E&OE................................................................................................
PRIME MINISTER:
......very good thanks and I'm looking forward to coming
to Kalgoorlie this morning.
JOURNALIST:
Fantastic. Now what is the purpose of your visit?
PRIME MINISTER:
Well I haven't been to Kalgoorlie since I became Prime Minister.
I think in fact I'll be the first Prime Minister to visit Kalgoorlie
for 18 years and it's an opportunity with the new Federal Member
for Kalgoorlie, Barry Haase to talk to the representatives of the
various industries. It's a very famous part of Australia. I'll
naturally listen to what the mining industry's got to say, but
generally an opportunity to meet the people of Kalgoorlie and to register
the point that my Government is very interested and concerned about
regional Australia.
JOURNALIST:
Okay. How important do you think that areas, major mining industries
like Kalgoorlie's are to the economy?
PRIME MINISTER:
Well mining is a very important part of the Australian economy. It
provides a huge amount of export income to the Australian economy.
It's a very important part of the Western Australian economy
but from a national perspective the contribution it makes to the aggregate
Australian economy is very big. Mining is of course influenced heavily
by world markets and world market prices, and every mining activity
in this country is influenced by world commodity prices. That is certainly
the most powerful influence of all on the industry.
JOURNALIST:
How much of the uncertainty over native title at the moment do you
blame for the cut in the exploration dollars.
PRIME MINISTER:
It's a very big contributor, and can I say that for every day
that the Western Australian Labor Opposition holds up the passage
of the native title amendments through the Western Australian Parliament,
the more money is taken from the value of the mining industry in this
country. The mining industry in Australia and Western Australia has
already suffered from the huge delay inflicted by the Labor Party
at a Federal level, in the Senate. We finally got the 10 point plan
through, and while the Labor Party in Western Australia refuses to
pass the ten point plan they inflict damage on the gold mining industry
of Kalgoorlie, they inflict damage in the mining industry of Western
Australia. If they're interested in Western Australian industry
and jobs, and the mining industry of this State, they will pass the
Court Government's legislative changes without delay.
JOURNALIST:
Okay. Now there's been some talk that Mr Costello's authorisation
of the sale of half of Australia's gold reserve indicates that
the Government doesn't value gold as a commodity worth storing.
How do you feel about that?
PRIME MINISTER:
Well that claim is wrong. The decision of the Reserve Bank, which
it was, to deal with Australia's gold reserves as it did was
a very good decision. If it hadn't taken that decision it would
have cost our foreign exchange reserves very dearly because it was
an astute decision of the time given the movements in the value and
the market price of gold on world markets. In fact it was a decision
that on any application of ordinary business principles was a very
intelligent decision.
JOURNALIST:
Do you feel that has any bearing on the fact that the gold price is
still in a slump, hasn't risen since then?
PRIME MINISTER:
No, no no. That's really quite unrelated. It was a proper move
to protect the value of the gold and foreign exchange reserve, holdings
of the Reserve Bank of Australia. The Reserve Bank of Australia would
have been retreant to its responsibilities to the Australian people
if it had not acted to get a good price and to have the right and
appropriate and most valuable mix of our reserve assets.
JOURNALIST:
Okay. And are there any plans to sell off any more of our gold reserves?
PRIME MINISTER:
Oh, look, I wouldn't speculate about that. Those decisions are
ultimately made by the Reserve Bank which is the custodian of our
gold and foreign exchange reserves.
JOURNALIST:
Okay. And what are your plans here for the rest of the day?
PRIME MINISTER:
Well I'll be going to a civic reception this morning, I'll
be attending a luncheon, I'll be going possibly to meet some
other groups, and generally move around the town and I'm looking
forward to it. Thank you very much.
JOURNALIST:
Prime Minister John Howard, Thank you very much for your time.