NSW equine industry digs deep in fight against latest coal mine

The NSW Planning Department has backed a proposal for a coalmine beneath land near the Coolmore and Godolphin racing operations.

Sophie Magnier with Charlie, Millie, Evie and Rose at Coolmore Stud in the NSW Hunter Valley. Picture: John Feder

The country’s most prestigious thoroughbred studs are facing ­renewed uncertainty after the NSW Planning Department backed a proposal for a coalmine beneath land near the Coolmore and Godolphin racing operations.

For Coolmore principal Tom Magnier, the proposed Maxwell underground mine is the fifth he’s had to deal with in just over a decade — one which he told a hearing on Wednesday would create the same “severe and irreparable damage” as previous applications.

The two stud farms in the Upper Hunter are among several in an area recognised as one of the world’s most important breeding regions, and have produced some of the biggest champions in racing, including Melbourne Cup winner Makybe Diva.

Plans by Anglo American for an open-cut mine, known as Drayton South, were knocked back four times before the Berejiklian government granted a new exploratory licence — for an underground mine — to Malabar Coal in 2017.

Speaking on Wednesday at a NSW Independent Planning Commission hearing, Mr Magnier said Coolmore had invested in its operations based on the decisions of the previous assessments.

“Now we and everyone at Coolmore Australia face uncertainty again, particularly with the surface water that sustains our farm and the groundwater that nurtures it,” he said.

“To be going through this for the fifth time is heartbreaking,” he later told The Australian. “If you look at the Hunter Valley at the moment in relation to open-cut mining, it’s at saturation point.”

The government changed laws in 2014 to protect the equine and wine industry in the Upper Hunter, banning coal-seam gas extraction and putting stringent controls on any mining operations.

Despite these changes the Planning Department is in support of the new mine proposal, which unlike its predecessors will be largely dug underground, including partly under Coolmore.

The proposed mine would extract 148 million tonnes of coal over 26 years, with early estimates forecasting 350 direct jobs and $1.7bn in taxes and royalties.

In its submission to the commission, the Planning Department said the benefits of the mine “outweighs its potential costs”, although it also noted the potential impact on aquifers and subsidence in the area that will be mined.

Mike Young, an executive ­director at the Planning Department, said the underground ­nature of the Maxwell mine reduced any potential impacts.

The Australian reported in ­December 2017 that Nationals MP Michael Johnsen had lobbied the government to approve a licence in the area — a marginal electorate — to create jobs.

Hunter Thoroughbred Breeders Association president Cam­eron Collins said the Planning Department assessment of the mine’s impact showed “no expertise” on the effects of the proposal on horses, water, soil or Indigenous archaeological heritage.

“We know the damage (the Maxwell mine) will do to our industry, the disruption it will do, and the threat to our environment,” Dr Collins said. “The threat of this project on the doorstep of the two major pillars of our industry does not make sense.

“This is a short-term disruptive project from an industry in ­decline.”