The Red Tape..Hopefully the GFC will assist with cutting the red...

The Red Tape..

Hopefully the GFC will assist with cutting the red tape...
I had read somewhere that the newly elected WA govenment wanted to streamline processes, can they do better than the previous govenment all as per usal all they are good at is lip service....



Red tape strangling WA mining projects

The previous government's $37.4 million bid to streamline the resource sector approvals process has failed, the Auditor-General has found.

Releasing a damning report into the process today, Colin Murphy said the reforms had been implemented, but they had not achieved the desired results.

He said government agencies needed to reconsider their approach.

The report follows a survey of resources industry executives, which found WA was ranked lower than countries like Botswana for investing in mining and energy projects, mainly due to the amount of red tape encountered and the time taken to process applications.

Mr Murphy said resource project applications were unable to be tracked as they went through various government departments.

"Because of this it is not possible to determine if overall timelines have improved. Agencies do not routinely measure overall timelines and do not analyse the time data to identify opportunities for improvements," he said.

Neither the Department of Industry and Resources nor the Office of Development Approvals Coordination had clear criteria for the special assistance they provided some applicants, and this created a risk of "real and perceived inequity".

Government agencies had not altered the way they conducted approval processes, despite a surge in applications and there was no criteria for assessing the social and economic impacts of resource projects, adding to uncertainty about government priorities.

DoIR needed to make its policies transparent, including the factors it uses to process applications, while both DoIR and the department of Premier and Cabinet needed to develop and publish criteria for providing assistance to applicants, Mr Murphy said.

A tracking system needed to be set up for applications that were assessed by different departments, recruitment and retention strategies needed to be rethought to stem the flow of experienced staff elsewhere and agencies needed to consider "new ways of working".