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Fair play in the uranium sector: BHP Billiton called on to relinquish its ability to undercut standards at the Olympic Dam Uranium Mine
BHPB AGM Brisbane: Ethical shareholders and environmentalists will be calling upon BHP Billiton to relinquish extravagant exceptions to environmental and cultural heritage legislation that effectively place its Olympic Dam mine above the law in South Australia. At the company’s Australian AGM they will be asking the board to live up to its publicly stated commitments to strict environmental and social standards, starting at home in Australia with the Roxby Downs Olympic Dam uranium project.
BHP Chairman Don Argus was quoted in the company’s London AGM held last month as stating; "as a major producer of uranium, we have to meet the strictest environmental, health and safety standards.” This statement is seemingly incongruous with the current regime under which the company’s largest uranium operation is not required to comply with fundamental public interest legislation that bind all other actors in society.
The Olympic Dam operations secured exemptions to the Aboriginal Heritage Act 1988, the Development Act 1993, the Environmental Protection Act 1993, the Freedom of Information Act 1991, the Mining Act 1971, Natural Resources Act 2004 (including the Water Resources Act 1997)
This raft of exemptions embodied in the Roxby Downs Indenture Act effectively places this mine outside the law protecting accepted social, environmental and cultural values, and makes the company’s commitments to complying with strict standards manifestly unbelievable.
Concerned shareholders are also asking BHP Billiton to comply with its commitments to the World Bank Guidelines on Involuntary resettlement in its operations at the El Cerrejon mine in Colombia. Communities forcibly displaced by the operations have sought since 2001 for relocation to a site where they can continue to live according to their traditional social and cultural structures, a request that is consistent requirements of the World Bank guidelines.
Proxy shareholder and Executive Director of the Mineral Policy Institute, Techa Beaumont states “BHP BIlliton continues to express its commitments to the World Bank guidelines, and generally to high social and environmental performance. Their ability to step forward and address these issues will be the best test of whether these commitments are rhetoric or reality.”
The Question submitted prior to the BHPBilliton AGM by BHP Shareholders for Social Responsibility:
Mr Chairman, I am representing the BHP Shareholders' for Social Responsibility.
We would like to congratulate you and our company on the successful financial performance of our company over the past year.
Our “Annual Review 2006” report opens on page 1 with a statement of some foundation principles including: “An overriding commitment to health, safety, environmental responsibility and sustainable development.” and “Integrity and doing what we say we will do.”
In your Chairman's Review, on page 5, you make two excellent points:
Firstly on Governance: “the right approach .... is to draw on best practice from all the jurisdictions in which we operate and are regulated.”
Secondly on Responsibility: “.... positively impacting the communities and environments in which we operate.”
Under “License to Operate” the Review's page 10 begins:
“BHP Billiton is determined to achieve the highest standards in the way we do business.”
In recent years BHP Billiton has expressed and demonstrated some desire to better its social and environmental performance.
When Western Mining opened Olympic Dam at Roxby Downs they demanded and gained exemptions to the
Aboriginal Heritage Act 1988
Development Act 1993
Environmental Protection Act 1993
Freedom of Information Act 1991
Mining Act 1971
Natural Resources Act 2004 (including the Water Resources Act 1997
This raft of exemptions embodied in the Roxby Downs Indenture Act effectively places this mine outside the law protecting accepted social, environmental and cultural values.
BHPB would have become aware of this when carrying out due diligence on the purchase of WMC.
These legal privileges place this mine far outside our company's own guidelines and way outside our community's expectations for ethical and transparent behaviour.
Could you please commit to relinquishing these extraordinary privileges before the next BHPB AGM,
or if not, would you care to defend these offensive and racist legal privileges?
For more information, please contact:
Techa Beaumont
Executive Director
Workphone: +61 2 9557 9019
Mobile: +61 (0) 409 318 406
Created: 27 Nov 2006 | Last updated: 27 Nov 2006
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