Mining magnate Gina Rinehart spoke at a series of Bush Summits where the billionaire businesswoman outlined five key priorities for Australia.
Below is a transcript of Ms Rinehart’s fourth speech in the series, delivered in Orange, New South Wales, earlier this year.
In the speech, Ms Rinehart calls for Australia to double its natural gas production.
Hello and welcome to all farmers, small business owners, miners and other regional Australians struggling with time-consuming government paperwork and policies that don’t take into account the people of our rural areas.
It’s great to welcome you to the Bush Summit here in Orange. The birthplace of Australia’s Banjo Peterson and the song we love, Waltzing Matilda.
The Bush Summit has become increasingly important, as I hope it will allow rural people to be heard, rather than taken for granted and overlooked. It doesn’t matter how much we work, it doesn’t matter how much we contribute.
We have developed primary industries that shine on the global stage. Our agricultural products are among the best in the world.
Thank you to all members of our primary industries and the companies that support our primary industries.
Our living standards are no accident. They are the result of investment and our incredible people in our primary industries.
It is upon these primary industries that all other activities are built. We cannot have manufacturing without mining and agriculture.
Gina Rinehart says Australia’s living standards are no accident. They are the result of investment and our incredible people in our primary industries.
It seems that some find it too easy to forget that every aspect of our lives is affected by the agricultural or mining industries. As you know, everything has to be grown or extracted, whether it’s the food on our tables, the energy used to refrigerate or cook it, or the utensils used to eat it, and much more.
These Bush Summits are a refreshing opportunity to listen to those in our rural areas, and I hope that, with the help of the Bush Summit media, our governments will listen.
This is our time to let our politicians know that we don’t want to go below as an industry or country, we want to go above. We want to see policies that do not scare away investment, but lead to greater investment, higher standards of living and more money in your pocket after tax, to spend as you wish. We want to hear from respondents that it will be the leaders who will deliver victory. ‘
We sure have had enough of ‘the below‘. ‘The downturn’ makes many parents worry about the future of their children and grandchildren. And many in agriculture worry about whether the agricultural industry can even survive.
The decline will continue if we do not reduce government approvals and paperwork, which add costs and delays. But it’s not just companies that are hurt. Given these costly government burdens and costly delays, there is less money available for staff salaries and benefits, less money available to employ more staff, less money for training and retraining, and less money available to donate to charities or for research.
And it gets worse if expansions or new projects are delayed or lost thanks to government bureaucracy and slow approvals, since all of the above suffer more. Let’s stop believing that government burdens don’t matter, they only affect businesses, in reality they don’t, they add costs to everyone and many people suffer.
In some parts of Australia investments are delayed for years because litigants have no interest in the area. They do not own the land or even the surrounding land; they may not even be Australian or they may be funded by foreign interests. Or even financed without the taxpayers wanting it, by the taxpayers.
On the surface some may think that this is fine, that everything is fine in the name of the environment. It may be necessary to look more closely at, for example, the Nature Positive scheme, where 17 of the species to be protected are so dangerous they could kill you. Let’s hope the Nature Positive plan doesn’t affect your region. The government’s secret map needs to be made available, under which 30 per cent of Australia’s land and 30 per cent of our oceans will be restricted. 30 per cent of Australia is a big part of Australia. Added to this, farmers are already very upset that wind farms, solar panels and transmission lines are taking up their farmland.
And we all know about the rising cost of living. During these rising costs, I feel especially sorry for all those trapped in poverty on pensions of one kind or another, our 2.5 million pensioners, incredible veterans, college students and the disabled, who are not allowed to work without onerous procedures and then they are only allowed a few hours. per week. They should be allowed to work as long as they want, so that they are not trapped and unable to cope with rising costs.
Too many people in our country, given government restrictions, mistakenly face “heat or eat.” This is unacceptable; Our politicians should act immediately. And we have a worker shortage crisis, barely helped by costly immigration, while our government makes it too difficult for our own Australians to work if they want to. Let’s not forget that the approx. one million immigrants this government has brought in, resulted in only approx. 40,000 added to the workforce. However, what causes many disadvantages is that almost a million people are adding to our housing crisis, increasing the cost of rents, putting pressure on the police resulting in more crimes and increasing delays in hospitals, even being rejected in emergencies, since our doctors, nurses, medical facilities simply cannot cope. His family’s medical treatments are being delayed.
If only our governments would consider the farmers and many of them who are struggling and remove payroll, license fees and stamp duty like they said they would do when the GST came in, wouldn’t that help the cost of living and the cost of the home? And wouldn’t it also help if the federal government eliminated the fuel excise tax, not only reducing the costs of our cars and other vehicles, but also lowering the cost of all goods transported and all goods that require fuel to process? or manufacturing? Again, this would actually help the cost of housing, if all these government taxes were eliminated.
Unfortunately we are on the “down” path. For the past five consecutive quarters Australia has experienced negative economic growth per person, according to the Australian Bureau of Statistics.
Instead, let’s lift up our country.
Please use your time and your voices, at every opportunity, to get Australia back on this upward path.
This is my fourth speech at the Bush Summit and it is time to address my next important issue that I believe should be a priority for our governments and essential moving forward. You think this is the one almost everyone would want, or maybe will want once you run out of it and pay even more, but unfortunately governments have stepped in, prices are rising, and our competitive advantage is eroding with it.
Of course, these are reliable, cheap and abundant sources of energy.
It is clear that our governments have made a mistake in energy policy. Our bills continue to rise, supply and demand have been interfered with, and our energy system is becoming increasingly unreliable.
Many noticed what was happening. But our governments decided not to listen. Instead, they focused too much of their efforts and our taxpayers’ money on forcing more and more so-called “renewable” energy sources onto the grid, and insisting that cheap, reliable coal-fired power plants be closed, while that interrupted the development of gas.
Reliable, cheap and abundant energy sources must be a priority for Australia
The Liberal-National opposition under Peter Dutton has announced its ambition for tried and tested nuclear power to help our future. But this is more than a decade away, and with the tape and government approvals, it’s probably two decades away. So what do we do here and now? As a friend of energy security says, “drill baby, drill.” We develop our enormous natural gas resources and provide all the supply we need.
Some people like to claim that our country can run on sun and windmills, of course, put them on your own property if you want, but don’t force us to do that when the wind doesn’t always blow and the sun doesn’t always blow. Always shine, even at night! Natural gas is needed as a raw material for manufacturing and processing, in addition to its uses to generate electricity for homes, offices, hospitals, shopping centers, hotels, restaurants, traffic lights, schools, sports and entertainment centers. Those who don’t want to use gas, choose not to use it, but those who want reliable energy, have it.
We have plenty of natural gas in Australia, and if we decide not to use our vast coal deposits, let’s at least make use of our gas resources.
If some billionaire wants to spend money on untested, highly flammable and explosive hydrogen, let him do so, but this should be at his expense, not as a burden on taxpayers, and not to add to our record national debt.
Don’t forget to join us at this year’s National Agriculture and Mining and Allied Industries Conference, which will be held this year in Penfolds and Santos, with more information on the screen. These are important national days, November 21 and 22 each year, make sure they are on your calendar. I hope to see you there.
Thank you.