analysis
Too much gold? Bottlenecks, renovations and uranium’s return: what was talked about at Diggers & Dealers 2026

As soaring gold prices trigger contractor bottlenecks and narrow the floor at Diggers & Dealers, mining executives are turning to low-cost revamps while sounding the alarm over capital gains changes. Beyond the precious metal, debate over a potential clean energy source was reignited. Renovators delight Ramelius Resources boss Mark Zeptner said the well-publicised gold boom has led to high demand for engineering contractors to construct an “unprecedented” pipeline of new processing plants in WA. His rival at Westgold Resources, Wayne Bramwell, has a novel solution to avoid the construction crunch — renovate instead of building new. Westgold on Wednesday said it would focus on expanding processing capacity of its Cue hub incrementally, instead of a major new build, with its first “capital light” initiative being the addition of more powerful motors at Cue’s existing mill. “I see these incremental capital spends as a bridge as we continue to grow these resources to bigger processing plants, probably new ones,” Mr Bramwell said. “But that’s further in the future when maybe there’s not so much pressure on the engineering world. “All the engineers have got a pretty healthy order book, and that would be making a lot of people nervous if you’re diving into a big greenfields development.” Too gold heavy? Diggers & Dealers has always been skewed towards the precious metal given its host town of Kalgoorlie is the gold mining capital of Australia. But it is veering dangerously close to being a glorified small and mid-cap gold conference and alienating other commodities, according to numerous attendees The West Australian spoke to, with non-precious metal miners steadily abandoning the forum. Australia’s largest uranium company, Paladin Energy, and the country’s largest rare earths company, Lynas Rare Earths, both presented last year but did not feature this time around. Core Lithium was another no-show. Former Lynas chief executive Amanda Lacaze, who is normally a consistent fixture of Diggers, did not rock up to accept her GJ Stokes Memorial Award — apparently to the ire of the conference’s organisers. Fenix Resources boss John Welborn was the sole iron ore mining presenter and pointed out in his spiel that Diggers was introduced as a “gold conference” in the forum’s opening session with Joe Hockey. Official attendance this year was down 100 to 2500 (and likely more according to many of the vendors). Some observers attributed the downfall to a lack of commodity diversity. Capital gains frustration While the mood among the plethora of gold companies at the forum was broadly jovial, there was a strong undercurrent of concern about the Albanese Government’s axing of the 50 per cent capital gains discount. Greatland Resources chief executive Shaun Day was one of a number of prominent gold mining bosses to sound off about the capital gains overhaul, warning that the funding tap for future miners is being turned off. “I think the tax settings are discouraging investment. We’ve had fund managers come back and say that they want to pivot to dividend yield rather than growth,” he said. “Dividend yield is steady-state businesses that are not investing, or investing less, I think that’s a perverse outcome. “That puts a roadblock against what we should want as a sector, which is an acceleration in exploration investment — we want to create the mines and the opportunities of the future.” Greatland is taking matters into its own hands by relinquishing some of its mining tenure to make sure junior explorers can still thrive. “If you have a look at what we’ve done with Aventine Resources, we’ve actually seeded some tenements into them as part of their initial public offering,” Mr Day said. “We want there to be this thriving community and ecosystem of explorers in and around the Paterson (Province).” But the most scathing assessment of the CGT axing was made by Mr Hockey, the former Federal treasurer, on day one of the forum. “Capital gains tax is a disaster, their changes — stupid,” he said. Uranium conundrum Nuclear power in Australia was a hot topic during the 2024 iteration of Diggers & Dealers when former Federal opposition leader Peter Dutton gatecrashed the forum to spruik his pro-nuclear policy. But a humiliating defeat at the 2025 Federal election for the former defence minister buried any hopes of nuclear being part of Australia’s future energy mix. Now, the attention has turned to using Australia’s uranium to power nuclear reactors in other countries. A uranium export deal signed last month with India reignited debate about WA’s uranium mining ban. New Mines Minister Daniel Pastorelli on Wednesday at Diggers said he had no plans to change WA Labor’s policy despite decarbonisation being a core pillar of Premier Roger Cook’s vision. Boss Energy chief executive Matt Dusci, believes WA’s ban does not make sense. His company runs the Honeymoon uranium mine in South Australia and enjoys strong support from its State Labor Government. “Uranium as a product is no more hazardous than the products we’re bringing to site,” he told The West Australian. Mr Dusci said that various hazardous materials used in uranium production were also used in the mining and processing of other commodities in Australia.

analysisToo much gold? Bottlenecks, renovations and uranium’s return: what was talked about at Diggers & Dealers 2026

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analysis
Too much gold? Bottlenecks, renovations and uranium’s return: what was talked about at Diggers & Dealers 2026