A married mother of two who made particularly disturbing allegations of persistent sexual harassment in the mining industry to a parliamentary inquiry is continuing her whistleblower campaign, fronting cameras to tell her story.
The West Australian’s Caitlyn Rintoul won a Walkley Award last month for her series of reports uncovering rampant sexual misconduct in WA’s mining industry, which began with an alleged rape at a BHP mine site and sparked the inquiry.
A litany of horror stories emerged, including a submission by Astacia Stevens, who claimed that when she was working for contractor Macmahon at a Fortescue site, a superintendent promised to make an investigation into her haul truck near-miss “go away” if she had sex with him.
Ms Stevens also alleged that at a Rio Tinto site, where she was working for contractor DT Workforce, a superintendent told her she would have to get on her knees if she wanted to get “her shirt” — a permanent job with the mining giant.
“If you want to get on the trucks, you need to get on your knees,” she told a 60 Minutes report to be broadcast this Sunday.
“Once you get on the trucks, if you want to get on the water cart, you need to get on your knees.
“You want to get onto the digger, you get on your knees.”
She also told the program sexual assaults happened “so much more often than anyone realises” and whistleblowers “never work in the industry again”.
Another woman featured in the program described the sector as a “hell hole for women”.
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