
A message from the Chairman
Dear Sydney Mining Clubbers
So its time to saddle up again, and we are all looking forward to an exciting 2021 restart…
Our industry finishes the year standing tall – drought proof, COVID-resistent, productive and the absolute backbone of the Australian economy. We are five times the size of agriculture – and well – not much point drawing comparisons with our poor old friends in the tourism sector! As so many of our fellow Australians have suffered, businesses have folded, and so many people have become financially stressed. Meanwhile we have chugged on, filling our export ports and the national coffers.
Some of those marooned away from family and friends in the national interest were also miners who couldn’t get back home to family for very long times. Thank you them.
Well done you! Whatever far flung corner of the continent you are in, whatever machine you are operating, whether you’re in an underground mine or an open cut, in the mill or the office, in the assay lab or on an exploration rig with only emus to talk to, driving an ore train or doing the accounts… Well done you, well done us!
Lets hope the hard part is not yet to come. China’s ban on Australian coal imports is pretty confronting news to most of us. It can play two ways. Maybe it just becomes a ‘round robin’. We supply whoever it was that is now taking up China’s supply, we all move around a spot, the ships all drive a bit further to their ports, and life goes on, a bit strained but the same. Or it escalates to other commodities. As if China giving us the flu wasn’t enough! Between China woes, the ‘woke’ crusaders and the climate v energy wars, it’s all a bit daft to me.
As you will know by now our gift for SMC speakers is an authentically recreated Eureka Flag, or the ‘Miner’s Flag’ as we call it. December 3rd marked the 166th anniversary of the treacherous acts of the Victorian Government in ambushing the sleeping miners on a Sunday morning in 1861. Miners were shot over their refusal to pay exorbitant lease taxes. Thirty miners died under the Miners Flag. The event became seminal in the creation of the Australian nation, and again thank you to miners for their strength and their deep sense of values and purpose.
Eureka however also reminds us that ‘miner bashing’ is a national sport that goes back over one-and-a-half centuries in our nation. And still we prevail, we just keep on going. And that is where I just love being part of the mining community. And so also I love running your mining Club. Really looking forward to seeing you all in one room again.
A huge thank you to our 2020 sponsors who haven’t had much bang for their buck over the year. Georgina Moodie has been busy in the meanwhile and is ready to roll out a brand new website and an Eventbrite booking system that will streamline the workings.
We finish a most peculiar 2020 in very strong shape so rest up over the break, enjoy the cricket and cicadas, and just maybe another commodity super cycle will be born in a fresh new year. And we can joke about 2020 hindsight!
Regards
Julian Malnic
Chairman
P.S. We’ve confirmed the dates for our 2021 events which are listed below. Don’t forget that by clicking on the date on your mobile device you should be able to add the event directly to your calendar.
