Traditional owners urge Glencore to finalise agreement

Frustrated traditional owners have moved to speed up negotiations over protecting their sacred sites on a northern territory mine site.

Transcript

00:00 It's grown from a dump into a mountain. Waste rock from Glencore's MacArthur River mine

00:07 now towers over the NT's Gulf of Carpentaria.

00:11 I feel so sad every time we drive past and we look at it.

00:15 The toxic rock burns when touched by air or rain, so the miner is using insulation covers

00:22 to try to keep it stable. But the dump is still leeching heavy metals into the river,

00:28 fearing the steep sides could collapse onto legally protected areas. The NT's Sacred

00:33 Sites watchdog refused to approve it doubling in size.

00:38 It's already damaged, you know, and we're just really worried about it.

00:42 So two years ago, the company started talks with traditional owners, brokered by the Northern

00:47 Land Council, to get a land use agreement protecting Sacred Sites, the environment and

00:54 compensation for damaging a river dreaming.

00:57 I reckon there should be a compensation for the damage of the Rainbow Snake.

01:02 Glencore wants to keep adding flammable waste rock to the huge dump behind me until it's

01:07 140 metres high. The territory government has allowed it to keep doing that while negotiations

01:13 with traditional owners continue.

01:15 So far no environmental solutions or compensation have been proposed. For people in Borrolula,

01:22 fed up with depending on welfare and a government struggling to improve infrastructure.

01:28 We have a billion dollar mine just down the road and we still have housing problems. Our

01:34 roads have holes in it.

01:36 So the mine site's traditional owners have formed a new group to try to negotiate with

01:41 the company directly, instead of through the Land Council.

01:45 I haven't seen any progress at all. That is why we got together now and we want it to

01:52 progress in our way.

01:54 The Land Council has responded it's confident it has facilitated a process that will produce

02:00 a robust and fair agreement in the near future. Glencore says it remains committed to negotiating

02:06 an agreement through the Land Council. Traditional owners feel they've already waited too long.

02:12 [BLANK_AUDIO]