Ian Wright

So the Commonwealth government is suing 3M for the damage caused by the use of

PFOS.

It's a particular type of PFAS chemical and it was used as a foaming agent for firefighting.

So particularly for things like fuel fires, burning planes or tanks and other sort of

storage tanks of fuel associated with military bases.

They did lots and lots of training with this foam.

And there's stories of Christmas time, mountains of foam and kids playing with it, using the PFAS foam.

It's incredible foam.

It's like a giant bubble bath.

But that use and the training has built up in the soil at military bases around Australia.

And the Commonwealth is talking specifically about 28 of them.

And it's still in the soil.

It's in the water.

What is also a great concern is the community surrounding these military bases because it's moving off site and causing contamination, particularly if it gets into the water table and then moves into the local waterways and sometimes into the water supply.

For example, the military has actually paid out a class action.

They have been sued by the community for PFAS contamination surroundings.

So

the contamination coming from military bases.

So the Commonwealth has already paid out money for that.

They'll be seeking to compensate because the argument that the Attorney General is putting forward, and I think it is quite correct, is that the 3M company knew how dangerous their products were containing PFAS chemicals, yet they withheld that information for commercial reasons.