The Jackson report on James Hardie was released this week. Not surprisingly, it found that the management of James Hardie knew that asbestos was harmful but continued to pretend that it was not, and caused immense harm to the workers and users of its product—such that the epidemic of asbestos-caused diseases has not yet peaked. The Aboriginal communities at Baryulgil near Wittenoom were hard hit, with children playing in the tailings there. The scientific community was aware as early as 1919 that blue asbestos was harmful. The fact that an entire industry could develop after that time is remarkable and shows a real failure of the regulatory system.

It is interesting that we have just finished a debate about whether phone towers are harmful. An entire industry is developing, but in this case we have the ability to look at whether it is harmful by looking at the exposure data that could come from Telstra, yet no government in Australia has made the slightest effort to get this exposure data and correlate it with the development of later problems. This is totally irresponsible. It is clear in the asbestos case that the $293 million provided to the Medical Research and Compensation Foundation was the lowest level of funding saleable to the marketplace. The public relations division of James Hardie was enterprising enough to ask the office bearers of the Asbestos Diseases Foundation of Australia [ADFA] to launch the foundation with them.

The office bearers of ADFA were a good deal smarter and more vigilant than the Australian Securities and Investments Commission. Even as a sudden response the ADFA office bearers were sceptical that the amount set aside was enough. They were unaware that the Midical Research and Compensaton Foundation was merely a way of the company leaving its liabilities. Of course, this is what has happened. After more realistic actuarial assessments it would now seem that $2 billion is needed. The problem still has not been adequately assessed. I have had representations from people living in housing commission units in South Coogee who have asbestos in their ceilings and switchboards. The issue has been glossed over and avoided by the Department of Housing. I have put a number of questions on notice asking what the Department of Housing has done to assess the amount of asbestos in its buildings and what it proposes to do about it. The reply will be interesting. The story is not told yet—by a long chalk.

When I was a child my father built two sheds in our backyard. He marked on the fibro where he intended to cut and asked me to blow the asbestos dust as he sawed the sheet. I guess we are all at risk. All the fibro buildings constructed during this time will have to be demolished. While it can be argued that there is less exposure to each individual worker doing the demolishing, there is still a problem if a large number of workers are still involved in the demolition. The Democrats have endeavoured to do something about this: they have written to D.66, the Liberal Democrats in the Netherlands, to request that they put in train reciprocal agreements with Australia in terms of corporate law and obligations. We have argued very hard for corporate responsibility in this matter.

The Democrats introduced corporate-code-of-conduct legislation aimed at enforcing the highest possible environment, employment and social standards for Australian companies conducting business overseas, but we were not supported by the Australian Labor Party or the Coalition. We introduced corporate law related-entity amendments that would have made it easier to recover money from James Hardie companies, but that was not supported by the Coalition. We have advanced a detailed and strongly articulated program of legislative reform that has not yet been assessed by the major parties, and we have assured that Australia has the toughest possible corporate governance laws requiring improved disclosure by shareholders. We have campaigned for a much stronger Trade Practices Act.

In this Parliament I have moved for corporate manslaughter legislation. This is not some crazy leftie idea: it was suggested by the Standing Committee of Attorneys-General. It is an absolute disgrace that the major parties will not accept the recommendations of their attorneys-general. We spend all our time in this House introducing penalties for little people committing crimes, but if tobacco or asbestos kills thousands of people there is not even an offence those responsible can be charged with under State or Federal law. The callousness of industry never ceases to amaze me. I was amazed that Meredith Hellicar has not yet met an asbestos victim, although she has been the Chairman of James Hardie or on its board for 12 years. [ Time expired .] "