DROUGHT-affected landowners were still pressured by banks to provide capital despite Winton’s “Last Stand” in December, according to a Longreach priest.
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However, parish priest Matthew Moloney said he was misquoted in December claiming 46 foreclosures in the Winton and Longreach areas.
He said there were about 46 properties in central and North Queensland areas under “severe financial hardship” and pressured by banks to provide capital.
Father Moloney was told this under confidence through religious responsibilities.
After Winton’s Rural Debt Crisis Summit he received phone calls across Australia from farmers facing similar situations, and he still believed bank foreclosure and mortgage practices needed reviewing.
“Banks are still putting pressure on people,” he said.
Graziers’ financial situations had not improved, even with ANZ Bank’s one-year moratorium on bank foreclosures.
The moratorium only applied to property owners who were not already foreclosed.
Father Moloney said the greater Longreach region had up to 10 millimetres of rain this year.
“One place west of Longreach had its first rainfall over an inch for over three years,” he said.
“Some places still haven’t rainfall over an inch.”
Eighty-year-old Winton grazier Charlie Phillott believed the debt crisis summit “made things much better” for landowners.
“I think the Winton meeting brought the action of the banks into the open.” Mr Phillott believed Member for Mount Isa Rob Katter – who organised the summit – was the only politician who did anything to ease the situation. “I think it has made the banks sit up and think anyway,” he said.
“It’s getting some sort of legality into the operation of the bank.
“Well, I think it’s not too much legal in the situation is there?”
Widespread reports stated Mr Phillott was forcibly removed by police when the bank foreclosed his family property, Carisbrooke Station.
Police did not attend the property, but a notice to vacate the property was given to Mr Phillott’s son.
Mr Phillott never made these claims – having only said at the start of the meeting how the drought affected businesses.
“The rest the media got for themselves,” he said.
Mr Phillott said his family had access to Carisbrooke, but there were further negotiations to be had which were slowed during Christmas holidays.
“We haven’t concluded arrangements with the bank,” he said.
An ANZ Bank spokesman said the 12-month moratorium on drought affected properties did not apply to properties already foreclosed.
The bank would still sell these properties.
