The decision to mine the uranium deposit or not should have been taken by the parties involved, not through the high-handed intervention of an anti-nuclear government.
The Northern Territory and federal governments’ announcement last week not to renew the lease to mine the Jabiluka orebody and to incorporate it into the Kakadu National Park is a lamentable case of interventionist governments interfering with private sector rights.
In doing this, they have effectively “cancelled” the value of one of the largest high-grade uranium orebodies in the world, a deposit that also contains significant quantities of gold and platinum group metals. The benefit to Australia from potential royalties and taxes from mining Jabiluka would be so substantial as to fall within a reasonable definition of national interest.
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Tony Grey is a former Chairman of the Uranium Institute, now the World Nuclear Association. He is the founder and was the CEO of Pancontinental Mining Ltd, the company that discovered the Jabiluka uranium deposit in 1970.
