They are, however, wrong. Although mining is not a major activity and is not greatly effected by land claims in Victoria, Melbourne is the home-base of many of the nation's major mining firms. We will only keep that home-base while Australia is a major area of mining activity. If mining firms continue to move exploration and production offshore, as they are currently doing because of land rights, then head-office jobs will soon follow. More importantly, the Australian economy is still predominantly resource based.
Resources dominate our stock market.
Resource projects still are the main drivers of private investment. In short, if the resource sector suffers, we all suffer. There are a number of fundamental faults with the NTA, the most significant being the right it gives to native-title claimants to negotiate with miners and pastoral leaseholders. This has led to a flood of claims. For example, the WA gold fields region is currently subject to 90 different claims with some areas being subject to as many as 14 separate claims, some of which are conflicting claims by members of the same family.