Speech: Technology, Infrastructure and unlocking the value of Northern Australia
Good morning, everyone,
Broome is a place that represents the potential of Northern Australia, a great place to open the important bush summit.
Today, I want to talk about how government policy, infrastructure and technology can help us build a stronger, more resilient future for Northern Australia.
Let’s start with the basics on government.
A government’s primary responsibilities are to ensure:
- The safety of its people from external threat and internal criminals
- Provision of essential services and infrastructure. Here I specifically refer to resilient transport networks, health care and beneficial education
- Ensure an environment where investment chooses to be deployed, the economy can grow, creating jobs, supporting living standards and creating the revenue to enable points 1 and 2.
Why should this be important to you?
We all know when services get cut because money is tight, the bush suffers 1st.
I lived for 10 years in Port Hedland and experienced the struggles you have getting good health care and ensuring your kids have the same opportunities as those in the city.
After a while my family and I, like so many others, had to make the decision to move back to Perth. The quality of education, opportunities and more, we wanted to provide for our two at the time teenage girls could not be accessed in Port Hedland. Under resourced police service and crime continues to be a significant problem there, deterring families from living there for long.
So, how do we change this – how do we unlock the future value of Northern Australia together?
The answer lies in:
- 1st creating a widespread understanding that extensive government tape and regulations, long approval times, ineffective government policy that doesn’t help productivity or competitiveness internationally, does nothing to encourage investment and hence does nothing to support more jobs and better living standards.
An article in the West Australian yesterday had the headline ‘The Pilbara would not happen today’ and referenced a speech that Kerry Stokes, made at the Resources Technology Showcase where he warned that as a nation, bad policies mean we are in danger of missing out on the next wave of success that will threaten the standard of living for generations to come. Wise words and well said.
Replace this reality with a common vision that has bi partisan long term support from government that set us on a growth path, and consequent higher living standards for all.
- 2nd invest in cost effective reliable 24/ 7 electricity production, and other enabling infrastructure that help to generate the revenue to pay for this vision.
- 3rd have the same common vision and support from industry, government and the people in the regions of our north.
The last point is important. Too often in recent years we have seen minority activist groups slow down or prevent economic prosperity in the regions – in the end it’s the people of those regions especially, and all the related businesses that loses.
So, how do we create this common vision.
Lets firstly ask, with record national debt, businesses failing in regional areas, many consecutive quarters of declining living standards, inflation adjusted decline in investment, declining education standards, grossly inadequate health facilities in regional areas, declining productivity and competitiveness , a consequential future of declining living standards, can we really afford not to take a better path?
Australia’s mining industry has built and is operating some of the world’s most efficient logistics systems, operating heavy haul rail, Deep seaports and airports in some of the most remote and rugged parts of the country.
At the same time government and others have identified ports and other logistics infrastructure it sees as critical to Australia.
Rather than look at all these as individual projects, what if we try and align priorities across government, regional Australians and industry and create a shared infrastructure network.
With less tape and regulation, this would unlock potential across the north, securing resilient supply chains to protect our country, foster development of the region, and most of all generate the economic growth to pay for all of this.
When looking at tax reform lets look at the past. People of the north above the 26th parallel used to have a realistic tax rebate facility, operating for decades, which has been left to diminish given inflation and the passage of time, this should be reinstituted across the north of Australia. Northern Territory is a territory, not a state, massive dropping of government tape and regulations should be added to turn the Northern Territory into a special economic zone, Like the more than 7, ooo special zones operating successfully around the world today, but not in Australia.
Sitting alongside this, is how we utilise technology to further unlock this potential.
Technology can support doctors and nurses, improve diagnosis, and make specialist care more accessible in remote communities. This is about fairness —making sure regional patients can get the care they need close to home.
We recently saw first-hand the difference technology makes in regional health outcomes, when one of our mining team members from Sanjiv Ridge – one of our contract mining sites in the Pilbara – was taken to the Marble Bar Nursing Post for assessment.
There, the medical staff were quickly able to conduct important tests using an i-STAT machine, a portable blood analysis system that delivers lab-quality diagnostic results in minutes that was donated and made available through the generosity of our Executive Chairman, Mrs Rinehart, who had seen similar equipment overseas.
These life-saving devices are ideal for remote medical facilities where previous blood samples would have to be taken and sent to major regional centres or even down to Perth. Now, they can take samples and make a diagnosis in about 10 minutes.
At Hancock Iron Ore, we see the benefits of integrating our technology capability and infrastructure strength every day.
We’re using advanced data analytics, automation, and artificial intelligence to make our operations safer, more efficient, and more competitive. Both automation and artificial intelligence require reliable 24 / 7 electricity, and ai, requires massive amounts of it! For example, our investment in high-speed connectivity across our sites means our teams—whether they’re in Perth, the Pilbara—can collaborate in real time, access critical information, and respond quickly to challenges.
But technology and infrastructure alone aren’t enough. We need the right policies and the right partnerships.
Our Executive Chairman has been calling for integrated or special development zones in Northern Australia for many years now. Although rarely spoken about in Australia, IDZ’s or Sez’s are increasing globally and are a proven concept dating back to the early 20th century. An example of mid- and long-term government policy settings, introduced adequately, that would encourage investment and new businesses to Northern Australia are tape, regulation and tax cutting sezs or IDZ’s.
If I can leave you with the following points, for this to happen Government, industry and people in the north must work together.
It will take honesty, honesty to look at the consequences of ineffective government policy, policy that doesn’t deliver low cost reliable electricity, leadership, vision, investment, and collaboration to unlock the value of the north. We need to look beyond, noisy activist minorities and election cycles and focus on long-term solutions — making this truly unique part of our country a place where people want to live, work and build the future.
Looking forward – investing in integrated logistics and technology infrastructure for our regional towns, growing the tax rebate for those working north of the 26th parallel, isn’t just about progress – it’s about innovation, and giving every Australian, no matter where they live, the tools to build a better future.