MARGOT White and her husband lived 24 kilometres from the nearest open cut coal mine when they bought their Wybong property 20 years ago and built their home.
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Now the nearest open cut mine, Glencore's Mangoola, is five kilometres away and could be half that distance if plans to extend the mine's operations are approved.
"I'm really embarrassed, as a 61-year-old woman, at what we've done to the Hunter, for sheer greed," Mrs White said only hours before the end of the public submission period today.
Glencore has applied to mine 52 million tonnes of coal in the site's north by extending its approval from 2029 until 2030. In an environmental impact statement the company said mining would end in 2025 without the new approval, after an earlier variation on its original consent lifted the annual production limit from 10 million tonnes per year to 13.5 million tonnes.
The proposal, if approved, would allow about 400 Mangoola employees to retain their jobs for another five years after 2025, and provide royalties of more than $120 million.
But while the environmental impact statement downplayed the social and environmental impacts of the mine and its current operation, the Upper Hunter Shooters Fishers and Farmers candidate Lee Watts backed distressed Wybong residents in February who said they were stuck in "no man's land" because of Mangoola.
They were not eligible to have their properties acquired by mining companies, but mine impacts including noise devalued them and potentially left them unsellable, she said.
Lock the Gate Alliance noted Glencore figures showing coal extraction had increased ten-fold in Muswellbrook in the past 15 years while miners' average annual salaries were almost double the average annual salary in NSW.
"The environmental impact statement fails to recognise the significant social risk faced by Muswellbrook and the Hunter region more broadly in having a highly-paid workforce in the prime age group of 35-45 years old, predominantly male and with low educational attainment, concentrated in one industry that is subject to market fluctuations beyond the control of the companies or any public authority in Australia," Lock the Gate said.
Mrs White said noise and dust from Mangoola left residents "hostages" in their own homes, while temperature inversions in winter exacerbate the noise but cause high readings to be rejected.
"Those of us left are stranded," she said.
An attempt to sell their home generated considerable interest until people visited the site and registered the mine impacts.
"Not one person discussed the price because no one wants to live next door to a coal mine. We're hostages here because of government policy. We were so far away from the nearest mine when we moved here that it sounded unimaginable that it would travel so far out of Muswellbrook, but it's five kilometres now, and it could be only 2.5 kilometres," Mrs White said.
"The system allows for such inequity in sharing the benefits of mining. If you're close to the mines you only experience the negatives. Glencore accelerated the removal of coal so that it will run out by 2025. That's an opportunity. They should be rehabilitating the site rather than getting approval to take more."
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