The Queensland government stands to lose as much as $1.5 billion in mining royalties over the next decade because of a property law loophole that is adding more friction to the growing debate over land use.
Labelled by the government as an "accident of history", the legal vagary gives landowners whose property was titled before 1910 the royalty rights to coal below the land's surface, rather than those rights vesting with the state government as is usually the case.
The loophole is providing a boon for some farmers, with coal royalties payable ranging between 7 per cent and 10 per cent of the value of all coal extracted.
The Australian
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