Hi All,
I've gone through the approval documents from Jan 2017 by the government and note two anomalies with the minister's comments.
The first major one is that NWI lost their right to exclusitivity to develop the berth given they were not making any progress. In the afr this arvo, it was alleged the minister said this in parliament. The doc confirms that the govt extended NWIs interest until 2022 but it requires substantial development by then.
http://www.epa.wa.gov.au/sites/default/files/Ministerial_Statement/Statement No. 1056_0.pdf
The second one is that the berth is reserved for junior miners. This is not the wording used by the minister in Jan 2017 when describing the proposal. Instead the word "emerging miners" was used. See below.
The definition of emerging is:
Things that are emerging are just being born — or they're reaching an adult state. The important thing is they're growing and developing.
Roy Hill is emerging. Its attempting to increase its run rate to 55m tonnes. They are currently growing and developing.
There's a big distinction between junior and emerging...
I think the wa govt has assumed junior was used but it wasn't. It also should understand that NWI was given an extension of 5 years. It doesn't need to be substantially developed until 2022.
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