Trouble in WA’s ‘engine room’
EXCLUSIVE: CLAIMS of serious misconduct at the City of Karratha are detailed in a 30,000-word submission to the WA parliamentary select committee into local government.
The private submission by Pilbara-based Norwest Sand & Gravel alleges executive staff and elected members, some of whom still work at the City, have delayed over many years his legitimate activities in Karratha and Wickham.
Former ministers, mayors, councillors and staff at the council and the departments of mines and land administration are named in the parliamentary submission lodged in August last year. It cannot be released publicly until the committee reports or decides to make it public.
NWSG director Kim North told StreetWise he approached WA Premier Mark McGowan with his concerns in May this year but was referred to Local Government Minister David Templeman’s office.
The allegations also raised with regulatory bodies including the Department of Local Government and the Public Sector Commission follow damning findings against the ‘dysfunctional’ City of Perth where former and current staff face investigation for possible criminal offences.
NWSG’s allegations are based on hundreds of FOI and council documents and the testimonies of former staff who confirmed the victimisation against the family run company dates back to 1999 when it was awarded leases near Point Samson without the Mines Department informing the then Shire of Roebourne.
“For years I couldn’t understand why my leases were being held up and rejected when my competitors were getting quick turnarounds,” Mr North said in his appeal to the Premier, CC’d to relevant ministers.
The City told StreetWise it was aware of the allegations it says, “relate to a former staff member who has not worked at the City for more than 10 years and is now deceased. These allegations have been investigated multiple times over the past decade and each time found to be unsubstantiated”.
Mr North says delays on just five of his top mining leases totalled more than 50 years. He adds a 2017 application for a licence to operate a concrete waste recycling facility in Wickham has only just been approved when his main competitor received approvals in three months.
NWSG provides much-needed earth moving materials, mostly high quality sand for homes, schools and parks, and employs about 30 people, sometimes up to 60 depending on the time of year. The Wickham company with offices in Karratha provides much-needed heavy machinery to build and repair roads, rail and bridges, particularly after cyclones and severe flooding events.
Fed up after years of red tape and lengthy delays on his various applications, Mr North wrote to Mr McGowan on May 11 asking he intervene as his concerns extended to individuals in several departments and agencies including the Water Corporation.
“A lot of what the City has thrown at me could not have happened without mines or land administration ticking off on it,” Mr North claims.
He told StreetWise the submission to the select committee chaired by Liberal MLC Simon O’Brien is the result of a company review of lease holdings and pending applications. It reveals what Mr North claims is a litany of public sector breaches and questionable conduct whenever NWSG applied for council approvals.
Mr North told the Premier he believed the City’s treatment of NWSG, “is personal”, and had cost the company tens of millions of dollars dealing with the City’s extraordinary demands, court actions, exorbitant rates and petitions designed to raise community opposition against his legitimate operations.
He said Pilbara businesses and industry inject hundreds of millions of dollars into the economy, “but not when you pay a high cost of doing business with a council that singles out those it doesn’t like”.
Tomorrow: Doing business in the Pilbara
