Poisoned by the hand that feeds

Sharlene Body's 4-year-old son Sidney had the highest recorded lead level of all the children tested in Mt Isa - more than three times the accepted safe level. Photo / Kathy Marks

From the air, Mount Isa emerges as a scrabble of houses in a parched landscape, dwarfed by three tall stacks thrusting skywards. The chimneys, which pump out fumes day and night, belong to Australia's biggest lead mining and smelting operation. A few hundred metres away is a town of 23,000 people.

For decades, the mine, which also produces copper, silver and zinc, has brought jobs and prosperity to this isolated corner of northwest Queensland. Thousands of outsiders, including a steady flow of New Zealanders, have moved to the town, attracted by the well-paid work and laid-back lifestyle.

But a dark cloud has settled over Mount Isa, with signs that its residents are paying a steep price. Lead contamination has been uncovered in homes, gardens and waterways, and a recent survey found that more than one-tenth of its young children have potentially unsafe levels of the toxic metal in their blood.

The mine's owners, the Anglo-Swiss giant Xstrata, deny their operations are the source, pointing instead to outcrops of naturally mineralised bedrock in the area.

That stance is echoed by civic leaders, for whom lead represents the town's economic lifeblood, and by the Queensland Government, which receives millions of dollars every year from Xstrata in taxes and royalties.

Some parents disagree, however, and half a dozen have launched a class action, accusing the company of negligence in polluting the environment and endangering children's health. The lawsuit also names Mount Isa City Council and the state Government, alleging that authorities knew about the risks years ago but failed to take steps to protect the community.

Daphne Hare moved to the town in 2002, when it was booming, and landed a job in a busy pub. But her infant daughter Stella was frequently sick, and when her blood was tested, it was found to contain 13 micrograms of lead per decilitre (mcg/dl). The World Health Organisation sets a limit of 10mcg/dl, which many scientists still consider too high.

Hare says: "You could have blown me off the chair with a feather. I was in shock. I would wake up crying in the night." Eighteen months later, Stella's blood lead level had risen to 17mcg/dl. Hare returned to her native Townsville, on the north Queensland coast, but not before announcing she planned to sue.

Other families have since joined her fight, and the case will be heard by the Queensland Supreme Court next year unless a settlement is reached, according to their lawyer, Damian Scattini.

Scattini is scathing about the idea of "naturally occurring" lead. "It's ludicrous," he says, brandishing photographs of dust clouds drifting towards the town from the mine site. The proximity of the mine, with its jumble of pylons, conveyors, crushing plants, pits and slagheaps, often takes visitors aback. Only a road and railway line divide it from homes, shops, motels, schools, sports fields and playgrounds.

Xstrata, the city council and state Government are contesting the legal action, and - despite all the evidence about lead's damaging effects on children's IQ - they are supported by many in Mount Isa.

The mayor, John Molony, dismisses the litigants as "just a few women chasing a quid". Most parents ignored Queensland Health's offer of free blood screening, and of the 45 children with readings above 10mcg/ dl, only 13 were brought back for follow-up tests.

Picking up her brood from one primary school, Louise Armstrong shrugs at the mention of lead. "I didn't get my kids tested, but I know they're OK," she says. "I grew up here and there's nothing wrong with me. I haven't got two heads, and neither has anyone else I know."

But while locals - fiercely protective of their jobs and their town's history and heritage - appear unconcerned, others have been trying to ring alarm bells for years.

Ted Prickett, the council's former chief environmental health officer, first noticed deposits of lead around town in 1986. In 1990 land near a kindergarten was decontaminated; however, the council, fearing that "the matter may get out of hand and cause a panic", played down the problem, according to internal documents.

Prickett, who quit Mount Isa in 1995, was horrified to learn recently that no further action had been taken for another decade - and then only after another whistleblower, Tim Powe, resigned. Powe, a manager with Queensland's Environmental Protection Agency, had lobbied for the repeal of legislation allowing the mine to release triple the pollution permitted nationally, and had also condemned the fact that Xstrata monitored its own emissions.

Powe believes the authorities were "scared to take on the company, because it was one of the largest employers in the state".

After he went public, there was a flurry of activity, leading to the recent blood lead study. But the issue of the lead's source was fudged. The state MP for Mount Isa, Betty Kiernan, declared: "The reality is that lead is literally part of the foundations of our community and we all have a responsibility to ensure we manage our exposure." John Piispanen, Queensland's Environmental Health Director, suggested that children might be ingesting lead from home-made fishing sinkers.

Such notions make Sharlene Body fume. Her four-year-old son, Sidney, recorded the highest reading of all: 31.5mcg/dl. But, having grown up in Mount Isa, she knows that attacking Xstrata - which took over Mount Isa Mines in 2003 - is tantamount to treachery. "They say, 'don't bite the hand that feeds you"', she muses. "But what if that hand is poisoning you too? Should we let our kids get sick just because they're providing the town with jobs and money?"

Body adds: "We're supposed to just shut up and deal with it, but I want to get it out there, what Xstrata are doing. I want them to take responsibility, because we are going to have to live with what their irresponsibility has done to our kids."

Sharlene Seeto moved to Mount Isa in 2007, hoping to "get ahead". Her daughter, Bethany, now nearly four, had a blood lead level of 27.2mcg/ dl; dust from the air-conditioning unit in her bedroom contained 30 times the maximum safe limit for lead. "She was breathing that in," says Seeto, incredulous. Bethany has problems communicating, and is 18 months behind her age group, her mother believes.

The Queensland mine is Australia's largest emitter of lead: during the 2007-2008 financial year it sent 290 tonnes into the atmosphere, topping the national charts for arsenic, cadmium, antimony, zinc and sulphur dioxide as well. Soil tests have revealed high concentrations of heavy metals, which, scientists conclude, come from smelter emissions and dust blowing off the enormous uncapped slagheaps.

An eminent American professor of environmental toxicology, Russell Flegal, an expert witness for the families, says Mount Isa's soils contain more lead than notoriously polluted mining towns in China and Romania.

The company defends its environmental record, pointing to its removal of contaminated waste from the local river and a project aimed at cutting emissions. Fumes are carried away by prevailing winds for much of the year, according to Ed Turley, the company's environmental manager, and smelters are shut down when necessary.

Turley describes Xstrata's 15 air quality monitors as "the most intensive monitoring system in Australia". But even within the company, there is disunity. Asked where he believes the lead in blood is coming from, Gordon Teague, head of the Air Quality Control Centre, replies: "Airborne from the [mining] lease."

A follow-up study of young children is planned for 2012. Scattini, the lawyer, comments: "More monitoring - what can that do?

"You can note that another generation has passed with brain damage.

It's like saying we'll watch the road accident rather than doing something about it."

Scattini criticises official advice to parents to minimise lead exposure by washing children's hands regularly. "Suppose this was asbestos and they were saying that really it's just a matter of using a soap and towel? If it was asbestos that was pouring into houses, what would people say?"

Brenda Oliver spent 18 months in Mount Isa in the 1990s. Her husband, Jeffrey, worked at the mine and Brenda, who was pregnant with their son, Ryan, would wash his overalls. Ryan, now 13, has learning difficulties and behavioural problems. She says: "I don't think I would have had him up there, knowing what I know now, and how hard it's been to raise him."

Daphne Hare worries about Stella's future.

"Will she be able to have her own children or hold down a job?" she asks. "These are things we won't know until she's older, but there's not a day goes by when you don't think about it."

Sharlene Body says: "The lead's going to be in Sidney's system now, and I don't think he'll ever get rid of it. People say we're only doing this for the money. But I would rather he was healthy than all the money in the world."