shakergt said:
Goldtalk Leonora said:
Both tenement holder and pastoralist are notified by DMIRS....if you choose to contact either then that's your choice.
It is a notification period as there are no grounds for objection by the tenement holder.
Just a question as I have had this one cime up. I have done a couple of 40e with no hassels except I have had one mining company come back and say if they are doing exploration in the area at the time I came that I would not be allowed in the area. Can they do this? I can understand if they are using explosives but besides that would they have any other reason to not allow access
its a can of worms actually Shakergt. You will get tenement holders writing back to you saying they do not approve of your application and you cannot go there....they have no right to do this and are dealt with by DMIRS...it's a game of bluff and once again you need to know your rights and obligations.
To answer your question directly......on the 40e you will see that one of the conditions is that you are not allowed within 100m of exploration activities of the tenement holder. So...the tenement holder is well within their rights to move you on. The reason why it's a can of worms (for me anyway) is that 100m is not nearly enough. As professional prospectors, we have safety documentation for many of our work activities and the basis of our safety protocols is the separation of man and machinary. At times on our tenements we may have some very large machinary working and having recreational prospectors on the same ground I am trying to work is a recipe for disaster. We have exclusion signage on site but people being people will ignore this and want to come up and see what we are doing and have a chat. Years ago we were digging some ground and one fellow climbed up on the waste pile I was building with a large excavator to take a photo!...Please keep in mind that one swipe and he would have been dead. Dust is also a big issue and whilst dust suppression is a requirement on minesites it is not with the 'low impact' operations we carry out. ..the point being that dust will carry a lot further than 100m. In the past, I have been only day's away from mobilizing machinary out to a tenement...a one block E...and received notification of a section 40E. Fark.....long story short I have no opportunity to object and so the only safe thing I could do was abandon that project and not move gear out. Yes, I could have seen the couple on site and explained the situation to them but by then it may have been too late and an accident occurred...the only responsible action I could take was to not work. What I did do was serve notice on the Director of Safety of DMIRS and explain the situation and highlight the fact that DMIRS has put me in this situation by allowing a secondary access permit on ground that I have a legal contract of lease upon. He didn't like that too much and threatened to send out the safety inspectors.....this I welcomed and reminded him that now that he is PERSONALLY aware of the situation that he has a PERSONAL RESPONSIBILITY if something goes **** up.
What tenement holders can do, is chase 40e permit holders around....claim they are within the 100m exclusion zone and keep chasing them till they bugger off. I reckon its a crappy way to act but what other option do tenement holders have? Lets take one example where 52 or 54 40e's were taken out on a private blokes one block E over in Meekatharra a few years back....now thats up to 150 people prospecting legally and a small operators ground....using the same gear...or better for 2 and a bit months. Is that fair and reasonable? Some of the tour operators over here run their tag-along tours via the 40e permit system....so potentially I can have bloody tour groups on ground that I lease and the only thing I can do to stop them is front them in the bush and make everyones life miserable.
So what is the answer. Pretty simple actually...APLA lobbied (spelling) for the 40e's back in the late 90's (from memory) and the whole intent was to open up large exploration leases to the little guy. It actually worked a treat....untill recent times. These days we have hoards of recreational prospectors (which I support and encourage btw) and very few could actually give a toss about whose land they take a 40e out on. Whilst you will never make everyone happy, the relatively simple solution is to restrict 40e applications to exploration licences of 5 graticular blocks or more. The exclusion of 4 blocks or less will remove most small operators out of the picture and take the permit system back to what it was originally intended to be. Without wasting time with the details, the figure of 4 blocks is a smart choice as some parts of Mining regulation already consider and refer to this as a small E.
Why won't it change?...simple....it needs to come from APLA and APLA is made up predominantly of recreational prospectors that use the 40e permit system!. A few of the more knowledgeable within APLA want the change but have told me privately that the exec does not have the stomach for it. That was a couple of years back and perhaps things have changed....
Oh...and just to jump on my high horse yet again...the permit holder only really has one obligation....to report any finds to the tenement holder with their exact locations. The non-compliance rate for this one simple task is 90 or 94% (can't remember)...so what do I as a tenement holder get out of it...nothing positive mate.
There ya go Shakergt...a can of worms mate!
layful: 
