A FEDERAL parliamentary inquiry has recommended the Australian Government provides financial assistance to those affected by per- and poly-fluroalkyl substances (PFAS) contamination.
Richmond RAAF Base is one of numerous defence sites included in the inquiry into contamination from PFAS which was present in a legacy fire-fighting foam phased-out in 2004.
A Defence investigation found a ten-square-kilometre plume of the chemical in groundwater around Richmond RAAF, and residents were advised to reduce their consumption of locally-sourced egg and red meat due to contamination.
The inquiry recommended “the Australian Government assist property owners and businesses in affected areas for demonstrated, quantifiable financial losses associated with PFAS contamination that has emanated from Defence bases”.
The Committee recommended priority for compensation - including the possibility of buy backs - should be given to the most seriously affected residents, including property owners who have suffered losses as a result of being unable to use their land, persons who invested in land between the time that it was known by the Australian Government to be contaminated and the time of that contamination being made public, and businesses and other owners of property in the most highly contaminated areas.
“The compensation scheme should be flexible enough to accommodate a variety of individual circumstances,” the report stated.
“Acceptance of an offer for compensation in respect of their property’s utility or value should not preclude the person from a future claim in relation to any human health effects that may be found, as a result of future research, to be attributable to PFAS exposure.”
Assistant Defence Minister, Senator David Fawcett told ABC Radio Newcastle that Defence is dealing with 41 individual claims for compensation over PFAS, and these would be dealt with on a case-by-case basis.
Richmond resident Joanna Pickford, whose soil and chickens eggs tested positive for PFAS, said: "It makes me immensely sad that even after a Parliamentary Inquiry recommending that people get appropriately compensated and that Defence act as one organisation and not a fractured ‘divide the nation and conquer style’ that they are putting their head in the sand and Assistant Minister David Fawcett said the Government will not shift from its policy of refusing to implement a broad-based compensation scheme and take a 'case by case' approach."
Ms Pickford said she had thrown away over 60 chicken eggs over the last month due to contamination.