MINING giant Glencore has lost a Land and Environment Court case against Muswellbrook Shire Council over the amount of rates it must pay on buffer land and environmental offsets surrounding its Mangoola open-cut mine, 18 kilometres west of Muswellbrook.
Glencore had gone to the court after the council had refused a company request in May 2018 to re-rate two aggregated parcels of land from mining to farming, which would reduce the amount of rates it would have to pay.
Although Justice Tim Moore did find that farming outweighed mine use on one part of the larger parcel for one year of the two-year period under question, he found the "dominant" use of both parcels was for mining - "and overwhelmingly so" in the case of the larger parcel.
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The court heard that the two lots of land were managed by a cattle-grazing company, Colinta Holdings, which Justice Moore said operated "generally (if not exclusively) on lands in the vicinity of coal mines operated by Glencore", its parent company.
Glencore declined to comment on Friday's verdict, but Muswellbrook Mayor Martin Rush said it was a considerable win for the community.
"Given the acrimonious way in which Glencore has fought the case, we anticipate there may be an appeal," Cr Rush said.
"Nonetheless, council is confident of its position. We will also undertake a review of other mining buffer lands within the shire to ensure that it is genuinely being used for the purpose for which it is being rated.
Mining land and the surrounding buffers and environmental offsets bought by coal companies take up a considerable amount of land in both the Muswellbrook and Singleton council areas, meaning the decision could have substantial flow-on effects running into the millions of dollars a year.
"This is a significant win for the community and will give greater confidence that mines use their considerable buffer land purposefully for generating economic activity and employment rather than is some imaginary way or simply to reduce a mine's taxation liabilities," Cr Rush said.
Glencore objected to the council's expert witness on mine management, Michael White, saying the 25-year veteran of the industry had done consulting work for the region's horse studs and that he and his wife lived just five kilometres from Mangoola and had lodged "a large number" of complaints about the mine. Justice Moore noted the concerns but said they did not "warrant . . . rejection" of his evidence.
The two parcels of land, totalling about 7300 hectares, had some cattle grazing and cropping but also Aboriginal and biodiversity offset areas and dozens of monitoring stations for blast noise, dust, ground-water, air-quality, general noise, ecology and surface water.
Referring to an "essential" pumping station and pipeline on some land in question, Justice Moore said: no water from the Hunter River, no mine!".
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