THE CRITICISMS

Ranger itself constantly challenged the Supervising Scientist about research and its jurisdiction as an environmental watchdog as well as the cost and outcomes of research. Particular criticism was aimed at the levy imposed upon uranium production, the proceeds of which were used partly to finance the operations of the Supervising Scientist. This criticism was particularly pronounced in the late 1980s when the levy was increased at a time when the international market for uranium was collapsing.

A source of concern throughout the 1980s was the quality of laboratory facilities. In 1982 the Australian Science and Technology Council recommended construction of a permanent field laboratory at Jabiru. Seven years later a new environmental radioactivity laboratory was completed.

It has been considered that the lack of regulatory powers to enforce environmental monitoring systems was a serious problem for the Supervising Scientist. Professor G H Taylor, in a review in 1989, recommended that the Northern Territory regulatory authorities be obliged to adhere to and implement Supervising Scientist advice concerning Environmental Requirements. This recommendation was never acted upon.

Aborigines have had a number of concerns about the Supervising Scientist. These have centred upon "perceived exclusion from or inadequate inclusion of Aboriginal representative groups in initial planning and continuing negotiations over the effects of uranium extraction in the area" (Drinkwater, 10).

The then Australian Institute of Aboriginal Studies questioned the role of the Supervising Scientist in the 1984 report, Aborigines and Uranium, but did not seriously criticise its performance, seeing it instead as one of several participants in a complex regulatory environment based on a series of "structured conflicts":

Structured conflicts can serve as a regulatory mechanism - as clearly seen by [Mr Justice] Fox [in the Ranger Reports] when he set the mining companies, the Northern Land Council and the Australian National Parks and Wildlife Service in a delicate balance with each other. It could be argued that the Office of the Supervising Scientist and its associated Alligator Rivers Region Research Institute [now the Environmental Research Institute of the Supervising Scientist] were intended to be neutral parties in this equation: the voice of reason, the bearers of the scientific tradition, and the arbiters of true knowledge. While this was done in the name of the environment, they were not neutral, or, more to the point, they themselves were subject to supervision, (formally through the Coordinating Committee for the Alligator Rivers Region) and required to be responsible to pressures, not only from the mining companies, ANPWS and the Land Council, but also from the Commonwealth and Northern Territory governments and various of their departments. (Australian Institute of Aboriginal Studies, Aborigines and Uranium, (1984), 126)

Another subject of criticism is the provision for secrecy contained in section 31 of the Environment Protection (Alligator Rivers Region) Act. Its repeal has been proposed on a number of occasions. This has not occurred. It does not seem to have been a serious impediment to the workings of the Supervising Scientist.