Gold miners unhappy about tax talk

Western Australia's emerging gold companies say the state government's plan to raise royalty taxes will be a big blow to future exploration.

WA gold producers already pay about two hundred million dollars in royalties each year.

The royalty system is currently under review and is set to be overhauled in the May budget.

The changes would mostly affect small companies, which constitute 20 per cent of the industry and do not operate under state agreements.

Bruce MacFadzean from Catalpa Resources says the changes unfairly target companies such as his.

"I think this approach of having a crack at a smaller part of the resource industry is probably not quite reasonable," he said.

"We're in the last month of a $100 million project construction and all of a sudden we're here facing a battle of an increased cost to the operation."

Ian Gordon from Ramelius Resources agrees.

"And it's really the small end of town that are taking the biggest risks in terms of gold mining in Western Australia."

The gold miners want to meet the Premier to discuss the changes.

For his part, Premier Colin Barnett says any increase in gold royalty rates would be modest, if the rates are increased at all.

" No-one likes to pay more and I can understand the gold industry feeling that, the iron ore industry, but we are not proposing radical changes to royalties but we are looking at the royalties system, we need to.

"This may be a period of increasing prosperity but the demands on the West Australian Government are immense."

More Quotes and Company Information:RAMELIUS RESOURCES LIMITED (ASX: RMS.ax) ... read original article
Tue 16th March 2010 - 10:32pm