Funding, Power and Community Development by McCrea Niamh Finnegan Fergal

Author:McCrea, Niamh, Finnegan, Fergal [McCrea, Niamh, Finnegan, Fergal]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781447336181
Barnesnoble:
Publisher: Policy Press
Published: 2019-01-23T00:00:00+00:00

BHPB and the funding of community projects

In addition to the contributions to infrastructure projects already described, RNO sought to fund local community projects. According to corporate interviewees, BHPB’s policy of setting aside 1% of pre-tax profit for community initiatives posed a challenge. In 2007/08, at the highpoint of the Australian mining boom, the value of this 1% ‘increased by $37.6 million from the previous year to $141.0 million’ (Kloppers, 2008: i). One corporate interviewee with responsibility in this area opined that it was “never believed that it would be so much” and that, as a result, distribution “was a difficult task”. This difficulty was understood by corporate interviewees to arise from the “problem” of “community expectations” in that “more money equals higher expectations. Communities want the company to not only fund things but to do them as well”. At the heart of the matter, in this interviewee’s estimation, was a fundamental tension: “We’re a mining company [as opposed to development agent] – we need to keep reminding ourselves.” Corporate interviewees presented the company stance as “keen to partner, that is take the lead in initiatives but not the doing”. One interviewee explained that, “We’re looking for some of those win-win type relationships; that’s fairly important” and went on to offer the example of the way that one community was:

‘very keen to have us engage with them on fire control issues, and particularly helping them equip their fire services locally, which for us is a win-win because we’re part of that community, you know? We’re a landowner and … we want to protect our land and we don’t want fires to come through it.’

In addition to identifying ‘win-win’ opportunities,5 RNO representatives were responsible for disbursing grants directly to local community groups.6 The availability and manner of distribution of such grants was a matter of contention for many local interviewees. As one such interviewee phrased it: “I think, sometimes RNO’s buying the community”. At the same time, access to this funding was experienced as unreliable and messy: “there’s lots of promises [from company representatives] and then it’s like, ‘oh no, sorry we didn’t say that…’ ” In the following extended interview excerpt, a local pre-mine community member describes the perception and experience of acquiring such funding. This experience was common and is worth presenting in detail as it neatly captures the tensions and contradictions attending this type of funding:7

Interviewee: ‘And getting back to the pros and cons of the mine here as well, one thing we have noticed like for our fundraising efforts that we do, oh, they’re so generous, just amazingly generous. Rather than us fundraising and selling lamingtons or whatever to raise $750 to get the pipe for a dressage arena [at the local pony club], the company up there just went oh, “750 bucks worth, oh here you are. We’ll drop it off as well”. And to us it was like … we have never, ever experienced that sort of generosity before … and they just said “any time you want anything, just give us a call”.

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