Crazy decision undermines workers at coal mine

IF workers can’t trust Labor, who can — the answer is the Greens. In an extraordinary betrayal of miners in the Hunter, and those who work the port of Newcastle, the biggest coal-exporting complex in the world, Newcastle Council’s Labor and Green councillors voted to steer the council’s investments away from banks that hold funds in fossil fuel projects.

That would be each of the big four AAA-rated banks. This is a classic example of the “lawfare” the Abbott government warned against last week when the NSW government’s Environmental Defender’s Office was found to have backed the campaign now delaying the huge Carmichael coal project in Queensland. In that instance, the NSW government provided $750,000 in the last financial year to run its campaigns despite the devastating economic consequences. The Newcastle case plunges a dagger even deeper into the economic heart of the Hunter and has left local federal Labor MP Joel Fitzgibbon ­bewildered. Mr Fitzgibbon described the move by his Labor colleagues as “astounding” and “misguided” and an “overreach on steroids”. “Councils have to invest money wisely,” he told a local newspaper. “But it is amazing that a council with the largest coal port in the world would move to do all it can to undermine that industry.” Bob Baldwin, the Liberal MP for Paterson, told the ABC it was “silly” and sent a very poor signal to the ­industry Newcastle was reliant on. “It’s all about confidence,” Mr Baldwin said. “This move by Newcastle Council undermines confidence and not just in the coalface jobs in the mining industry, but all those support industries that flow through the whole of our economy. “It’s silly, it’s ideologically driven and bears no common sense.” Mr Baldwin said it was the wrong message for council to be sending at a time when investment was needed. “What this does, it sends a very bad sign to those wanting to invest,” Mr Baldwin said. “Those that need every ounce of confidence to invest in tight economic markets, when the council is not running with you, and running against you, it doesn’t make sense, because what will they object to next?” Newcastle Council’s bizarre decision came as the Chinese stockmarket went into meltdown, dragging down global markets. The Labor and Green councillors who drove the extraordinary move must be relying on the fantasy jobs which have served the unemployed so well in Tasmania to provide an alternate livelihood or they are looking forward to the dole. They have voted for a non-­existent, family-destroying economy instead of a robust job-creating ­society of workers. They have turned their backs on the coal industry even as the world is turning to NSW coal. The latest NSW coal export figures show volumes increasing by 3.6 per cent over the last financial year, driven by increased demand from emerging international markets. Coal exports out of the Port of Newcastle and Port Kembla rose by 3.1 per cent and 7.2 per cent over the last financial year.