Mark Beyer

While native title is increasingly delivering on its promises for all parties, there remain those who aren’t convinced.

Australia’s biggest live sheep exporter, Emanuel Exports Pty Ltd, is planning a constitutional challenge to animal cruelty charges brought by the state government under the Animal Welfare Act.

Native title agreements reached in Western Australia during the past year have a major focus on providing employment and business opportunities for Aboriginal people.

The federal government provides just more than $50 million each year to native title representative bodies (NTRB), yet both business and Aboriginal groups agree this is grossly inadequate.

Twenty-three Western Australian inventions, in sectors ranging from drug delivery to communications and minerals processing, will be on show at next month’s Commercialisation Expo 2006 in Melbourne.

Legal action against nickel miner Minara Resources has provided a stark reminder that negotiating a native title agreement is not the end of the matter for mining companies.

The owner of the Dampier to Bunbury natural gas pipeline has opted for a staged capacity expansion, fuelling speculation that planned expansion projects at Alcoa's Wagerup alumina refinery and BHP Billiton's Worsley Alumina refinery will be deferred.

Construction and development group GRD Ltd intends to sell down 180 million shares in its New Zealand gold mining subsidiary OceanaGold, now reducing its stake from 56.94 per cent to 6.94 per cent.

The top executive at BankWest parent HBOS plc has endorsed the aggressive and innovative growth strategy being pursued by the bank in Western Australia and on the east coast.

Technology Park manager Zernike Australia is planning to widen its activities, with new chief executive Arnold Stroobach looking to build stronger ties with the university sector and establish new medical centres.

Technology investor Entrepreneurs in Residence is planning a major diversification by establishing a US$20 million ($26 million) venture capital fund targeting Australian companies expanding into China.

Mortgage brokers could double their share of housing loans with the biggest winners likely to be the industry’s big players such as Perth-based Australian Finance Group, a conference in Perth was told last week.

Malaysian investment fund Navis Capital Partners is looking to expand its Australian presence after entering an agreement to buy Perth-based printing franchise Worldwide Online Printing.

The founding shareholders of Eneabba Gas Ltd have taken the extraordinary step of canceling 35 million shares and 26.25 million options collectively worth $12.5 million.

The state budget is projecting continued rapid growth in mining royalties and property revenue in 2006-07.

The high and open-ended cost of legal services is a perennial issue for companies and individuals alike.

Newly-formed technology company Sensear Pty Ltd is the fourth spin-out to emerge from the Western Australian Telecommunications Research Institute, based in Nedlands.

The Commissioner of State Revenue has suffered two defeats in the State Administrative Tribunal this year, with taxpayers successfully challenging payroll tax and stamp duty assessments.

Australia’s longest civil trial is scheduled to sit for a further four months after reaching an unprecedented 400 sitting days in early May.

The effectiveness of the State Administrative Tribunal as a cost-effective judicial forum could be eroded if government agencies appealed all adverse decisions to the Supreme Court, lawyers have told WA Business News.

Former Wesfarmers executive Bob Denby and Empired co-founder Justin Miller have teamed up to commercialise a Western Australian invention that tackles the world’s most common occupational illness – hearing loss.

Japan would remain Australia’s major trading partner for another decade despite the rapid growth achieved by China, Australia’s ambassador to Japan has predicted.

When Western Power formally split into four separate businesses on April 1, it marked the end of a long-established reform plan by the state government.

Big corporate collapses such as Sons of Gwalia, EG Green Group, Henry Walker Eltin and most recently Westpoint Corporation have provided plenty of work for insolvency lawyers, but a much smaller deal has been hailed as the best restructuring of 2005.

The establishment of new firms, some prominent partner moves and a plentiful flow of new work have characterised the past year in Perth's legal fraternity.

A booming economy, militant construction unions and the biggest regulatory change in a century have combined to make workplace relations one of the busiest practice areas for Perth’s law firms.

Law firms Clayton Utz and Blakiston & Crabb have been at the forefront of one of the major trends in the mining industry in the past two years: the move to Canada by miners looking to raise large amounts of money.

Most people know of Pacman as an early computer game, but for takeover lawyers the term has been applied to the unusual circumstances surrounding the battle between Alinta and The Australian Gas Light Company.

Engineering company Tenix Group is standing by its belief that a canal from the Kimberley is a viable water supply option for Perth, despite an independent review panel finding this was an expensive and risky concept.

The rapid expansion of Western Australia’s iron ore industry and the emergence of several aspiring producers have prompted the negotiation of an increasing number of joint venture agreements.

The state government has endorsed the findings of an independent review panel which found that transporting water from the Kimberley to Perth would be too costly and fraught with technical and environmental problems.

Last week marked the end of an era in Western Australian education when Curtin University of Technology vice-chancellor Lance Twomey retired after nine years in the position and 37 years at the university.