Miners warn Albanese not to repeat WA heritage debacle
Kalgoorlie | Association of Mining and Exploration Companies chief executive Warren Pearce warned the Albanese government not to wade into the Indigenous heritage space on the back of WA’s radical legislative reversal that has created an approvals minefield for explorers and farmers.
His comments come as one of Kalgoorlie’s Indigenous leaders revealed that he alerted the WA government to the pitfalls of controversial legislation that was formally scrapped on Tuesday last month.
Warren Pearce.
The WA resources sector must now grapple with an approvals mess for at least the rest of this year. Numerous projects are caught between the abandoned laws and reenacting the amended 1972 legislation aimed at preventing another Juukan Gorge.
Speaking on the sidelines of the Diggers ‘n’ Dealers mining conference in Kalgoorlie on Tuesday, Mr Pearce said: “I think it’d be a very, very courageous federal government, who wanted to head straight back into the space after the reaction the WA government has faced on their previous legislative attempts.
“If the federal government’s going to look at the space in the future, they really need to take a long period to actually consult with stakeholders, with industry and others, to understand what was trying to be achieved, and what the community is prepared to support.”
The lobby group represents 500 miners including Allkem, Fortescue and Mineral Resources.
Mr Pearce added: “You can’t have laws that the community doesn’t support. Ultimately, if it’s too hard for people to be able to actually apply the law, or people can’t understand what it is in the first place, you really can’t expect good outcomes.”
Goldfields-based Aboriginal elder Aubrey Lynch said the new laws the WA government spent
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