Bell’s report indicates that Queensland’s underground coal mine safety and health performance significantly improved in the 2009-2010 financial year and the state’s mining industry can now boast the best safety and health record in the world.

The report notes that there has been a 40 per cent improvement in the crucial area of injury severity, which is measured by days lost due to injury.

Underground coal injuries also fell from 200 in 2008-09 to 170 this year.

Bell was made the state’s first mine safety and health commissioner by Premier Anna Bligh last year, and the CFMEU welcomed the appointment.

The creation of the role, and the experience of the current Commissioner, we believe, will put added pressure on unsafe mining workplaces.

What is clear from Bell’s first annual report is that when it comes to mine safety, Queensland has one of the best approaches in the country and the world.

It is important to recognise, however, that achieving this world standard in preventing accidents is no accident itself.

As a union we are enormously proud of our role in reforming mine safety in Queensland over many decades.

What makes Australian legislation very different to all other countries is that participation by the workforce in the safety management process is enshrined in our legislation.

Unions fought long and hard for these laws and we are now seeing it pay dividends for the health and safety of workers.

The current strength of Queensland’s occupational health and safety regulations is the result of years of piece-by-piece construction.

Yet this is not to say that we can rest on our laurels.

Although safety standards have reached pleasing new highs, the constant development of new mining technologies means that safety practices need to keep pace.

This will require constant vigilance, and our union stands ready to make sure that this happens.

Unfortunately the greatest current threat to Queensland’s mining safety standards is the push to standardise OH&S laws across the country.

Removing Queensland’s specific OH&S laws relating to mining, and replacing it with a one-size-fits-all piece of national legislation threatens to undo so much of what has been achieved in this state.

Queenslanders appreciate the often tragic history involved in crafting the current set of tough safety laws. To wipe that all away for the sake of administrative elegance is a perverse concept.

Yet while the safety of Queensland mine workers may have improved in recent times, other aspects of their quality of life have sadly been declining.

Towns in the Bowen Basin like Collinsville, Moranbah and Moura should be among the nation’s wealthiest, as the mines surrounding them become more and more profitable.

Yet instead towns like these, and dozens of others across the state, are literally fighting for survival due to the modern employment practices of mining companies.

More than 10,000 mining jobs have been created in the Bowen Basin alone in the past three years, with plans for at least 42 new mines in Queensland in the next decade.

Yet the rise of a fly-in/fly-out workforce and accommodation camps is crippling local communities.

In light of the astronomic profits being generated by the Queensland mining industry, this current neglect of the state’s towns is, quite simply, wrong.

The resources being exploited belong to Australians. First and foremost they belong to the Australians who live and work in coal mining towns.

A key aim of the Rudd Government’s toppled Resources Super Profit Tax was to ensure that a proportion of the wealth being generated by mining regions actually went toward building social and physical infrastructure.

The original RSPT was modelled to support Regional Infrastructure Funds, which will be absolutely vital in ensuring Queensland mining towns get a proper share of the prosperity they are delivering.

Ensuring a fair go for mining towns is and will continue to be a key focus for the CFMEU in coming months and years.

The Gillard Government’s new MRRT may deliver less money overall, but it must continue to offer a proper deal for mining towns