7ombfro% M'ACP. OTranscript
and Report
to go to a:
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Questions
Minister. What Gove For tryi ther trie and circ
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Well thou if y
Right, the Government is not going to block off anything.
The Government is not going to enter into any negotiations
with customers that's a job for companies. But what
we want to do is try and prevent the circumstance
I
happening in which one Australian company offers lower
prices and then destroys the prospects of others, and you
can imagine the difficulty of one company negothting
is then fearful that the company next in the list will be
prepared to offer much lower prices than they'd want to
accept, but that fear causes them to accept lower prices
tl--hems-elvBeust. the price limits are going to be set
1 6.00 p. m. SUMUAY, LI.-. J
of Interview between Prime Minister f-laicoIL 7e/ 12
er Richard Colville for CHANNEL TEN " SUNDAY REPORT"
Lr at 6.00 p. m. on Sunday, 29th October, 1978.
ppreciate acknowledgements of any excerpts used.
posed by Richard Colville and answered by the Prime t" LS!
' s the purpose behind the new policy which requires
rnment approval for mineral export contracts? V
many years there has been a policy in Australia of f
ng to protect Australian exporters, especially when.
e is a unified buying system in a country which often
s to pick off one Australian exporter after another
bear down on the price. Now, under the present i
umstances there is plainly a buyers' market for a i
er of our minerals. There is a downward pressure on
es and a number of the companies have wanted the o
rnment to do what it could to strengthen the arm of
Australian negotiators.
how will that help a company that. might-have
isands of tonnes of unsold minerals, for instance coal,
rou go and block off its possible avenues of sale?
after discussions with the Industries concerned, and
therefore the Government is certainly going to be
reasonable in relation to these matters, and I think it
is much better to approach it from this way than to take
the action of past Governments that people negotiate,
they come to an agreement, but the Government says
' No, that's not good enough, go back and negotiate again'.
That obviously creates great difficulties and we didn't
want to approach it that way.
Can you convince Sir Charles Court and Mr. Bjelke Petersen
of that, do you think?
Well, there might be some difficulty in that, but I do
know that a number of the major Australian companies are
convinced that Australia's negotiating arm their
negotiating arm needs strengthening, and it can't be
strengthened unless the Government has some kind of
involvement.
A couple of months ago on this programme you said you
expected major uranium developments to start work within
a couple of weeks. Circumstances have intervened since
then. What's the situation now what's going to happen?
Well, lan Viner will be going to the Northern Territory
for discussions with the Northern Land Council and there's
not very much I can say until that discussion has taken
place. But he has been very closely in touch with the
Chairman and with other members in the Northern Territory.
I think some of the intervening events are quite
unfortunate because it has become quite plain that some
people have been not so concerned about Aboriginal interests
but concerned merely to block uranium mining for their own
Contd
2 11t1i 1ll! l i illillilill; llllilllll
particular purposes, and we have sought, and gone to
great lengths to protect the interests of the Aboriginal
people and of the environment. But there is a national
interest also to see that uranium is exported.
Q: There is a meeting of the Loan Council coming up in about
a week. Now I understand the Government regards this as
being particularly important to Australia's future?
I think it will help to take Australia forward into the
1980' s) with a great deal of confidence. About 18 months
ago at the. Premiers' Conference we agreed to-have
discussions between Commonwealth and State officials to.
see whether or not it would be possible to allow some
State instrumentalities to borrow overseas to supplement
funds to bring forward development projects or to assist
in getting development projects off the ground by
providing infrastructure which earlier the companies
themselves might have had to provide. Now we are in a
more competitive world, the Trading situation is tougher,
world markets aren't growing as-' much, and, you4-know, one
of the purposes of this examination was to see if we could
sharpen Australia's competitive-' edge as. against other
countries. Now Commonwealth and State officials have quite
exhaustively examined these matters we have agreed on
the broad guidelines, the principals, at the last Premiers'
Conference, and since then Commonwealth and State officials
have been examining deatailed projects . which have been put
forward by the States, which th~ y would like to finance
in these ways.
Now, I can't say what the result of that's going to be.
The majority of the Loan Council is needed for the
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approval of support for any particular project, but I
do believe that the purpose of the meeting is a very
sound one, and that in a sense it will be a historic
meeting because I think it will help to move some
developments in Australia forward, at a faster rate
and that will be good for the Nation.
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