Tania takes the mic: When mining speaks, Canberra should probably listen

By all accounts, Tania Constable didn’t just drop the mic at the WA Mining Club — she fracked the stage, dug it up, and shipped it off to China.

Striding onto the podium like a miner with a map to El Dorado, the Chief Executive Officer of the Minerals Council of Australia delivered an address that was part state-of-the-union, part budget eulogy, and part battle cry. Had it been any more charged, BHP would’ve tried to export it.

“Mining was forgotten,” Tania declared, as if it were a poor orphan child left behind in the national budget’s rush for election glory. A tragic oversight, especially for an industry that just handed the Treasury a tidy $4.5 billion tip — and didn’t even ask for change.

Let’s be real: the only thing harder than Western Australian iron ore is Tania’s position on Canberra’s policy settings. Her speech carved out a vivid (read: terrifying) picture of a future where approvals take longer than Tolstoy’s War and Peace, uranium is still treated like it's cursed treasure from a 'Pirates of the Caribbean' sequel, and the government gives more love to green branding than a St Patrick’s Day parade.

The emotional high point? A shout-out to 92-year-old Eddie in the audience. Perhaps the only thing in the room older than some of our mining approval timelines.

But let’s talk uranium. Apparently, it’s not safe enough to mine, but it’s perfectly fine to park a nuclear sub with 150 reactors and a missile or two on our shores. You can’t dig it out of the dirt in Kalgoorlie, but you can casually power up a floating nuclear fortress next to a beach in Fremantle. Makes sense if you squint and spin.

And don’t even mention AI. According to Tania, we could process an environmental approval in “hours.” Not days. Not months. Hours. Which is ironic, considering it took us 18 years to approve a project with fewer moving parts than a vending machine.

As for industrial relations? Tania pulled no punches. According to her, unions are popping up like unsolicited LinkedIn requests. One miner saw a 300 percent increase in “right of entry incursions,” which, to be fair, sounds more like a bad night in Northbridge than a workplace policy issue.

Then came the pièce de résistance: energy policy. Or, as she dubbed it, an “emergency.” Prices are up, reliability is down, and Australia’s renewable rollout is being driven like a V8 ute in reverse — fast, loud, and with limited visibility.

So, what do we do? Well, according to Tania, we dig in. Metaphorically and literally. Speak out. Get on the radio. Hijack dinner party conversations. Educate your neighbours. And for heaven’s sake, start talking to your kids about where their smartphones come from — no, Apple doesn’t have a secret orchard filled with iPhones.

“This is not the time to play nice with fair weather friends — you either support mining or you don't,” she said.

Tania’s speech was a high-octane, iron-clad manifesto for an industry that doesn’t want to just survive — it wants to thrive. And, if need be, shout its value from the top of Mount Whaleback.

Because when it comes to mining, silence isn’t golden — it’s just bad policy.