Banjima Traditional Owners Launch $1.5 Billion Asbestos Claim Over Wittenoom

The traditional owners of Wittenoom, one of the most contaminated asbestos sites in the Southern Hemisphere, have filed a $1.5 billion compensation and remediation claim against the Western Australian government. The Banjima Native Title Aboriginal Corporation (BNTAC) lodged the case in the Federal Court in Melbourne on February 24.

The claim targets decades of government inaction over millions of tonnes of blue asbestos (crocidolite) waste left behind at three abandoned mines near the former Pilbara town, located about 1,400 kilometers northeast of Perth.

What the Claim Seeks

BNTAC has asked the court to split the case into two phases. The first focuses on orders to clean up Banjima country. Specifically, BNTAC is seeking:

• Sealing of three abandoned mines
• Removal of three tailings dumping grounds
• Demolition of the asbestos-built Wittenoom racecourse and airport
• Remediation of gorges, rivers, and creeks polluted by asbestos runoff

The corporation expects remediation costs to reach $1.5 billion or more, subject to expert evidence.

The second phase will address damages for asbestos contamination and what BNTAC’s lawyers allege was the WA government’s knowing participation in the dispossession and disadvantage of Banjima people.

Contamination History

Blue asbestos was mined at Wittenoom from the late 1930s until 1966. Colonial Sugar Refining Company (CSR) operated the mines. At its peak, several thousand people lived in the town.

The town was shuttered in 1978 and formally struck from maps in 2007. In 2023, the remaining structures were demolished. But no action has been taken to remove the asbestos tailings. The WA government’s own reporting shows the contamination continues to spread.

An exclusion zone covering 46,000 hectares of Banjima native title land remains in place. That area is eight times the size of Sydney Harbour.

Health Impact on Banjima People

The statement of claim argues the contamination has had a disproportionate health impact on traditional owners. A 2016 report by WA Senior Scientific Officer Peter Franklin found that Banjima people had the highest per capita rate of mesothelioma incidence in the world.

More than 4,000 deaths across Australia have been attributed to asbestos exposure at Wittenoom, according to the Asbestos Diseases Society of Australia. The toll continues to rise.

Banjima woman Johnnell Parker told ABC News that “there is not one family that hasn’t been touched by this mesothelioma.” Her uncle, Banjima elder Maitland Parker, died in 2024 after an eight-year battle with the disease. He never worked in the mines. He served as a ranger in the adjacent Karijini National Park.

Government Response

WA Premier Roger Cook said he was not surprised by the claim, noting he had been in contact with Banjima representatives and their legal team.

“I would prefer a negotiated outcome, but I respect, absolutely and fundamentally respect their right to seek justice,” he told reporters.

BNTAC chief executive Ed Armstrong said previous discussions with the WA government had failed to progress. “We believe that if there’s no legal action taking place, they’ll continue to defer or delay this and just kick it down the road,” he said.

Legal Precedent

CSR, which held the mining leases, has paid tens of millions in damages to former employees who contracted asbestosis and mesothelioma. The same legal team behind several of those cases, led by lawyer Peter Gordon, is representing BNTAC.

The key legal question is whether responsibility for the tailings passed to the WA government after the mines closed. Gordon argues the state “has owned, occupied and been responsible for the land upon which this contaminated waste has sat since 1979.”

A 1992 WA parliamentary inquiry recommended removing the asbestos tailings. More than three decades later, the waste remains.