Gina Rinehart shares controversial views with school students: ‘Polar bear numbers have increased’

Australia’s richest woman Gina Rinehart has recorded a video for students at an exclusive school telling them they should do their own research into climate change ‘propaganda’.

Australia’s richest woman Gina Rinehart has recorded a video for students at an exclusive school telling them they should do their own research into global warming as the number of polar bears is “increasing”.

The mining magnate prerecorded a keynote address played to students at Perth’s St Hilda’s Anglican School for Girls in honour of its 125th anniversary during an assembly.

She said she hoped her former private school, which was also attended by four generations of her family, including her mother Hope, would “always endeavour to … strongly guard against propaganda intruding on real education and rational thinking”.

“I’ll give an example, I’d heard that senior school students in a previous headmistresses time, were having to watch sometimes 4 times over for their various classes, even English lit, the ex-Democrat Vice President Al Gore film, “An Inconvenient Truth” catchy title, but sadly short on delivery as far as truth is concerned,” she continued.

“Eg, the sad loss of polar bears, when actually their numbers have increased, but lots of emotional things like that to stir or frighten people.”

Polar bears are listed as vulnerable to extinction by the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN), with climate change a key factor in their decline.

The fate of polar bears has long been a point of contention in the debate over human-caused climate change, used by scientists and environmentalists as well as deniers in their arguments.

Gina Rinehart pictured at the Soldier On Gala, May 21, 2021, is Australia’s richest woman. Picture: Kai Godeck

Ms Rinehart, who is worth $31 billion, also criticised the spending of taxpayers dollars on reducing carbon during the speech, which she later uploaded on her website.

During the 16 minute clip, she urged students to ask teachers questions while doing their own research into which came first, global warming, or an increase in carbon.

“It should help to point to four independent facts, which all come to the same conclusion, independently, including, what has been found in the geological record of ice, ocean floors, and separately chemistry principles,” Ms Rinehart said.

“If these four independent facts all support, global warming comes first, not increases in carbon, the rationale would ask, why does the media in general and those they influence, now call for reducing carbon?

“Why should taxpayers’ money be spent towards reducing carbon? The higher debt our government racks up, the higher your taxes will be forced to be.”

Ms Rinehart, whose wealth soared by $2.2 billion in the six months to May this year due to surging iron ore prices, said she was “grateful” for her time at St Hilda’s Anglican.

“I had a real education, not one based on propaganda, but facts, and rationale,” she said.

“I continue to believe that facts and rationale should provide the basis for education, it concerns me greatly that the current generation of school leavers and attendees, too often miss such important basics, as too often propaganda erodes these critical foundations.”

Originally published as Gina Rinehart shares controversial views with school students: ‘Polar bear numbers have increased’