Huge LNG cost blowout – The Fin; Seven West dodges shareholder revolt – The Aus; IOH offers new Pilbara port solution for exporters – The West; Barnett to push Oakajee in Beijing – The Fin; Chinese secure northern foodbowl – The Aus
Huge LNG cost blowout
Australia's biggest ever resources development, Chevron's Gorgon liquefied natural gas project, faces a $20 billion cost blowout to more than $60 billion because of the high dollar, union demands, high-cost local manufacturing and productivity problems. The Fin
Seven West dodges shareholder revolt
Shareholders in Seven West Media have vented their anger at the group’s dismal share price performance and its controversial decision to hand former chief executive David Leckie a $1.9 million termination bonus. The Aus
IOH offers new Pilbara port solution for exporters
Kerry Stokes' Iron Ore Holdings has thrown a new port option into the Pilbara mix, lodging an environmental application for a 20 million tonne a year multi-user facility at Cape Preston. The West
Barnett to push Oakajee in Beijing
West Australian Premier Colin Barnett says his government will approach Chinese state-owned enterprises directly in a bid to kickstart the $6 billion Oakajee port and rail project proposed to service iron ore miners in the state's mid west. The Fin
Chinese secure northern foodbowl
Chinese property development conglomerate Shanghai Zhongfu has won the sole right to develop 15,200ha of high-value irrigated agricultural land in the north of Western Australia after the state and federal governments spent $510 million of taxpayer funds building road, irrigation, port and local community infrastructure to support the deal. The Aus
THE WEST AUSTRALIAN:
Page 3: Betting on races is common among Australian jockeys and Damien Oliver has been made a scapegoat, WA racing identities said yesterday as the champion sportsman's career hung in the balance.
Page 5: The state government will make an “act of grace” payment of $450,000 each to Kimberley ultramarathon burns victims Turia Pitt and Kate Sanderson despite refusing to accept reponsibility for the tragedy.
Page 9: Tony Abbott has called WA Liberal backbencher Ken Wyatt an “urban Aboriginal” while saying Parliament should embrace more “authentic” indigenous MPs.
Page 10: Stirling naval base in Rockingham is certain to become a major hub for the US military as Washington shifts forces to the Indian Ocean to counter the rise of China and India.
One of Australia's most senior businesswomen says WA's position as an economic powerhouse is a recent phenomenon and the state has barely started to make a net contribution to the nation's wealth.
Page 11: More than 200 workplace laws will be reviewed in the biggest overhaul to the state's industrial relations system in a decade, potentially boosting or reducing pay for more than 100,000 workers.
Page 13: Businessman John Bond has thrown a lifeline to Ruth Tarvydas, offering the WA designer a shop in his Times Square development so she can keep a retail presence in Perth as she tries to rebuild her fashion empire.
Page 14: WA's leading welfare group has called on the state government to introduce a lower electricity tariff for disadvantaged households, saying current concessions are not enough.
Page 18: Julia Gillard has foreshadowed a revision of the way schools are funded after a new analysis showed that cuts in the eastern states will cost WA schools $21.4 million next year.
Page 21: Bunnings will unveil plans today for a $135 million expansion across Perth as its battle with fellow hardware giant Masters heats up.
Business: Seven West Media plans to tap new digital initiatives and more than $100 million of cost savings to bolster earnings and push back against the tightening squeeze on media companies.
Kerry Stokes' Iron Ore Holdings has thrown a new port option into the Pilbara mix, lodging an environmental application for a 20 million tonne a year multi-user facility at Cape Preston.
China is poised to gain a major foothold in Ord River farmland, with the Shanghai Zhongfu group tipped to be announced next week as the successful bidder for 15,000ha of land est of Kununurra, which it will use to grow sugar.
Coles managing director Ian McLeod has moved to mend some fences with WA farmers, saying the company wants to work with them to maximise agricultural efficiency and the quality of food on supermarket shelves.
Three of Australia's biggest banks may have cost their shareholders hundreds of millions of dollars after they rejected a secret offer from the WA government to settle the long-running dispute over the collapse of Alan Bond's Bell Group.
Chevron insisted yesterday its 15.6t million tonne a year Gorgon LNG project remained on track to be finished by late 2014 despite speculation the US giant will within months announce a cost blowout at the $43 billion development.
The one-time rival charged with elevating DLA piper into the top league of global law firms says his staff have a point to prove.
British-based Gem Diamonds is reassessing its options surrounding the Ellendale diamond mine in the Kimberley, while at the same time hinting it may have to reduce the asking price for the operation after nearly 12 months on the market.
The head of the world's third-biggest drilling company believes the outlook for the mining industry looks much better now the “wave of panic” which hit global markets a few months ago has subsided.
The US shale boom has sparked more corporate action in Australia, with junior Sundance Energy agreeing to take over peer Texon Petroleum to create a well-funded player with assets in the Bakken and Eagle Ford shales.
After five years of negotiating, Serpentine-Jarrahdale Shire and residential developers are close to agreeing on developer contributions for Byford, one of Australia's fastest growing residential areas.
THE AUSTRALIAN FINANCIAL REVIEW:
Page 1: Australia's biggest ever resources development, Chevron's Gorgon liquefied natural gas project, faces a $20 billion cost blowout to more than $60 billion because of the high dollar, union demands, high-cost local manufacturing and productivity problems.
Company directors are blaming workplace laws, government policy, red tape and skills shortages as the main controllable reasons for a hit to confidence in boardrooms.
Page 3: Australia and the US will agree today to extend joint military exercises to regional countries, paving the way for confidence-building humanitarian and disaster-relief missions with Indonesia and China.
Page 4: Australia is in danger of missing two of the main goals agreed on by the state and federal governments to improve education and training: to lift year 12 completion rates to 90 per cent by 2015 and to halve the proportion of workers without post-school qualifications by 2020.
Unions want a safety overhaul in the offshore oil and gas industry after two workers died on the Stena Clyde drilling rig in Bass Strait in August.
Page 5: Businesses have been rattled by the Reserve Bank of Australia's decision to slash interest rates close to emergency lows, casting doubt on the effectiveness of delivering more cuts in the near term to spur confidence.
Page 6: The International Energy Agency has forecast an acceleration of global trade in natural gas as a result of the shale gas boom in North America, putting competitive pressure on conventional gas suppliers and possibly affecting pricing in Asia.
Page 7: Rio Tinto is asking rail and port operators to share in the pain of lower coal prices that have led to mine closures on the east coast.
West Australian Premier Colin Barnett says his government will approach Chinese state-owned enterprises directly in a bid to kickstart the $6 billion Oakajee port and rail project proposed to service iron ore miners in the state's mid west.
BHP Billiton chief executive Marius Kloppers insists the company is “serious” about expanding its Olympic Dam mine in South Australia even after shelving the project.
Page 8: Elmer Funke Kupper has admitted the exchange should have moved earlier to bolster West Australia's capital markets and make it easier for smaller miners to raise money.
The head of Incitec Pivot, James Fazzino, has launched a fresh attack on the government's energy policy, saying Australia is missing enormous opportunities to create jobs and investment.
Page 15: Billionaire Kerry Stokes narrowly avoided a “first strike” against Seven West Media's remuneration report yesterday when shareholders used the vote to express anger at the company's poor performance since it was created in a merger last year.
The rising cost of mining coal in Australia and an overheated investment environment at Gladstone in Queensland have conspired to delay the delivery of crucial export infrastructure.
Page 17: Australia's banks are facing a looming funding crisis that will force them to ration lending to home buyers and businesses, National Australia Bank chief Cameron Clyne has warned.
UGL chairman Trevor Rowe has taken a tough line on executive performance targets, warning it is “inappropriate” for boards to reduce them so executives can meet hurdles in softening economies.
Page 19: Paladin Energy chief executive John Borshoff has assured investors that his sale of more than a quarter of his stake in the uranium miner in no way reflects any diminished belief in the company and its prospects in the current “train wreck” of the uranium supply market.
THE AUSTRALIAN:
Page 1: Chinese property development conglomerate Shanghai Zhongfu has won the sole right to develop 15,200ha of high-value irrigated agricultural land in northern Australia after the state and federal governments spent $510 million of taxpayer funds building road, irrigation, port and local community infrastructure to support the deal.
A union employee who was concerned about wrongdoing told the national head of the Australian Workers Union in June 1996 that he deposited about $5,000 cash into Julia Gillard’s bank account at the request of her then boyfriend Bruce Wilson.
Australia is failing to meet crucial targets in Julia Gillard’s education plan, as state governments struggle to improve their performance just as they negotiate new funding deals worth billions of dollars.
Page 2: BHP Billiton chief executive Marius Kloppers says the Olympic Dam mine will not be expanded until the high-cost environment in Australia improves, with the resources industry overheated by too much demand.
Page 3: Accommodation tents are returning to the increasingly overcrowded immigration detention centre on Christmas Island, despite their links to ‘‘challenging behavioural issues’’ and a central role in the fires and riots that threatened to raze the facility last March.
Page 7: Remote indigenous leaders have backed Tony Abbott’s call for traditional and cultural Aborigines to enter the federal parliament, saying only locals understand the bush properly, as a furore erupted over the Opposition Leader’s attitude towards indigenous MP Ken Wyatt.
The Coalition has dropped its hardline opposition to the Gillard government’s ‘‘act of recognition’’ bill acknowledging indigenous Australians and will vote with Labor to avoid a dispute.
The two most badly burned victims of the disastrous Kimberley Ultramarathon will each receive $450,000 from the government of Western Australia in recognition of the extreme nature of the injuries they received.
Business: Shareholders in Seven West Media have vented their anger at the group’s dismal share price performance and its controversial decision to hand former chief executive David Leckie a $1.9 million termination bonus.
One of Australia’s top company directors has called for a revamp of the disclosure requirements for executive pay, arguing that revealing the remuneration of individual executives has pushed up corporate salaries.
Ten Network chairman and shareholder Lachlan Murdoch says there is ‘‘no hiding’’ from the company’s poor ratings performance but he is standing by the management team as executive pay fell by 43 per cent.
Leighton Holdings could be facing further hits to its profit and cashflow if the situation at toll-road operator Bris-Connections continues to deteriorate.
National Australia Bank chief executive Cameron Clyne has warned Australia needs to avoid ‘‘economic xenophobia’’ and complacency if the nation is to take full advantage of the Asian century.
THE SYDNEY MORNING HERALD:
Page 1: NSW Premier Barry O'Farrell has questioned the Catholic Church's rues exempting priests from having to report admission of sexual abuse made in Confession.
Page 2: There may no longer be room for three commercial television networks in Australia, the funds manager who plucked the Ten Network from receivership in the 1990s says.
Page 3: The head of racing in Victoria knew before the Melbourne Cup that jockey Damien Oliver had confessed to placing an illegal bet on a rival horse in 2010.
World: General John Allen, the US commander in Afghanistan, is under investigation for sending inappropriate emails.
Business: Seven West shareholders almost succeeded in lodging a `first strike' against its remuneration report.
Sport: Sonny Bill Williams' $550,000 signing with the Sydney Roosters has earned the NRL double that amount.
THE DAILY TELEGRAPH:
Page 1: Former minister Frank Sartor has told ICAC that former ALP heavyweight Eddie Obeid had suggested he could help him out financially if he decided to enter state parliament.
Page 2: Victorian police have confirmed that they are willing to speak with former Australian Workers Union official Ralph Blewitt about union fraud.
Page 3: A New Zealand-born man has reportedly won refugee status in Australia, after fearing a bikie gang attack in his homeland.
World: The wife of former CIA director David Petraeus is reportedly outraged by her husbands affair but is still living with him.
Business: Seven West Media chairman Kerry Stokes has told shareholders the conglomerate's share price does not reflect its competitive success.
Sport: The Australian Cricket team's fast bowlers rediscovered their game yesterday in a match against South Africa.
THE AGE:
Page 1: Sydney Cardinal George Pell says a royal commission into the Church is not needed and blames a smear campaign on the inquiry. Victims group cites 99 instances where the Church's so-called Melbourne Response had failed them. New hope for type 1 diabetes sufferers that one day they could be free of multiple daily insulin injections.
Page 2: Defence Minister Stephen Smith flags a more prominent role for the naval base at Perth as US deepens its long-term involvement in the Asia and US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton flies into Perth. White House has no plans to introduce carbon tax.
Page 3: All but six protesters end hunger strike in Nauru. Oxford American Dictionary elevates Gif - animated computer picture files - to 2012 word of the year. ASIO to open a counter-terrorism probe looking at Melbourne's anarchist political scene after a female a Melbourne University graduate and anarchist is wanted by Mexican counter-terrorism authorities. Single mother Leesa Laporte gets child care support as she returns to school for her VCE. German video game designer thinks a game placing players in the shoes of asylum seekers trying to reach Australia may change opinions about boat people.
World: Thousands cross into Turkey from Syrian border town of Ras al-Ayn as fighting continues to rage.
Business: Former Channel Ten owner Laurence Freedman says the network has lost the plot and doubts it can survive in the free-to-air battle.
Sport: A second letter by Adelaide Crows omitting any mention of a secret third party pay deal for Kurt Tippett emerges as the AFL gets ready to investigate the alleged salary cap breach deal.
THE HERALD SUN:
Page 1: Police focus on a gangland figure linked to shadowy racing identities in their investigation to find the killer of trainer Les Samba.
Page 2: Receivers winding up collapsed Banksia Securities shut down its entire branch network. Two women who suffered horrific burns in the West Australian bush during the 2011 race will receive $450,000 each in an act of grace payment from the WA government.
Page 3: New boss of Etihad Stadium says AFL should look to English soccer and NFL for ways to brighten up the atmosphere and entertainment at matches. Melbourne Aquarium welcomes the hatching of its first sub-Antarctic Gentoo penguin chicks for 2012.
World: Thousands flee Syrian border city of Ras al Ayn for the safety of Turkey as the battle between Syrian rebels and government troops for control rages on.
Business: Seven West Media warns nothing is sacred as the company slashes $50 million in costs.
Sport: Kurt Tippett says he is innocent in the Adelaide salary cap scandal and threatens to sue the Crows if AFL deregisters him.
THE CANBERRA TIMES:
Page 1: ACT church leaders strongly support royal commission into child abuse but call for more healing. War Memorial rejects honour request for peacekeepers.
Page 2: ACT Liberal leader Zed Seselja denies he has plans to move into federal politics.
Page 3: Gloomy economic forecasts for the ACT are overly pessimistic says Treasurer Andrew Barr.
World: The six Gulf states support a newly formed opposition bloc as the Syrian people's legitimate representative.
Business: Troubled mining operator Nathan Tinkler has avoided liquidation on his racehorse stud farm Patinack Farm.
Sport: Canberra Raiders to test whether he can compete in the NRL next season.
