Enterprise Migration Agreements and the coal industry

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GVK and the Alpha Coal Project

In February 2012, GVK vice-chairman Sanjay Reddy suggested that the company was likely to apply to use guest workers via the Enterprise Migration Scheme for the Alpha Coal Project. "Anybody who has an investment of more than $2 billion, plus more than some 2000 workforce, will be eligible for it,” Mr Reddy told The Australian Financial Review. "If we have an option to apply and get – as per the policy of the government – certain approvals, certainly we’ll do it.”

However, following controversy about the approval of an Enterprise Migration Agreement for a Gina Rinehart iron ore project in Western Australia, GVK softened their position. In May 2012 Reddy told the Australian Financial Review that "we are in the process of negotiating our engineering, procurement and construction [EPC] contracts,” he said. “Once we finalise with the EPC contractors then we will decide."

Clive Palmer flags possibility of EMA for his projects

Clive Palmer, who proposes to build the China First Project in the Galilee Basin in Queensland, told ABC Radio that he would apply for an enterprise migration agreement (EMA) if there weren't enough Australian workers for his projects. "Jobs should be first for Australians but we should not hold up national development (if there’s a shortage of workers)," Mr Palmer said. He said that an EMA application would depend on “a number of issues which are still undetermined.”

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