Speaker 1: Thanks everyone for joining us today. Unfortunately this is a
Speaker 1: call that we have hair very disappointing day for us.
Speaker 1: For those who don't know, my name is Jim Birol.
Speaker 2: It's been a bad few weeks for Jim Bayer, the
Speaker 2: CEO of Australia's third largest gold miner, Regius Resources. He's
Speaker 2: had to tell investors that a billion dollar project could
Speaker 2: be dead and millions of dollars wasted.
Speaker 1: And we're here to provide a briefing on the surprising
Speaker 1: and disappointing Section ten declaration made by the Federal Minister
Speaker 1: for Environment and Water, Tania plibask on Friday morning in
Speaker 1: relation to mcphillamy's.
Speaker 2: The plans for a gold mine in New South Wales
Speaker 2: had been through all the approvals and the boxes had
Speaker 2: been tecked, but then came the decision from the Environment Minister,
Speaker 2: Tania Plibisek to intervene on the behalf of a group
Speaker 2: of traditional owners.
Speaker 3: Have called us and they've informed us another.
Speaker 4: Sessions and that we're part of the Vlari songline, which
Speaker 4: is a love your life.
Speaker 3: Headwaters is now protected under second Sex.
Speaker 2: The industry, the coalition and parts of the media are
Speaker 2: all furious. Some even suggesting that cultural heritage laws are
Speaker 2: being hijacked by green groups. So is that true? From
Speaker 2: Schwartz Media, I'm Ruby Jones. This is seven AM today,
Speaker 2: National correspondent for the Saturday Paper. Mike Second Montanya Plivsek
Speaker 2: the gold mine and who gets a say when it
Speaker 2: comes to mining projects. It's Thursday, August twenty nine, So Mike,
Speaker 2: let's start with this planned one billion dollar gold wine.
Speaker 2: Tell me about the project and who's behind it?
Speaker 5: Right, Well, actually it's more than a one billion dollar project.
Speaker 5: That that was just what they thought they were going
Speaker 5: to make a profit out of it. So the project
Speaker 5: was going to be near Bathist in Regional New South Wales,
Speaker 5: just west of Bathist. Was proposed to be an open
Speaker 5: cut gold mine called the mcphillamy's Gold Project, and it
Speaker 5: was being developed by a company called Regis Resources, which
Speaker 5: is Australia's third biggest I think gold miner.
Speaker 6: Every community needs new industry to keep the town growing.
Speaker 2: Mcilamies would bring jobs and attracts people and attracts families
Speaker 2: to the community.
Speaker 5: Regious Resources claimed the project would have supported about five
Speaker 5: hundred and eighty full time jobs during construction and two
Speaker 5: hundred and ninety odd jobs when it was in production.
Speaker 2: To not have to leave the town at.
Speaker 7: All, increase our house prices, keep the builders busy, ken
Speaker 7: the electricians busy.
Speaker 5: They would extract up to sixty million tons of ore
Speaker 5: and from that they would get two million ounces of gold,
Speaker 5: So it was a pretty big deal. Would have delivered
Speaker 5: two hundred million dollars in royalties to the New South
Speaker 5: Wales government. And the planning had been going on for
Speaker 5: seven years, something like that community consultation. I think they
Speaker 5: might have dealt with something like twenty three different community groups,
Speaker 5: including indigenous groups, preparation of environmental impact statements, all that
Speaker 5: sort of stuff. Finally it was ticked off by the
Speaker 5: New South Wales Department of Planning, Industry, Environment and then
Speaker 5: it was referred to the state's Independent Planning Commission and
Speaker 5: they ticked it off and it was granted approval under
Speaker 5: the Federal Environmental Protection and Biodiversity Act. To all intents
Speaker 5: and purposes, the MIND proponents thought at that point it
Speaker 5: was a goer, and then this month, at the very
Speaker 5: last minute, that was all unraveled when the Federal Environment
Speaker 5: Minister Tanya Plibisek.
Speaker 2: Intervened right okay, so we have this mine all set
Speaker 2: to go ahead, approvals ticked off, consultation done and these
Speaker 2: jobs expected. Then the minister intervened. So what did Tanya
Speaker 2: Pubsect do.
Speaker 5: Well, it goes back a few years before she said no.
Speaker 5: There was an application for protection for the entire area
Speaker 5: of the mine made in twenty twenty one on behalf
Speaker 5: of a quite small group of traditional owners called the
Speaker 5: Wrajeri Traditional Owners Central West Aboriginal Corporation, and two weeks
Speaker 5: ago Plibisek approved their application. She didn't actually protect all
Speaker 5: the mind site on cultural heritage grounds, so of the
Speaker 5: full two thy five hundred hectar site, she protected a
Speaker 5: much smaller part for roughly four hundred hectares. It so happens, though,
Speaker 5: that that protected area covers virtually the entire planned tailings dam,
Speaker 5: and Regius Resources says that's crucial to the whole operation.
Speaker 5: No tailing dam, no mine, So the whole thing's stopped. Right.
Speaker 2: So the mining company is saying, as a result of
Speaker 2: this decision, the mine will no longer go ahead.
Speaker 5: Well, they're not quite killing it off. I've been passing
Speaker 5: their words fairly carefully. Currently unviable were the words used
Speaker 5: by Regius Resources ce Jim Bayer. But still it looks
Speaker 5: like it looks like hundreds of millions of dollars down
Speaker 5: the gurglar. I mean, even if they were to try
Speaker 5: and revive it, they would presumably have to go back
Speaker 5: to the drawing board right because their tailing stam has
Speaker 5: been ruled out. I might add plibisek reckons they can
Speaker 5: find another site for the tailing stam. The company at
Speaker 5: this stage says they can't. So we've got a standoff.
Speaker 1: We don't have a site for a tailing stam, so
Speaker 1: makes it pretty hard to step forward with the project
Speaker 1: without that what we've got.
Speaker 5: Bey gave this quite bolshie, I think you would say
Speaker 5: briefing to his investors, where he said.
Speaker 1: Regis considers this Section ten declaration shatters any confidence the
Speaker 1: development proponents Australia wide, both private and public, can have
Speaker 1: in project approval timelines and outcomes.
Speaker 5: And he went on the implications of this decision and
Speaker 5: not limited to the resources industry.
Speaker 1: But also developers of infrastructure, renewable energy property, as well
Speaker 1: as tourism operators, farmers and owners of freehold land.
Speaker 5: More generally, the Association of Mining and Exploration Companies, which
Speaker 5: is one of the peak bodies for the extractive industry.
Speaker 5: It came in firmly behind REGIS and they raised the
Speaker 5: old specter of sovereign risk and saying that investors would
Speaker 5: lose confidence in investing in Australia.
Speaker 6: Understandably, after this and some other resources projects being blocked
Speaker 6: because of indigenous heritage claims, the mining industry is worried
Speaker 6: about the sovereign risk of trying to invest in this country.
Speaker 5: The heads of the Minerals Council of Australia and the
Speaker 5: Business Council of Australia among others, weighed in as well
Speaker 5: and got stuck into the regulatory system. Their complaints were
Speaker 5: amplified through the reporting in various media, most notably you
Speaker 5: know the Murdock papers, the Conservative papers and Kerry Stokes's
Speaker 5: West Australian paper, the West Australian. And you know there
Speaker 5: was I guess you would say the usual intemperate commentary
Speaker 5: by right wing pundits about approvals processes being hijacked by
Speaker 5: green groups and so on.
Speaker 3: Mistake, this is economic suicide because this is a government
Speaker 3: that's putting its faith in green ideology rather than the
Speaker 3: industries that have long been the foundation of our prosperity.
Speaker 3: Someone who identifies as an elder has told the minister
Speaker 3: she can hear the ancestors, and next.
Speaker 2: Boom, the mine is blocked.
Speaker 8: I mean that seems to be what it is.
Speaker 3: It is baseless and fast.
Speaker 7: Of all, how she could sleep at night worries me.
Speaker 7: But maybe she's got voices in her ear, because you
Speaker 7: know she's had these secret voices, these people who claim
Speaker 7: to be from this when we're a jer what is
Speaker 7: it called, we're a jury, We're a jury jury clan. Yeah,
Speaker 7: how you know this is say credit?
Speaker 5: Now, I think you can say that there was more
Speaker 5: than the usual amount of blowback on this decision. Right.
Speaker 5: Flpisex decision was also roundly attacked by the federal opposition.
Speaker 4: If a business wants to come and actually do a development,
Speaker 4: we have that data, that understanding of impact on environment
Speaker 4: that I think it's now time for a secut time
Speaker 4: that's on approvals.
Speaker 5: So I think it's fair to say that the level
Speaker 5: of complaint about this decision went well beyond the usual
Speaker 5: griping of the resources sector and its media and political advocates.
Speaker 5: This was the full court press, So it was an
Speaker 5: unusual reaction. But then this was also an unusual case.
Speaker 2: What do you mean by that, Mike? What makes this
Speaker 2: case unusual?
Speaker 5: Well, plisk is the Minister for the Environment, right, but
Speaker 5: her decision was not specifically about protecting the natural environment.
Speaker 5: It was about Aboriginal cultural heritage. And the decision was
Speaker 5: made under Section ten of the Aboriginal and Torres Strait
Speaker 5: Islander Heritage Protection Act. It's never been used by flibber
Speaker 5: sc before. I think she has knocked back several, but
Speaker 5: she'd never approved one before, so it's a very rarely
Speaker 5: used section of the law.
Speaker 2: Okay, So what we have then is at the very
Speaker 2: last minutevironment minister making a decision that's not about the environment.
Speaker 2: Should we believe that that is the case? Is it
Speaker 2: credible that this decision is actually not environmentally related?
Speaker 5: Well, well, there are claims out there, particularly by the industry,
Speaker 5: that these Section ten claims, these these Aboriginal heritage claims
Speaker 5: are being used as a kind of backdoor way to
Speaker 5: achieve environmental outcomes. That you know, Plipasek was really about
Speaker 5: protecting the environment in this area, which happens to be
Speaker 5: the headwaters of a fairly significant river YEP and.
Speaker 8: It relates to cultural heritage, the protection of cultural heritage,
Speaker 8: the imminent threat of destruction.
Speaker 1: Right.
Speaker 5: So I spoke to Tania Plipsec about this, and she
Speaker 5: firmly rejected any suggestion that her decision, which protected the
Speaker 5: headwaters and the springs associated with this river, was taken
Speaker 5: out of environmental concern.
Speaker 8: No, I mean, the decision completely relates to cultural heritage protection.
Speaker 5: But yes, there were environment groups also opposed to this project.
Speaker 5: There was the Belubula that's the name of the River
Speaker 5: Headwaters Protection group, for instance. They were worried about the
Speaker 5: potential impact on the river system because you know, wastewater
Speaker 5: from gold mining is notoriously toxic and Taling's dams are
Speaker 5: notoriously prone to mishap. It's interesting also that the Environmental
Speaker 5: Defender's office provided legal representation both to the indigenous group
Speaker 5: and to the environmental group that were opposed to it,
Speaker 5: and campaign for public donations to help fund the fight. So,
Speaker 5: you know, it's interesting that plebisec consists it's entirely about
Speaker 5: cultural issues, but pretty clearly there's a big overlay of
Speaker 5: environmental activism in there as well.
Speaker 2: After the break, the claims that the Heritage Protection Act
Speaker 2: is being hijacked. So, Mike tiny plibisex, she's used the
Speaker 2: original entist Rod Islander Heritage Protection Act in this case
Speaker 2: and this decision relating to a new South Als gold mine,
Speaker 2: and you say that decision is unusual. In fact, it's
Speaker 2: the first time that she's actually granted protection under that Act.
Speaker 2: So could you just tell me a little bit more
Speaker 2: about Section ten and what it's designed to do?
Speaker 5: Right? Well, the mining industry has complained for several years
Speaker 5: that applications made under this particular section of the Act
Speaker 5: are proliferating and they have a dare i say, a
Speaker 5: reasonable case to make. And while mine's are the most
Speaker 5: common target, you know, they do also affect other developments,
Speaker 5: as they have alluded to in his briefing the other
Speaker 5: day to his investors. There was a report by the
Speaker 5: law firm Ashurst a couple of years ago that found
Speaker 5: that the number of applications had been trending up since
Speaker 5: about twenty nineteen and that there had been an unprecedented
Speaker 5: number was what they described it as in the twelve
Speaker 5: months up until twenty twenty two when the report came
Speaker 5: out and they went through and they detailed quite a
Speaker 5: number of these Section ten applications, and they related to
Speaker 5: a very wide range of proposed developments. Among them was
Speaker 5: roadworks near Kuroi and Queensland, underground power lines near Kempse
Speaker 5: in New South Wales, a residential housing development in Ginderbyne
Speaker 5: in New South Wales, and the one that I thought
Speaker 5: was most interesting, which was a wind farm on Robins
Speaker 5: Island in Tasmania. So it highlights an interesting internal conflict.
Speaker 5: I guess within the green movement that in this particular
Speaker 5: case they have made common cause with an indigenous group
Speaker 5: to knock over what at one level looks like an
Speaker 5: environmentally positive project a wind farm.
Speaker 2: Okay, and so you said earlier that there is this
Speaker 2: concern that Section ten might be being used by people
Speaker 2: with one agenda, whether that is environmental or perhaps otherwise,
Speaker 2: to try and block a project that they don't agree with.
Speaker 2: Is that the problem here, Mike. That's something that's designed
Speaker 2: to be used to only protect indigenous heritage sites can
Speaker 2: potentially be used in these other ways.
Speaker 5: Well, yes, and you know I don't want to be
Speaker 5: mistaken for some rabid right wing here. I mean, I
Speaker 5: note that when Plebisk made this decision, the federal opposition
Speaker 5: Shadow Minister Ofurces, Senator Susan McDonald came out and accused
Speaker 5: the Labor government of encouraging anti mining activists to use,
Speaker 5: you know, these cultural considerations for their own purposes. She
Speaker 5: called it death by stealth and said that genuine concerns
Speaker 5: were being weaponized. There's a degree of hyperbole on both
Speaker 5: sides here, I think, but particularly on the conservative side,
Speaker 5: you know. And even worse was Senator just Center Price,
Speaker 5: who gave some comments to The Knightly, which is a
Speaker 5: sort of pro mining new newspaper established in Western Australia
Speaker 5: by a number of mining billionaires, including Kerry Stokes and
Speaker 5: Gina Reinhardt. The headline on the story Regius Resources colon
Speaker 5: Justenta Nampajinpa Price fumes over fake Indigenous Australians after New
Speaker 5: South Wales gold mine shafted, and in her quotes to
Speaker 5: the newspaper she said that she had spoken to genuine
Speaker 5: Wiradjeri people and that a lot of people who were
Speaker 5: claiming to be indigenous in fact weren't. Now, this was
Speaker 5: an outrageous insinuation, absolutely outrageous. There's no evidence of that
Speaker 5: at all, but there is I think a legitimate question here,
Speaker 5: which is who speaks for indigenous interests and on whose
Speaker 5: behalf they speak. In the case of this gold mine,
Speaker 5: there was this local group, but there was also a
Speaker 5: land council, the local land council, which had no problem
Speaker 5: with the mind whatsoever. So we have competing indigenous factions,
Speaker 5: one pro development and one anti development, and todate. We've
Speaker 5: seen anti development First Nations groups making common cause with
Speaker 5: environment groups. Those actions tend to be celebrated by progressives,
Speaker 5: but it could be a two edged swort. You know,
Speaker 5: there's no reason why write groups could not use Section
Speaker 5: ten claims. You know, for example, the anti climate change
Speaker 5: people could quite easily move to stop you know, wind farms,
Speaker 5: solar developments on the basis of Aboriginal heritage concerns. So
Speaker 5: you know, this is a two edge sword that can
Speaker 5: cut left and right, I guess is my argument here.
Speaker 2: Okay, So when you look at how this process unfolded them,
Speaker 2: particularly in regards to this mind in South Last, if
Speaker 2: we come back to that and the arguments being made
Speaker 2: around the Heritage Protection Act being weaponized, I mean to
Speaker 2: what extent do you think that those arguments are exaggerated
Speaker 2: or do you think that there is a case to
Speaker 2: be made here that the entire approvals process needs change,
Speaker 2: needs to be reformed.
Speaker 5: Well, I think you put your finger on it there.
Speaker 5: I mean, obviously you have to take consideration of the
Speaker 5: environment and of the cultural implications for Indigenous folk. You know,
Speaker 5: that has to be part of the process. I think
Speaker 5: the overarching problem here is that the process is so
Speaker 5: bloody long that it goes seven years in this case
Speaker 5: of this particular mind, and then at the last minute's
Speaker 5: knocked over. When I spoke to blibersecond about that, she said,
Speaker 5: absolutely correct. You know, the process takes a very long time.
Speaker 5: The current government is moving to try and expedite matters
Speaker 5: as best it can, and would that necessarily expedite claims
Speaker 5: of this current Section ten type claims.
Speaker 8: Well, one of the proposals we have is a new
Speaker 8: national standard for First Nations consultation, which would make it
Speaker 8: clear much earlier in the piece who the right people
Speaker 8: are to talk to.
Speaker 5: And I think that is probably the answer here. It's
Speaker 5: not a problem with the fact that this section exists.
Speaker 5: It's the fact that it can be cited quite late
Speaker 5: in the piece and can bring things to a grinding
Speaker 5: halt right at the very.
Speaker 2: End, Mike, thank you so much for your time.
Speaker 5: Thank you.
Speaker 2: Also in the news today, Green's leader Adam Bant wants
Speaker 2: to see big business taxed at forty percent. Speaking at
Speaker 2: the National Press Club, Ban singled out fossil fuel companies
Speaker 2: as the types of multinationals that made quote obscene profits
Speaker 2: and should be giving more back to the public. Bant
Speaker 2: called it a robin Hood tax. Meanwhile, the Minerals Council
Speaker 2: of Australia, the leading advocate for Australia's oil and gas companies,
Speaker 2: called it economic sabotage. And inflation is finally coming down,
Speaker 2: with the RBA announcing the July rate at three point
Speaker 2: five percent, down from three point eight percent in June.
Speaker 2: The ABS says electricity rebates driving down energy prices have
Speaker 2: helped curb inflation this month, but economists say the drop
Speaker 2: is unlikely to result in an interest rate cut. I'm
Speaker 2: Ruby Jones. This is seven am. Thanks for listening.