Segments courtesy of Nick Evans, Simon Benson and the Australian.
The Perth leg of the Bush Summit — featuring mining magnate Gina Rinehart and cricket legend Adam Gilchrist — comes at a time when regional WA is firmly in the national spotlight.
Money earned in regions should be returned: Rinehart
Mining magnate Gina Rinehart has called for more money earned from the bush to be returned to the bush for better regional services while warning farmers would be forced off the land and food prices would rise without government assistance to transition to net zero.
The Executive Chairman of Hancock Prospecting, in an address to The Australian’s Bush Summit being held in Perth, urged the removal of limits on work hours for veterans and pensioners to fill jobs in the bush, tax cuts for workers in northern Australia and the creation of special economic zones for certain regional areas.
Ms Rinehart said she wants to see a commitment for “monies earnt in the bush, return to the bush”.
“For instance, frankly we should have the best equipped and most luxurious hospitals in Newman, Tom Price, Dampier, Cape Lambert, Port Hedland and in other mining towns, thanks to the revenue we create in the Pilbara and similarly in other mining areas,” Ms Rinehart will say in a keynote address to the summit Monday afternoon.
“And ditto, see 24 hour, 365 days a year airstrips, so that the better equipped and fastest RFDS (Royal Flying Doctor Service) planes can always arrive. And our people in the outback be more safe.”
Ms Rinehart, while acknowledging her own industry could afford the transition to net zero, agricultural businesses did not have the same resources to meet climate change commitments without waivers or subsidies from government.
“Otherwise, most farmers and others in agriculture, just can’t afford net zero,” Ms Rinehart said.
“They will have to leave agriculture, with the consequence Aussies will see huge food price increases and fresh food shortages.
“I’m not the first to come up with cutting tax for those employed in or investing in the north, above the 26th parallel, my dad did much earlier.
“He came up with many practical ideas, as you often do living in the bush, where you either make do or do without.”
Ms Rinehart also opened up about the relationship with her family, accusing the media of focusing on the feud between the country’s wealthiest woman and her children.
“Growing up on stations, the family unit is close, and trusting, as ours certainly was, which used to be well known in West Australia,” she said.
“It’s saddening that media likes to ignore the good if you’re successful and not a socialist, even in the last few days, ignoring the tight bond this West Australian family had for decades, instead just referring to some correspondences, when I was very concerned about our family company over a few years, and rightly so, without adding the truth that dad and I had again become very close pre his sad departure in 1992, and I admire his moral and courageous stand in his final weeks.”
Ms Rinehart also repeated her support for a nuclear energy industry in Australia.
“Let’s not upset many farmers with bird killing wind generators and massive solar panel stretches, and bring on clean, safe, nuclear energy please Australia,” she said.
Rinehart spruiks nuclear future over wind and solar
Australia’s richest woman has added her voice to calls for Australia to look to a nuclear future, telling The Australian’s Bush Summit on Monday the country to look to nuclear generation to decarbonise rather than wind and solar power.
Mrs Rinehart, whose Hancock Prospecting has an extensive agricultural businesses as well as its traditional mining interests, told the Bush Summit farmers and regional areas needed to be supported by the government to move towards electrification of their equipment and business energy sources – and that nuclear generation should be an important option in that process.
“Given agriculture usually doesn’t have the financial resources that the mining industry has, that for the government’s net zero policies requiring electric vehicles – be they for lawn mowers, motor bikes, utes, 4 wheel drives, tractors, harvesters, trucks, bulldozers, graders, front end loaders (plus approximately $650,000 for solar plants with huge batteries for when the sun doesn’t shine, plus solar panels to replace multiple bore pumps, essential for daily water) – that those in agriculture won’t have to spend more than $200,000 on net zero requirements, the rest to be met by the governments, or waived,” she said.
Mrs Rinehart said that, without “real assistance” for net zero policies in regional areas, farmers will be forced to leave the land.
“Otherwise most farmers and others in agriculture, just can’t afford net zero. They will have to leave agriculture, with the consequence Aussies will see huge food price increases and fresh food shortages,” she said.
“Let’s not upset many farmers with bird killing wind generators and massive solar panel stretches, and bring on clean, safe, nuclear energy please Australia.”
West deserves better healthcare system: Rinehart
Gina Rinehart joined other panelist calling for the return of more mining royalties to the bush regions that generate so much of the country’s wealth.
“Frankly we should have the best equipped and most luxurious hospitals in Newman, Tom Price, Dampier, Cape Lambert, Port Hedland and in other mining towns, thanks to the revenue we create in the Pilbara and similarly in other mining areas. And ditto, see 24 hour, 365 days a year airstrips, so that the better equipped and fastest RFDS planes can always arrive. And our people in the outback be more safe,” she said.
Speaking at the Bush Summit in Perth on Monday, Mrs Rinehart also reiterated calls for the establishment of special economic zones in Australia’s north, to help encourage investment and population movement.
Mrs Rinehart said the zones should cut both government red tape and taxes.
“There are now more than 8,000 of these zones operating successfully around the world.
“Together let’s lead the way, to drive such very beneficial economic zones, indeed I don’t know of a better way to secure the very worthwhile theme of this summit, especially if such zone then spreads to cover more bush areas – improving the lives of regional Australians to create a better Australia,” she said.
Cut ‘onerous paperwork’ to help regional workforce: Rinehart
Australia’s richest woman says the government should encourage veterans, students and pensioners to return to the workforce by canning limits on the hours that can be worked before the loss of benefits.
Gina Rinehart said relaxing the “onerous paperwork” burdens caused by the rules would help fill regional health and other country jobs from Australia’s existing population.
The call was one of six put forward by the mining magnate at The Australian’s Bush Summit to help solve problems in regional areas.
