WEST KIMBERLEY PLACE REPORT - Department of Sustainability ...

the company. The findings of a site inspection by the Western Australian Aboriginal
Sites Department, the agency responsible for administering the Aboriginal Heritage
Act 1972 (WA), that Pea Hill was surrounded by an 'an area of influence' (Ritter
2002) was not accepted by the Western Australian Government. According to the
Western Australian Government's publication 'Noonkanbah: The Facts' (1980) the
concept of 'areas of influence' was not supported by 'most anthropologists or
Aborigines'.
In May 1979, Dicky Skinner, a member of the Yungngora community, went to Perth
with a petition against Amax. The story was picked up by the media and Skinner
addressed the Western Australian Trades and Labour Council, which carried motions
of support and letters to Amax. Union rallies in Perth shortly thereafter recommended
bans on all drilling work at Noonkanbah and the Australian Workers Union (AWU)
suggested that all nine oil rigs operating in Western Australia could be closed down if
drilling at Noonkanbah went ahead. Bob Hawke, as leader of the Australian Council of
Trade Unions (ACTU) also called on Amax to pull back (O'Lincoln 1993).
The Yungngora community barred and locked the gate of Noonkanbah station in June
1979 amid Amax and state government threats to start drilling. Ritter (2002) notes the
spectre of physical confrontation receded with the success of an interim injunction
filed by the Aboriginal Legal Service to prevent drilling. While the injunction was
eventually lifted, the onset of the wet season prevented the company from further
drilling.
In March 1980, Western Australian Government ministers visited Noonkanbah to try
and resolve the situation, but with no success. Later that month, Amax entered the
property without notice, with a police escort and began bulldozing a camp site. A
second injunction was granted to stop the work, but was lifted a short time later
(Ritter 2002). In May 1980, the Western Australian Premier visited the station to
discuss the matter with the Yungngora community, as did the Federal Minister for
Aboriginal Affairs, Fred Chaney, but all talks failed to resolve the situation (Ritter
2002).
The most publicised act in the Noonkanbah dispute occurred in August 1980 when a
non-union, strike breaking convoy transported drilling equipment 2,240 kilometres
from Perth to Noonkanbah. Backed by a large police presence, the forty-nine truck
convoy broke through a number of blockades and a number of arrests were made
along the journey. Just north of Port Hedland, a bridge was blocked by 160 local
Aboriginal people, and near Broome, 200 protesters greeted the convoy. At
Noonkanbah, 60 men set up a blockade at Mickey's Pool, on the access road into the
station. After a long overnight vigil, police finally cleared the blockade. In total, 55
people were arrested by police as a result of the blockades, including members of the
Aboriginal community, church leaders and resource union representatives (Howitt
1980, O'Lincoln 1993; Ritter 2002; Allbrook 2009). Despite getting through the
blockades onto the station and under pressure from the ACTU, the drilling crew voted
not to operate the rig (O'Lincoln 1993; Gillespie 2009). To get around the ACTU ban,
the Western Australian Government transferred the drilling rights to a shelf company,
thereby allowing a non-unionised drill crew to sink the exploration well without
further delay. No oil was found. For Aboriginal people this outcome was to be
expected because, as one senior Aboriginal man who participated in the Noonkanbah
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