Belinda Robinson, the chief executive of the Australian Petroleum Production and Exploration Association, said small and mid-size operators were angry at having the exploration rebate traded away by the big miners while still being saddled with a new tax.
‘‘There’s a real groundswell of discontent out there,’’ she said.
‘‘We made it very clear that we did not want to scrap it top pay for the concerns for the large miners.’’
Phil Coorey, Tuesday, 1 June:
A MINING industry group on which the federal government had been banking to support its proposed resources super profits tax went on the offensive yesterday with a series of advertisements attacking the tax.
The Association of Mining and Exploration Companies represents smaller exploration companies which the government says will benefit from the tax through the $1.1 billion in exploration rebates allocated from the $12 billion the taxis budgeted to make in the first two years.
The association’s chief executive officer, Simon Bennison, said exploration companies preferred capital and claimed this would move overseas as a consequence of the 40 per cent super profits tax.
"We’re not going to buy a rebate conditional on the tax," he told the Herald.
"We’re after capital and equity finance, not a rebate. The rebate is tokenism."
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