Oakey Meat Works Pollution

The Oakey meat works is 100% owned by NH Foods of Japan. Between mid-March and mid-June 2022, NH Foods released 175 megalitres (175,000,000 litres) of heavily contaminated abattoir runoff into Oakey Creek, which flows into the Condamine Balonne river system, part of the Murray Darling Basin. From there, the contamination makes its way down the Darling and Murray Rivers into the Lower Lakes in South Australia.

The contamination was horrific: 460,000 MPN/100ml (milliliters) for E.coli, 151 mg/litre of ammonia nitrate, and phosphorus at 29 mg/litre.

The Queensland Government investigated and agreed with the facts but only fined the meat works $13,000 when they could have been fined $1.3 million per day. This might have something to do with the close links between the meat works and the union movement.

I pointed out that charging a foreign meat works $13,000 to dispose of such a large amount of heavily polluted water under cover of heavy rain is a scandal. Why would Oakey meat works or any other company bother to dispose of waste properly when they can just dump it into the Murray Darling system and pay a token fine for doing so?

I first asked the Inspector-General of Water Compliance if he would investigate, and he refused. This is despite the Act, which established his agency, specifically outlines his duties to include intervening when a State Government fails to do their job, which Queensland has in this case.

After that hand-washing, I asked the Murray Darling Basin Authority if they were concerned about such a large source of toxic pollution, which may have led to the famous blue-green algae outbreak and fish kill near Menindee. The answer was more deflection, with the matter ending at the Queensland Government's door.

If this was a farmer, they would be all over it, and indeed are all over farm runoff. But abattoir runoff? Apparently not.

I am sick of the rules not applying equally. I hope raising this matter will at least focus the attention of relevant authorities on the Oakey meat works to ensure this never happens again.

Transcripts: https://www.malcolmrobertsqld.com.au/oakey-meat-works-pollution/