18th March, 2026.
The Future Jobs and Investment Bill 2025 will be of high economic significance to the Wollondilly electorate. A number of long seam metallurgical coal operators in my electorate employ a sizable proportion of local residents and spend locally on goods and services. While the initial stage of the Future Jobs and Investment Program is concentrated on the thermal coalmines, at any time the continuance of mines could cease. The Tahmoor mine is a case in point. After 14 months of voluntary administration, the Tahmoor mine entered the liquidation phase in March 2026. I argue that this program should be instigated concurrently across all four regions, including Wollondilly-Illawarra. In his second reading speech, Minister Scully stated:
The bill sets out a scaled approach, focusing first on the regions that will feel the greatest impact in the short term.
The program is time sensitive for the collieries in my electorate, evidenced by the profound negative impacts of the liquidation on the Tahmoor Colliery workers, who have not entered the colliery in the past 12 months. I draw attention to the fact that 14 months ago the Tahmoor Colliery operations in my electorate went into voluntary administration, and then the Supreme Court appointed a liquidator. The coalmine workers have endured mental, financial and other stresses caused by the uncertainty of the mine's ownership.
The Tahmoor mine remains non-operational. Over 500 coalmine employees continue to experience payment cessation—even if they accepted redundancy—and job and career uncertainty. The current mine suspension relates to the eighth owner of the Tahmoor mine. The program is time critical for the collieries in my electorate, particularly Tahmoor. The economic strategy for transition should be started in the short term to build worker, community and local business resilience. The Tahmoor mine is a prime case study of the actual and needed government efforts, resourcing and advice required to support affected workers and contractors. There was no other comparable-size substantial industry in the area that could absorb an intake of the Tahmoor coalmining workforce, and public transport out of the area is practically non-existent, even though coal plays an important part in our area and will probably be sustainable for many years if an individual or business bails Tahmoor Colliery out of liquidation.
Coalmines of all types are vulnerable to changes in the mining resource market, business investment and closure ahead of their scheduled end of life. I support the bill, which is a critical policy reform that will facilitate long‑term and sustainable economic restructuring of the local workforce currently employed in the metallurgical coalmines. Additionally, the reforms should plan for the resilience of local towns and villages. Planning for future jobs and economic restructuring are required as soon as possible to plan transition to other employment sectors well before the expected closure of coalmines.
However, the bill should be amended, as some of my colleagues have foreshadowed, to enhance its intended objectives for local communities. It should be amended to transition all mining regions at the same time and financially guarantee stakeholders' commitments to implement, monitor and evaluate local structural action plans and workforce plans. The bill should also be amended to provide timing, certainty and transparency of communications between coalmining company operators, the mining workforce and local communities about any proposed mine closure dates and environmental rehabilitation of mining lands.