Pike River final sealing on hold – reports

The final sealing of the Pike River coal mine on the South Island’s West Coast is on hold, according to local newspaper reports, while victim family members launch a last-ditch legal action to go back inside the mine.

Several of the Pike River families filed a judicial review application at the High Court in Wellington last week, challenging the Government’s decision not to go further.

On November 19, 2010, an explosion tore through the mine, killing 29 men.

The Government has rejected a proposal by the Pike River Independent Technical Advisory Group, on behalf of 22 of the 29 families, to continue into the mine as far as the main fan, which they say is the likely source of the explosion and the most critical forensic site within the mine.

And now, the Greymouth Star has reported that the sealing of the mine – the last stage before the Pike River Recovery Agency (PRRA) walks away – is on hold while the families await a court case.

PRRA officials are refusing to confirm whether their plans have stalled.

“As the matter is before the courts, it would be inappropriate to comment,” chief executive Dave Gawn told the Herald.

Pike River Recovery Minister Andrew Little took a similar view, saying: “In view of their intention to take legal action, it would be inappropriate to comment.”

In a report prepared by the PRRA, Little was given the option of directing the agency to complete a full risk assessed and costed plan or to simply decline to implement the plan without any further consultation with the families or their experts.

The group of Pike families are dismayed by the decision rejecting their plan, claiming there has been no consultation, amounting to a “breach of the Government’s commitments to the families”.

They say it has caused “them further pain”, according to a press statement last week.

“The report prepared for Minister Little states, ‘while the plan is technically feasible, there would be significant costs associated with developing and implementing the detail,” the statement says.

“However, as Minister Little has rejected the agency option to complete a full costing on the plan, the figures and time frames quoted in the agency report cannot be substantiated and appear to be guesswork.”

The figures included in the plan presented by the families were, they say, supported by data provided by the agency itself.

And while Little says there has never been a “blank cheque” with regards to the drift re-entry, the families say “no one expects there to be”.

“That said, early on the police advised that they were treating this investigation as a 29-man homicide,” the families’ statement says.

“Never before has the New Zealand justice system been subjected to arbitrary fiscal restraints in this way.

“The Government has effectively taken a ‘cut and run’ stance in relation to Pike River.

“They made commitments to the families and to the people of New Zealand but the minister seems to have forgotten what they were.”

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