It comes after odour detection dog teams found the presence of fire ants at several mine sites in the Central Highlands and Isaac Council regions, including at the BHP Broadmeadow Mine west of Mackay.

In light of the latest detection, Reece Pianta believes BHP should be the ones to pay for the treatment required across their sites that were impacted by the fire ant infestation.

“When a mining company moves contaminated material and sparks an outbreak, taxpayers shouldn’t be left footing the bill – the companies responsible must pay to have their mess cleaned up, no different from an oil spill,” he said.

“This is a catastrophic breach – shipments from just one infested site have triggered a major regional outbreak.

“But every dollar and every drone we have should be focused on wiping out fire ants at the frontlines near Brisbane, not cleaning up after corporate carelessness.”

Pianta insists it is not a matter of punishing companies such as BHP in this instance, rather than forcing public funds to be used would undermine efforts to deal with the fire ants issue.

“This isn’t about companies footing the bill for everything. But if governments allow outbreaks like this to suck resources away from where they’re needed most, we risk undermining the eradication effort across the whole country,” he said.

“BHP did the right thing reporting and supporting fire ant surveillance work, now they are uniquely well placed to support the response.”

BHP has been contacted for comment.