NEW England MP Barnaby Joyce has defended the decision of his Coalition colleague Greg Hunt to sign-off on Shenhua Watermark’s controversial coal mine.
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Mr Joyce’s comment that “the world has gone mad” after the Environment Minister approved the project last month saw him accused of breaking “cabinet solidarity”.
But the federal Agriculture Minister took a more conciliatory tone on Sky News over the weekend when asked about his government’s approval of the open-cut mine.
“I think that Greg Hunt, (with) the information that he was given, has done the best that we can ask for,” he said.
“He has maintained that he will continue to be in negotiations and discussions about the issues and if further information comes to light, he’ll act.”
Mr Hunt relied on advice from the Independent Expert Scientific Committee when granting approval subject to “18 of the strictest conditions in Australian history”.
As the $1.7 billion mine is a state project, the federal government’s powers are limited to assessing the impact of mining operations on the surrounding water resources.
Shenhua still requires a mining licence from the state government before work can begin on extracting 268 million tonnes of coal from three pits at Breeza.
Liverpool Plains farmers opposed to the project suffered a significant blow in their campaign when Mr Hunt concluded the mine would have “no impact on the availability of water for agriculture”.
However, Mr Joyce said the increasingly tenuous economics of coal mining would become a “big player” in whether the project actually went ahead.
“One of my greatest allies now, to be honest ... is a thing called economics,” he said.
“The spot price of coal is about $60 a tonne. They sold a coal mine in North Queensland the other day for one dollar.
“I’m sure there’s people vastly smarter than me back in China saying, ‘Why are we about to invest hundreds of millions of dollars into something that we can buy, if we really wanted one’.”