BHP’s boss has joined the throng of businesses and corporate lobby groups calling for Western Australia to fully reopen its border, saying “now is the time”.
The planned reopening date of February 5 was scrapped last month due to the huge surge in Omicron cases on the east coast.
But thousands have been pouring into WA since that date when entry restrictions were eased under the state’s “Safe Transition Plan”, allowing in peopling with “direct legitimate family connections” with WA and anyone travelling on compassionate grounds.
While polling suggested Premier Mark McGowan’s tough border stance was overwhelmingly supported by the public for the vast majority of the pandemic, that sentiment appears to have changed, with those favouring and those opposing the delay roughly equally divided.
And the corporate world has been loudly demanding Mr McGowan set a new date to give them certainty.
The Chamber of Commerce and Industry WA recently conducted a snap survey of 400 WA businesses about the delay, with 65 per cent of respondents saying the impacts would be “negative”, while just 23 per cent believed it would have a positive affect.
Grabbing headlines in particular was Qantas chief executive Alan Joyce, who compared WA to North Korea, saying it was unfortunate the nation was “divided”.
BHP last month reported labour shortages due to WA’s border restrictions was having an impact on its all-important iron ore mines in the state’s north, saying it expected some “short-term disruption” when borders reopened.
Since then, a handful of cases have managed to creep into the Pilbara mines, starting with the Yandi operation where five cases were confirmed.
Over the weekend, BHP detected two cases connected to the Warrawandu Village near Newman and a single case at Mining Area C.
On Tuesday while discussing BHP’s latest first-half results, chief executive Mike Henry said everyone including the WA government would recognise “that at some point things have to return to normal”.
“It’s just a question as to when that happens,” Mr Henry told reporters on Tuesday.
“We believe that, as do many others, now is the time for our borders to begin opening back up again.
“We believe that, certainly as an industry, and as BHP, we have the ability to navigate the near-term disruption that arises as a result of that.”
His comments came after BHP reported soaring profits, driven largely by near record production at its WA iron ore mines and higher prices for its major commodities.
This was partially offset by factors including significant wet weather at its Queensland coal operations and inflationary pressures including higher fuel prices.
The miner declared its best-ever interim dividend of $US1.50 ($A2.10) per share or $US7.6 bn ($A10.66bn), up from 65 US cents or $US3.3bn for the first half of fiscal 2021.
RBC Capital Markets analyst Tyler Broda described BHP as “firing on all cylinders”, saying its recent “unification” delisting from the London Stock Exchange – making it an even bigger behemoth on the Australian Securities Exchange – was achieved relatively smoothly.
“Management has managed to not only drive a successful unification but also post a very strong half-year financially, leaving the group xjmtzywwith a blank canvas for future M&A or cash returns,” Mr Broda said.
“We think the market will take these results as an incremental positive to what are already very strong market perceptions.”
Macquarie Research was also impressed by the results, describing them as strong, with multiple numbers beating its forecasts.
The merger of BHP’s petroleum assets with Woodside is expected to be complete in the June quarter.
