Orica community meeting update

Friday August 19, 2011

Yesterday evening (Thursday 18 August) Orica held a public forum where they addressed the concerns of Stockton residents, following last week’s incident at the Company’s Kooragang Island site.

Over 250 community members attended the forum and put their questions to Orica representatives. James Bonnor, General Manager of Orica Mining Services, welcomed the discussion.

“We have been addressing individual community concerns through our hotline since the incident, and were grateful that we could respond to even more Stockton residents in this public forum.

“We understand that our communication with the community about this incident has been of serious concern to residents and we needed to address this, as well as provide as much information as we can about the incident,” said Mr Bonnor.

As a result of the discussion with residents, Orica is very much committed to rebuilding the trust of the community through a much more comprehensive, long term community engagement strategy.

Specifically, Orica will be taking the following immediate actions:

• Provide residents with more specific information about the impact of the incident on bore water sources;
• Provide all residents with their household chromium test results;
• Widen the existing Community Reference Group to include a greater representation of the local community;
• Conduct a detailed review of Orica’s Emergency Response Plan, in terms of the approach to alerting the Emergency Services; and
• Offer all residents in the affected area with concerns about the cleaning of their property the option of additional clean up activity from Orica.

Orica was encouraged by the genuine interest of the community in developing a more robust relationship, and continues to encourage all concerned residents to call the Orica help line for more information on +61 2 4908 9300.

• Media contact:  Nicole Ekert, Corporate Communications, (03) 9665 7538                 
  Mobile: 0407 166 783