Boom to bust in Queensland town of Dysart undermined

THEY have weathered the booms and busts in Dysart, along with all the worries that come with coal mining.

Norwich Park Mine workerDean Thacker with his wife Kamia

THEY have weathered the booms and busts in Dysart, along with all the worries that come with coal mining.

But the Norwich Park mine was one of the reasons the town was built on a baking plain in central west Queensland and for workers such as diesel fitter Dean Thacker, married to a local, it provided a degree of security in an increasingly unpredictable world.

Until yesterday.

As the community came to grips with the move by BHP Billiton to shut the mine in the midst of a coal boom, Mr Thacker and wife Kamia were looking anxiously to their future.

"We're here as a family and this is where we want to live and work," Mr Thacker said.

"We're going to lose a lot of families we socialise with and a lot of friends."

While BHP Billiton assured the 1400 affected staff and contractors that as many of them as possible would be redeployed to the other central Queensland coal mines it operates in partnership with the Mitsubishi group, recriminations erupted over the closure. As union leaders from the CFMEU accused the company of seizing on industrial action at the BMA sites as an excuse to cut its losses at Norwich Park, Queensland Premier Campbell Newman attacked Julia Gillard for "creating an environment" in which industrial disputes could erupt.

The company has cited the impact of floods, rising production costs and softening coal prices as the principal reasons for the mine closure, but it acknowledges that rolling strikes organised by the CFMEU and two other unions played their part.

Like most residents of this company town, 1000km northwest of Brisbane, Mr Thacker doesn't want to buy into the blame game.

But he worries about the impact the shutdown will have on his comfortable life with Kamia, 35, and their boys Zeke, 7, and Quinn, 5, in their BMA-provided house. Non-company homes in Dysart command prices of up to $600,000 and rent for $2000 a week.

Then there is the boxing club that he poured his heart and soul into setting up. "To see it go down the gurgler would just crush me," said Mr Thacker, 34. Mrs Thacker, who works in the local pharmacy, said they had decided to stay on in Dysart even though the cost of living was higher than it would be if her husband commuted from Mackay, three hours away.

The drive-in, drive-out lifestyle was not for them, she said. "We didn't have kids for me to be like a single mum, with him on a great wage. We wanted to be together," Mrs Thacker said.

Dysart Community Support Group community development officer Margaret McDowall feared the "ripple effect" from the mine closure. She has lived in the town for 32 years and her husband, son and son-in-law are employed by BMA.

"I have seen it go through ups and downs before but nothing like this," she said.

Veteran Norwich Park worker Kevin Brown, 53, said its closure would be "another tear in the fabric" of the community.

"A lot of people feel very insecure," Mr Brown said. "I just hope it works out for the younger people, the young families."

Supermarket manager Terri Smedes-Bagley said businesses such as hers would be hit. "Of course it will affect us," she said.

CFMEU Queensland president Stephen Smyth refused to back away from the industrial action, which was being stepped up last night with a 36-hour stoppage at BMA's Queensland mines including Norwich Park.

BHP, which manages the operation, had told the union the decision to cease production was taken on wholly financial grounds, he said.

"They told us fairly and squarely it was an economic decision because they're losing money," Mr Smyth said. "I see BHP treating us as a business transaction but to our members and people in the community it is a huge impact on their lives. The question is, now we're in a boom - what happens in a bust?"

While insisting that federal Labor was primarily to blame, Mr Newman appealed to BHP and the unions to "think long and hard" about continuing the dispute that had brought Norwich Park to the brink, and Dysart along with it.

Ms Gillard said her sympathy was with those who faced losing their jobs and it was not the time for "the playing of politics".

Dysart is a primarily Labor-voting town of about 3500 but this was checked at the election that delivered power to the LNP.

The town is in the state seat of Mirani, which until March 24 was the LNP's third-most marginal seat in Queensland. Labor's vote at the Dysart booth crashed from 70.38 per cent in 2009 to 50.51 per cent, with most of that vote seemingly going to Bob Katter's Australian Party, which picked up a creditable 20.65 per cent.