Coal provides thousands of jobs and billions of dollars to the Central Queensland economy, so the union representing the industry is calling on the State Government to establish a statutory authority to oversee the transformation of the sector.
The âWorkers Future Authorityâ, as the CFMEU has dubbed it, would be independent of government departments to manage industry transformation and workers transitioning to alternate employment.
With the transition to renewable energy, the CFMEU said the âWorkers Future Authorityâ would identify and attract new industries to impacted regions and would identify areas for skills development, training, and government investment.
Central Queensland has both solar and wind farms established and proposed, plus Gladstone has been identified as a hydrogen hub, on the back of its port, infrastructure, the Gladstone Hydrogen Ecosystem and Hydrogen Park Gladstone initiatives.
Premium Content
Subscriber only Stimulus packages coming off the back of the worldwide vaccine rollout will inject a boost of confidence into the resources sector. That is according to Resource Industry Network general manager Dean Kirkwood, who said there was much for the sector to look forward to in 2021. Mr Kirkwood said coal prices had bounced back, with mine sites in the Bowen Basin now looking to ramp up production again. With the worldwide (COVID) vaccine rollout, on the back of that, governments are looking to stimulate their economies, he said. Once you start stimulating the economy, a lot of infrastructure gets built, infrastructure is built by steel and we need metallurgical coal to make steel.