By Benjamin Millar
The waste crisis threatening the liveability of Melbourne’s suburbs has a determined new foe – the Anti-Toxic Waste Alliance.
Chaired by Yarraville campaigner Sue Vittori, the coalition of more than 30 organisations is pressuring the state government to take stronger measures to protect communities from threats posed by toxic waste stockpiled near residential areas in Melbourne’s west and north.
The alliance (A-TWA) brings together concerned groups frustrated at three “horrific toxic waste fires” breaking out in Melbourne’s western and northern suburbs in the past two years.
Ms Vittori said the group wanted more done to tackle continuing threats from badly managed landfills and storage and recycling premises in residential suburbs.
In a submission to the Parliamentary Inquiry into Recycling and Waste Management, the group calls for bipartisan support to protect public and environmental health and safety. The submission includes a video and mural featuring drawings, comments and questions from young children affected by the Tottenham and Campbellfield fires.
“Their incredibly dark, haunting drawings capture how this community feels better than words,” Ms Vittori said.
Alliance members include Friends of Cruickshank Park, Friends of Stony Creek, the Brooklyn Residents Action Group and the Western Region Environment Centre.
As the secretary of the Friends of Cruickshank Park, Ms Vittori knows all too well the devastating impacts that can be wrought when the ticking “toxic time bombs” go off.
She recalls waking up on the morning of August 30 last year to the sound of loud explosions, then going outside and seeing the thick black plume of smoke erupting from the Tottenham warehouse fire.
“It’s absolutely disgraceful that this community is in this situation,” she said.
While welcoming moves to increase penalties and lengthen jail terms for cowboy operators illegally stockpiling large volumes of dangerous waste,
Ms Vittori said there was still a long way to go before communities could feel safe again.
“This affects our health – it’s too close to our houses and it’s dangerous,” she said.
“These have been long-running issues and concerns that have been raised with state government for decades – people have been crying out for better … regulation in the waste industry for years.”
