Livelihoods of hundreds of small businesses left hanging in the balance
The Palaszczuk Labor Government is trying to ram-through major changes to small scale mining claims laws, with potentially catastrophic impacts to hundreds of small and family business operators in Queensland’s Gemfields.
Labor has tried to sneak-through consultation, failing to advise impacted stakeholder about the changes and refusing to conduct in-person consultation, leaving many without the chance to have their say.
Labor’s changes include reducing the term-length for claims and restricting new claims to two renewals, regardless of whether they are being actively mined, limiting hand-mining to a maximum of 15 years and prescribed mining to a maximum of 30-years.
Shadow Minister for Mines Pat Weir said Labor’s changes would impact the livelihood of hundreds of operators and they should be consulted.
“Labor has again shown its complete disregard for Queenslanders and Queensland businesses, trying to keep the changes under-wraps,” Mr Weir said.
“These are the first changes to small-scale claims in history and Labor doesn’t want Queenslanders to know about them.
“Labor’s refusal to conduct in-person public consultation is another example of the Palaszczuk Labor Government’s failure to listen to Queenslanders.
“With such complex changes proposed, anything short of in-person consultation is a deliberate attempt to ram-through Labor’s agenda with complete disregard for Queenslanders.
“Mining claim holders are struggling to grasp the detail of what has been proposed, let alone make informed submissions given the tight timeframe.”
Local MP Lachlan Millar has written to the Minister requesting this extension to the public consultation but is yet to receive a reply.
“Labor must extend consultation to give every Queenslander a chance to understand and provide feedback,” Mr Millar said.
“The LNP is calling on Labor to extend the deadline to be extended to February, with Christmas and New Year period, it’s only fair.
“These changes have the potential to cripple small regional communities and flow-on to local business and the tourism sector.
“An extension is not an unreasonable request, people deserve the chance to fully understand the impact to their livelihood.
“These are not hobby miners, these are people’s livelihoods at stake.
“I call on the Minister to himself visit the Gemfields and see first-hand how this could cripple the region, I will personally give him a tour.
“This is another example of Labor’s wrong priorities, Queenslanders deserve better than Labor’s chaos and crisis.”