A senate inquiry is holding two days of public hearings examining the extent, regulation and management of PFAS in Australia. The committee has heard from members of the wreck bay community on the New South Wales South Coast who have been greatly impacted by the forever chemicals.
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00:00Residents from the Wreck Bay Aboriginal community near Jervis Bay on the state's south coast
00:06have gathered in Nowra today to give evidence as the Senate inquires into Australia's management
00:12of PFAS.
00:14In 2016, the Australian Defence Force revealed high levels of PFAS had seeped into waterways
00:20at Wreck Bay due to the use of firefighting foam at nearby defence base HMAS Creswell.
00:25In 2023, members of the Wreck Bay Aboriginal community sued the Australian Defence Force
00:30for $22 million in a class action lawsuit for the impacts that the contamination has
00:35had on cultural practice.
00:38Today at the hearing, members of the Wreck Bay Aboriginal community gave evidence about
00:41the impact of losing those cultural practices on future generations, claiming that children
00:46were no longer able to go out onto country and do the things that they were once able
00:51to do, instead only able to learn culture in the classroom.
00:55Emotions were also high today when residents of the Wreck Bay community were giving evidence
00:59about the illness and death that had occurred in the community since over the last three
01:04decades of PFAS contamination.
01:07The inquiry heard from a local Jervis Bay GP, Dr David Goldberg, who had worked for
01:12ten years in the community in the early 2000s.
01:15Here's what he had to say about health impacts linked to PFAS in the community.
01:20I am of the firm belief that there is a cancer cluster occurring in Wreck Bay, and the statistics
01:29from the Australian Institute of Health and Wellbeing show that Wreck Bay, four years
01:35out of, five years out of ten between 2010 and 2020, was the most dangerous place in
01:42Australia to live from the point of view of dying under 75 or medical conditions.
01:46Day two of the public hearings this week will be held in Penrith, with residents from the
01:50Blue Mountains and Richmond giving evidence alongside Sydney Water, Water New South Wales
01:56and the New South Wales Environment Protection Authority.
01:59The final report is expected to be handed down with recommendations to the Federal Government
02:03in August this year.