18 MAY 2023
ISSUE 390
Nurses still calling for safe staffing levels
News
Guide Dogs support group celebrates 40 years See page 6
Out&About
In the lead-up to International Nurses Day on May 12, Central Coast members of the NSW Nurses and Midwives Association (NSWNMA) were out in force throughout the region last week, reaffirming calls for safer staffing levels and increased nurse-patient ratios. See page 3
A slice of RuPaul comes to the Central Coast See page 13
Business
Kelly Falconer and fellow nurse Kathy Triggell collect letters of support
Delta’s ‘dirty deeds’ degrading lake, says report The Hunter Community Environment Centre is calling for a rehabilitation fund of $20M per year from Lake Macquarie power stations to replace seagrass it claims has been damaged and killed by the operations of Vales Point and Eraring power stations. HCEC wants $12M a year from Delta Electricity and $8M from Origin Energy (Eraring) to go into a Lake Macquarie Seagrass Trust to offset seagrass loss in Wyee and Myuna bays and to help restore seagrass meadows. HCEC also wants fines issued by the Environment Protection Authority (EPA) increased ten-fold to $150,000. These are two of seven recommendations in HCEC’s latest report – a 60-page “dirt file”
Vales Point Power Station with Wyee Bay and the outlet canal in the foreground
scrutinising the practices of Delta Electricity and Delta Coal’s Chain Valley and Mannering collieries. The report – Delta’s Dirty Deeds Done Dirt Cheap: the impacts of Vales Point power station on Lake Macquarie – reveals 57 breaches of environment protection since 2015, and presents
new findings based on information sourced from the EPA Public Register, scientific literature, field investigations and regulatory documents obtained under laws for public access to government information (GIPA). Vales Point power station is also being investigated by the EPA following
two significant fish kills in 2022 at Mannering Park in Wyee Bay and a report on the outcome is expected to be made public in June. The HCEC report says that Delta Electricity and Delta Coal breaches of environmental protection licence (EPL) conditions included illegal asbestos dumping, 11 relating to water pollution and coal ash dust pollution, failure to pass a 2016 EPL compliance audit, 23 individual breaches since Delta Coal took ownership of Chain Valley Colliery in 2019, contamination of heavy metals in off-site groundwater in 2021, and the near complete loss of seagrass in Wyee Bay due to excessive thermal pollution between 2005 and 2023.
Girls of Steel blazing trail for female tradies See page 21
Sport
Mariners win first semi-final – big home final looms large See page 32
Continued page 4
Structural Pools & Spas
Puzzles page 18 Includes: • Excavation • 200mm coping • Cartridge filter • 1 HP pump • Aussie white pebble
Dig in winter to
0480 06 06 06
S wi m in Summer
Pool size 7.0 x 3.0 Rectangle shape Depth 1.0 x 1.6 Lic. No: 210539C Owner builders welcomed