Stop bullying and fix dams, Clive Palmer told

QUEENSLAND Premier Campbell Newman yesterday challenged his party's former top patron and now arch-enemy, Clive Palmer, to stop "bullying".

Clive Palmer

QUEENSLAND Premier Campbell Newman yesterday challenged his party's former top patron and now arch-enemy, Clive Palmer, to stop "bullying" and start keeping promises to upgrade his trouble-prone nickel refinery to protect jobs and stave off environmental disaster.

The challenge came as Mr Newman rebuked Mr Palmer for having acted "highly inappropriately" in seeking permission from the Liberal National Party to pollute the Great Barrier Reef with large volumes of toxic sludge produced by the loss-making refinery, which BHP Billiton effectively gave away in 2009.

Mr Palmer, the new federal member for the Sunshine Coast seat of Fairfax and founder and leader of the Palmer United Party, has not spent the funds required for an upgrade to bring a vast on-site dam, storing millions of litres of highly contaminated water near the Great Barrier Reef protection zone, into compliance with "spill risk" limits.

Regulatory authorities have been concerned about the potential for the dam to overtop in the wet season or suffer a catastrophic failure, which would result in its contaminants spilling into wetlands, a beachside community or be released into the protected waters inside the reef.

Mr Newman said yesterday: "He needs now to really stump up and meet his environmental responsibilities. He has a looming situation at Townsville that has continued to be in the media. It's a matter of public record that he has thousands and thousands . . . of litres of toxic liquids in holding tanks and dams, adjacent to the Great Barrier Reef.

"He sought, highly inappropriately, to get permission last year from this government to discharge those toxic chemicals and waters into the Great Barrier Reef waters and we said 'no'.

"This is a guy who has sought preferential treatment; he sought to pollute the Great Barrier Reef and we as a government have said 'no' and will continue to say 'no'.

" We will not be bullied by Mr Palmer just because he has a lot of money and . . . thinks he can shout louder than everybody else."

The Premier continued: "Only a few months ago he was saying he was going to employ at least 500 more people and invest a lot of money in that plant. Where is it? It's time that Mr Palmer was put under scrutiny. He's now a federal member of parliament. He can't keep saying and doing anything as he's done in the past."

A Department of Environment briefing note, dated October 16 and revealed in The Australian yesterday, states that Mr Palmer's refinery staff acknowledge that, despite a formal requirement "to transition into compliance with the spill risk condition", they will not have time to lift the dam wall before the wet season.

Mr Palmer warned in June last year that the dams could "burst and children are going to die".

"If we don't do something between now and the wet season, we are heading for disaster," he said at the time.

Mr Palmer's preference to use an ocean outfall discharge of the refinery's contaminants into the reef's protection zone was described in the internal briefing note as a last resort, "only in circumstances where there would otherwise be a release . . . via the spillway or to prevent a catastrophic failure in a (dam) wall".

Mr Palmer's media manager, Andrew Crook, issued a statement yesterday in which the tycoon slammed Mr Newman; The Australian's editor-in-chief, Chris Mitchell; this reporter; and the chairman of News Corporation, Rupert Murdoch.

Mr Palmer, who has launched Supreme Court defamation proceedings against this newspaper, said the refinery was in compliance with its conditions.

Accusing The Australian of relying on leaked "confidential documents" about the refinery, he said he was "committed to the protection of both the environment and our local community".