Media Reports

Download the full article here

Author: By IAN KIRKWOOD Date: 20/08/2012 Words: 316 Source: NCH FORMER BHP Newcastle executive Greg Cameron says the Coalition state government has abandoned the Hunter Region by deciding to expand Port Botany and Port Kembla instead of promoting a container terminal on the former steelworks site. And instead of suggesting the steelworks site for a naval base, Mr Cameron believes the naval ships should go to Port Botany, allowing Newcastle to be set up as a full-scale container port. Mr Cameron - who was involved in the original 1990s BHP plans to put a container terminal on the Hunter River site - says Hunter community leaders…

20 Aug, 2012 08:14 AM MORE than a decade after BHP stopped steelmaking in Newcastle, the future of the 150hectare site appears as uncertain as ever. On one hand, Newcastle Port Corporation has spent years working on ‘‘concept plans’’ for a $200million redevelopment of the waterfront side of the site, to be developed over the coming decades to handle a variety of cargoes. But on the other hand, the Coalition state government has dropped a long-standing – if questionable – Labor promise to make Newcastle the next container port after Port Botany, seemingly removing a major incentive for any private…

Author: By IAN KIRKWOOD Industrial Reporter Date: 18/08/2012 Words: 532 Source: NCH NEWCASTLE Port Corporation is confident of developing the former BHP steelworks site despite the state government opting for Port Kembla as the nextcontainer terminal after Port Botany. But a former member of a consortium that agreed with the former Labor government to develop the Newcastle site said the Port Kembla decision was the latest blow in a "frustrating" process. Nearly 13 years have passed since the steelworks shut, and the government approved a masterplan for the waterfront 90 hectares of the 150-hectare site in July. This new master plan…

By IAN KIRKWOOD Industrial Reporter Aug. 17, 2012, 11:50 a.m. PROCESS: Gary Webb, above, Duncan Gay, below. and at bottom, the site with Carrington coal terminal in the foreground. Main Picture: AECOM NEWCASTLE Port Corporation is confident of developing the former BHP steelworks site despite the state government opting for Port Kembla as the next container terminal after Port Botany. But a former member of a consortium that agreed with the former Labor government to develop the Newcastle site said the Port Kembla decision was the latest blow in a ‘‘frustrating’’ process. Nearly 13 years have passed since the steelworks shut,…

Author: By IAN KIRKWOOD Date: 03/08/2012 Words: 404 Source: NCH "WHAT we're saying is not now, but not never." With those words, NSW Roads and Ports Minister Duncan Gay formally consigned the Hunter Valley's hopes of a steelworks-site container terminal to the planning version of the never-never. In truth, the writing has been on the wall for some time before now, but in coming to Newcastle to deliver those words, Mr Gay was saying clearly and absolutely that Newcastle had lost its place in the planning queue to Port Kembla as the overflow port for the state's main container facilities at Port Botany. Plans…

Date: 01/08/2012 Words: 221 Source: SMH So consultants Morgan Stanley have told the NSW government it will get a better price for Port Botany if it lifts the cap on container movements through the port ("Roads pain tipped as container limit lifted", July 31). Most of these extra containers will end up on congested roads near Port Botany and Sydney Airport. To make this more acceptable, the suggestion is to complete the M5 East. This will cost at least $4.5 billion. A less costly solution would be to sell Port Kembla separately from Port Botany and connect Wollongong to western Sydney by completing the Maldon-Dombarton rail…

Author: Josephine Tovey Date: 31/07/2012 Words: 363 Source: SMH THE state government will allow unrestricted container movements from Port Botany as a carrot to the private sector bidding for the port, a move the opposition says will worsen congestion on some of Sydney's most clogged roads. The Treasurer, Mike Baird, confirmed the government intends to lift the existing cap of 3.2 million container movements as part of the transaction of the port in a 99-year lease. The cap was established following widespread expansion of the port under the former Labor government and fears that unrestricted movement would worsen congestion. But the adviser to the…

Author: By MICHELLE HARRIS Date: 31/07/2012 Words: 279 Source: NCH A CONSORTIUM behind a $600 million steelworks site redevelopment proposal says it still believes Newcastle can host a successful container terminal despite a cabinet decision to privatise Ports Kembla and Botany, which effectively kills off the idea. Newcastle Port Corporation is understood to be seeking more information from the government about the implications of the privatisation move for its own plans. The state cabinet agreed last week to lease for 99 years Port Botany and Wollongong's Port Kembla, following the completion of a scoping study that was commissioned to determine…

Author: By MICHELLE HARRIS State Political Reporter Date: 28/07/2012 Words: 200 Source: NCH PLANS for the Port of Newcastle to host the state's next container terminal are officially dead, after the state cabinet decided to proceed with the long-term lease of Port Kembla and Port Botany. Treasurer Mike Baird announced yesterday that Port Botany and Port Kembla will be sold on a 99-year lease after the Cabinet signed off on the recommendations of a scoping study commissioned to determine the process. The study also looked at the implications for the Port of Newcastle, which had long been promised under the former Labor…

By BEN SMEE July 16, 2012, 10:41 a.m. HOME BASE: HMAS Newcastle in Newcastle Harbour, where the old BHP site could become a new Australian Navy base. THE NSW Government will consider whether the former BHP Steelworks site at Mayfield could be used to establish a $1billion naval base, after container terminal plans were effectively abandoned last month. A Defence Force Posture Review concluded in March that the Navy would require a second base on the east coast if Garden Island succumbed to growing commercial interests in Sydney Harbour. The Federal Government’s announcement at the weekend that it would open the…

Date June 14, 2012 Brian Robins ADVISERS to the state government have warned that unless the cap on container movements to and from Port Botany is raised, the government could get $1.5 billion less from its planned privatisation. The inability to finalise plans to boost transport links to and from the port - both road and rail - has already clouded prospects of concluding the sale in time for the next state budget. In particular, a dispute between the federal government and a private sector consortium involving Chris Corrigan for an inland port at Moorebank, near Liverpool in the city's…

Author: ANALYSIS By IAN KIRKWOOD Date: 13/06/2012 Words: 478 Source: NCH PORT Kembla's gain is Newcastle's loss. That is the only realistic way to rationalise Treasurer Mike Baird's plan to offer a long-term lease on Port Kembla, reaping an estimated $500 million of which $100 million will be spent in the Illawara. But the $100 million is only part of the snub. The Hunter, after all, will supposedly receive $350 million from the Hunter Infrastructure Fund. No. The real importance of the announcement is the selection of Port Kembla as the state's backup port to Port Botany, all but ruling…

Author: Ian Kirkwood Date: 13/06/2012 Words: 151 Source: NCH NEWCASTLE Port Corporation will spend $18.1 million this year on capital works but its spending allocations have been overshadowed by the state government's plans to lease out Port Kembla for a major container and cargo development. While the Port Kembla project is clearly long term - Treasury officials say Port Botany could more than triple in size before running out of space - it effectively kills any aspirations Newcastle has had to being the state's next container port. Infrastructure NSW chief executive Paul Broad has been talking down the prospect in recent months anyway, but…

Author: Brian Robins Date: 09/05/2012 Words: 385 Source: SMH THE Infrastructure NSW chief executive Paul Broad's declaration that Newcastle will not be developed as acontainer port has cut across comments by the Premier, Barry O'Farrell, as well as plans held by the coalmining entrepreneur, Nathan Tinkler. After being blocked from pursuing plans to build a coal loader at the port, Mr Tinkler outlined plans for a container port, which has now run into difficulties. Under state planning guidelines, Newcastle was to be developed to handle an increasing volume of the state'scontainer traffic, especially as Port Botany approaches capacity. Port Botany is in the middle…

IAN KIRKWOOD 06 Apr, 2012 08:21 AM ONE of the architects of the plan for a container terminal in the Port of Newcastle says a rail freight bypass west of Newcastle is an absolute necessity. Greg Cameron, BHP’s Newcastle manager of external affairs between 1994 and 1999, said yesterday the Hunter public needed to be aware of plans to massively expand Port Botany at the expense of Newcastle. Mr Cameron said Botany handled 2million containers last year and would reach its approved capacity of 3.2million containers in about 2020. Former premier Bob Carr promised Newcastle would be developed once Botany…

06 Apr, 2012 04:00 AM IN a series of reports this week, the Newcastle Herald has looked closely at the longstanding proposal for a west-of-Newcastle rail bypass between Fassifern and Hexham. Although some have suggested different start and finish points for the link, the Fassifern to Hexham tag is the one that’s stuck since Hunter business leaders presented it in 1998 as the centrepiece of a draft transport study. At the time, they argued the line was crucial to the success of two major industrial developments, an underground coalmine at Wyong and a ‘‘multi-purpose’’ shipping terminal on the BHP steelworks…

PUBLISHED: 15 MAR 2012 00:10:00 | UPDATED: 02 APR 2012 15:45:17 This morning, two of Australia’s top infrastructure advisers could do what no government has done: broker an agreement to help unclog Sydney’s roads and clear cargo from one of the biggest ports in the country. Sydneysiders know the cost of being stuck in traffic behind trucks carrying everything from iPads to imported beer on roads around Port Botany, in the city’s south-east. But unless something is done within three years to move freight more efficiently from our second most valuable container port, every Australian will pay for the city’s transport…

Author: By MICHELLE HARRIS State Political Reporter Date: 31/01/2012 Words: 286 Source: NCH A $600 MILLION proposal to redevelop the BHP steelworks site for port uses, including a container terminal, will be considered as part of the case being mounted for plans to lease Sydney's Port Botany. A spokesman for NSW Ports Minister Duncan Gay said yesterday that an announcement on a Newcastle container terminal would be made after the scoping study for the Port Botany transaction, due to the government early this year, is completed. But financial advisers are also expected to consider whether to lift a cap on container movements on Port Botany's operator,…

Download the article here

Author: By MICHELLE HARRIS and IAN KIRKWOOD Date: 08/12/2011 Words: 731 Source: NCH A $1.1 BILLION spend on rail freight improvements between Sydney and Newcastle is being hailed by governments as a win for train commuters but is due to bring more pain for motorists already stuck at the Adamstown railway gates. The capacity of the 160-kilometre corridor is due to increase by about half, from 29 to 44 freight trains a day, once work is completed on the Northern Sydney freight corridor project, which the state and federal governments announced yesterday. But it does not provide for the Fassifern…

By IAN KIRKWOOD Dec. 6, 2011, 11:38 a.m. THE state government is looking to ditch a long-standing promise to make Newcastle the next container port after Botany. Changing Labor’s ‘‘three ports strategy’’ would make it easier for Nathan Tinkler to achieve his plans for a coal-loader on part of the former BHP site. A state government submission lodged last month with federal agency Infrastructure Australia shows the government intends allowing as many as 7million containers a year through Botany, or more than three times the 2.02million containers shipped last year. Botany’s existing approval is for 3.2million containers a year and 7million…

BY BEN SMEE CIVIC REPORTER 07 Jun, 2011 04:00 AM GREENS councillor Michael Osborne is calling for the release of a state government masterplan for the port of Newcastle as part of a push to establish a freight rail link to the former BHP site. Cr Osborne has tabled a notice of motion for tonight’s Newcastle City Council meeting, calling on the state and federal governments to link the BHP site to Sandgate junction by rail before any proposed redevelopment occurs. The contents of the masterplan, which is expected to be placed on public exhibition later this year, have been…

BY MICHELLE HARRIS 20 Apr, 2011 04:00 AM NEW Ports Minister Duncan Gay has not ruled out a coal terminal at the Mayfield former steelworks site after meetings with stakeholders, including mining magnate and loader proponent Nathan Tinkler’s camp. The fate of the site may be decided in a review of the state’s port strategy. A spokesman for Mr Gay said he had ‘‘met all stakeholders to receive briefings on the latest developments’’ in relation to the 90-hectare Mayfield site, which was a subject of controversy during the election campaign. The Newcastle Herald understands discussions between the Anglo Ports and…

Michelle Harris, March 4 2011 THE state government is staying silent on the fate of a proposed $600 million private-sector port development at the Mayfield former steelworks site, as mining magnate Nathan Tinkler pushes ahead with a rival coal terminal plan. Australian Securities and Investments Commission records show Mr Tinkler has registered half a dozen companies in recent months that would handle the project. The Newcastle Herald has learnt his proposed terminal would be called the Hunter Ports project, the name of one of the companies registered to a Honeysuckle address late last year. It in turn is owned by…

BY MICHELLE HARRIS 04 Mar, 2011 03:00 AM THE state government is staying silent on the fate of a proposed $600 million private-sector port development at the Mayfield former steelworks site, as mining magnate Nathan Tinkler pushes ahead with a rival coal terminal plan. Australian Securities and Investments Commission records show Mr Tinkler has registered half a dozen companies in recent months that would handle the project. The Newcastle Herald has learnt his proposed terminal would be called the Hunter Ports project, the name of one of the companies registered to a Honeysuckle address late last year. It in turn…

Author: By MICHELLE HARRIS Date: 03/03/2011 Words: 342 Source: NCH THE state government had given Sydney Ports a "holiday" from making dividend payments to Treasury while it expanded Port Botany, yet Newcastle struggled to secure a container terminal, lord mayor John Tate said. Cr Tate, who is standing as an independent at the state election, said he found out about the move late last year when he attended a conference at which a Sydney Ports representative spoke. The latest Sydney Ports annual report confirms the arrangement. Dividends to the government "continue to be suspended during the period of Sydney Ports' major capital…

Author: Greg Ray Date: 26/02/2011 Words: 839 Source: NCH IF this week's amazing scenes with the Newcastle Knights proved anything, it was that coal baron Nathan Tinkler is not a bloke who gives up easily. In his long-running bid to take over the National Rugby League licence of the Knights Tinks has displayed great persistence and determination. That's what makes it so interesting to watch the progress of the big feller's main game in Newcastle: his proposal for a new coal-loader on the former BHP industrial site at Mayfield. Maybe you follow coal news as keenly as you follow the…

Author: Mick Payze Date: 23/02/2011 Words: 462 Source: NCH THE debate over NSW's desperate need for the substantial expansion of container handling facilities at Newcastle continues, but the time for talk is over. The real work must begin. Those in doubt should read the Sydney Ports Corporation's website, which states: "The closer economic integration of Australia with the rest of the world has seen greater trade flows develop over the past 20 years. These trade flows have been supported by an increase in the use of containers as the means of exporting and importing commodities and manufactured goods. "A number of indicators suggest supporting…

BY MATTHEW KELLY 19 Feb, 2011 04:00 AM Unions and business officials have hit out over claims that Newcastle’s bid for a container terminal was being sabotaged from within the Labor Party. Maritime Union of Australia Newcastle secretary Jim Boyle said he was infuriated that behind-the-scenes in-fighting was holding back the Hunter’s economic development. ‘‘You just shake your head when you hear about what’s going on,’’ Mr Boyle said. ‘‘There are no winners when these things get political. ‘‘We want [the government] to come out with the recommendation because we are entitled to know what it is.’’ The Newcastle Herald…