LNP promises to speed up mining approvals and deliver promised extensions

The government has vowed lean further into mining after the sector generated $12.8bn in coal royalties and pumped more than $120bn into the economy in 2023-24.

There could be even more mining jobs up for grabs across Queensland.

The government has vowed to speed up mining approvals and deliver promised extensions on existing sites after the sector generated $12.8bn in coal royalties and pumped more than $120bn into the economy during the 2023-24 financial year.

In an keynote speech at the Queensland Resources Council annual forum on Friday, new Resources Minister Dale Last promised a room of more than 800 industry heads that the newly elected LNP government would expand mining operations to help revenue raise for the state.

“This is the portfolio that puts money into the bucket,” he said.

“This is the one that underpins Queensland’s economy.”

Mr Last said the government had officially formed a Resources Capital Committee, which he and Treasurer David Janetzki, Deputy Premier and Minister for State Development Jarrod Bleijie and Environment Minister Andrew Powell will sit on.

The government will throw more support behind Queensland mining.

The committee will meet by the end of the year to discuss ways to improve turnaround times for licence application approvals and renewals.

“Just this week, I’ve been working … on a pile of license applications for renewal of an existing operations, and the oldest one of those applications dates back to 2019,” he said.

“I approved, six.

“We will support projects that have met their environmental conditions and give extensions that were promised.”

The government has committed to raising early works on the Borumba pumped hydro project as it “investigates” other small pump hydro schemes in partnership with the private sector.

The existing coal royalty scheme will remain unchanged.

Janette Hewson, QRC Chief Executive Officer.

QRC chief executive Janette Hewson said she was hopeful that the door for future negotiations around coal royalties would be open under the new LNP government.

“We’re very hopeful, and we’ll continue to strongly advocate,” she said.

Ms Hewson expressed concerns over the shrinking pipeline of coal projects, which according to the Office of the Chief Economist, had dropped from 440m tonnes to 70m tonnes over the past decade.

“Our Queensland industry is concerned about this trend, and we would like to work with government to turn this around, streamlining approvals and improving the health of our sectors,” she said.

But Ms Hewson could not describe what the streamlined process would look like, or how many years it would shave off the current average project timeline of between 12 and 16 years.

“We’re not asking to shortcut,” she said.

“We’re just simply asking for the duplication between state and federal governments to be taken away and to make sure that we can run processes in parallel and give people certainty of results.

“What we want to see is to make sure that there’s rigorous development of EISs, we want to make sure that there’s good consultation, how long that will take? We will sit down and work with government and all industry and all stakeholders to make sure we get that balance right.”

Originally published as LNP promises to speed up mining approvals and deliver promised extensions