Matters of Interest

Asbestos

The Hon. E.S. BOURKE (15:24): Remember this date: 10 September 2021. It is a date history was made. It is a date a quiet hero, a South Australian, a Salisbury North boy, took on the fight he should never have needed to contemplate but he did and he did so doing because he wanted to make Australia a safer place.

Back in the nineties, a young Woolies warehouse worker kicked off his great Australian dream. At age 21, Mat Werfel was handed the keys to his first home in Pooraka. It was a fixer upper, but for Mat, he saw this as the start of success and security. He went on to buy a new house in Parafield Gardens. This was with his now wife, Jen, and he set to work quickly turning this into a home.

Mat is a hard worker; he always has been. He wasted no time sanding and painting the eaves of this house, leaving him covered in the dust from the day's hard work. It was in his hair and in his clothes but he turned that house into a home for him and Jen. Their dream was completed after the arrival of their three beautiful girls: Mya, Alana and Cadence.

Life was perfect until Mat found a lump in his inner right thigh. No-one deserves to find out, at the age of 41, that they have a rare form of cancer—mesothelioma, the renovators' cancer. The dust Mat was covered in when he was renovating his home some 20 years earlier was asbestos dust. No-one deserves to tell their three young girls and wife they have cancer.

What Mat had done was what many people dream to do. He renovated a house and he turned it into a home, but he paid the ultimate price. What he did next is what makes him an incredibly rare individual. I have known Mat and Jen all of my political life, for more than half of my life. They are both part of the SDA family.

Mat is as loyal as they come. Standing up for what is right is simply in his DNA. If it means being the one who steps forward and takes on the big guy, he will be the first to do it. That is why way back, when he was 21, Mat was the occ health and safety rep on the Woolies warehouse floor. That is why he was a union organiser at the SDA, and that is why he took on James Hardie—all the way to the High Court—and he won.

It was the very fact that Mat was a workplace safety rep that made his story set a new precedent for asbestos victims seeking justice. In the view of the High Court, it was because a workplace safety rep like Mat would have followed recommendations and procedures and precautions if he had known about them. Mat did not change history on 10 September 2021 for himself, he did it for the many innocent housing renovators looking to start their dream.

Last year alone, eight million homes were renovated in Australia and COVID has only increased the popularity of DIY home renovations. The true cost behind these renovations will take decades to determine, especially the fact that 229 cases were identified as being exposed to James Hardie asbestos just last year.

But there is a new weapon available to take on this giant. It is the precedent set by the Werfel v Amaca case, which confirms that James Hardie has a duty of care to the public to warn them of the ongoing risk posed by their asbestos products and remains legally liable for the lives these products continue to destroy.

Mat, you had every right to declare your Australian dream a nightmare, but you did not. You took on this fight because it was the right thing to do for every Australian. You and your family have every right to be proud of what you have achieved and you have made Australia a safer place, thank you.