The Parramatta National Rugby League club has been urged to overturn its decision to accept a multi-year sponsorship deal from the former asbestos manufacturer, James Hardie.
The club announced James Hardie will be the Eels front-of-jersey sponsor from 2025 — harking back to the company’s backing of the club between 1981 and 1995, when it won four premierships.
For decades, James Hardie was Australia’s largest producer of asbestos materials – a product that can cause lung cancer, mesothelioma, chronic lung condition, asbestosis.
It’s estimated that around 4,000 Australians die each year from exposure to asbestos.
James Hardie stopped asbestos production in 1987, but prior to then and in the decades following, sufferers fought the company for compensation, even when it relocated to The Netherlands in 2001.
James Hardie eventually set up a $4 billion compensation fund, but the scars of years of legal battles run deep for victims.
President of the Asbestos Diseases Foundation, Barry Robson, wants Parramatta to rethink the sponsorship deal.
“Don’t do it,” Robson said.
“I think it’s outrageous. It’s a trigger to what has happened by James Hardie with their dangerous products containing asbestos.
“It hasn’t gone away – the legacy of their products. I fought this company for 10 long years to get compensation for victims.
“To see the name Hardie on these football jumpers will trigger in some families memories of loved ones that have died from being exposed to these James Hardie products.
“I know Parramatta supporters have been victims. I’m asking them (Parramatta) to reconsider the decision.”
Parramatta released a statement announcing the new sponsorship deal, saying: “the club was delighted to strengthen an iconic relationship with deep historic roots for both organisations.”
“Eels fans will remember the club’s previous association with James Hardie as major sponsor from 1981 to 1995, which coincided with the greatest period in the club’s history,” Paramatta CEO Jim Sarantinos said in the statement.
Hardie’s CEO, Aaron Erter said: “James Hardie has been proudly providing Australian Made (sic) building products to Sydney and Australia for over 100 years, manufactured at our Australian sites including one in Rosehill, in Western Sydney.”
The former executive director of the Waste Contractors & Recyclers Association of NSW, Tony Khoury, said “the Parramatta Eels should reconsider their position on this James Hardie sponsorship”.
“If not, the many victims of asbestos and any surviving family members will continually be reminded of the tragic issues associated with asbestos,” he said.
He said he’d lost a father-in-law to asbestos diseases while his sister lives with pleural plaques — patches of thickened tissue on the lung that can be a precursor to asbestos diseases.
He said his brother-in-law worked for James Hardie for 25 years shovelling asbestos into sacks.
“He’d come home with his overalls plastered with asbestos and she’d shake them out and breathe in the fibres,” Khoury said.
For Parramatta “to want to relive those glory days (in the 80s) now knowing what we know is a shameful decision”, he said.
“Why isn’t the National Rugby league doing something?” Khoury asked.
The ABC has contacted the NRL for comment.
Parramatta were approached for comment, but were unable to due to match day commitments. A club spokesperson said a response would be issued shortly.
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