The accident-prone oil industry has already proven that catastrophic oil spills are always a matter of when, not if. It is brazen overconfidence that is now on show as global oil giant Equinor tries to establish a high-risk operation in the wild waters of the Great Australian Bight. But the truth is that offshore oil disaster has already struck in Australian waters and the impacted communities are still suffering.

The people of Nusa Tenggara Timur deserve justice. And the lesson from the Montara spill – and every other oil disaster around the world from Exxon Valdez to Deepwater Horizon – is that there should be a permanent ban on any oil drilling in the Great Australian Bight.

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