The skyline of Perth is dominated by three skyscrapers, each bearing the name of a major mining company - BHP Billiton, Rio Tinto and South 32. Looking at them on a recent trip, a DA colleague from parliament remarked to me: "Those buildings should be in Johannesburg."
When South Africa's economy opened up after the arrival of democracy, our mining sector should have been able to build on its world-beating status, but a hostile regulatory environment ensured investors looked elsewhere.
Over the past 23 years there's been a careful but steady withdrawal of enthusiasm, interest, capital, belief and business from South African mining.
It shouldn't be so. We have one of the world's greatest storehouses of minerals. Johannesburg was the centre of world mining, we dominated production of a number of minerals, we had the people, the expertise, the research capability, the engineers, and the business and financial structures to support it.
No longer. The global mining industry is looking elsewhere.
So why has mining investment flowed into Western Australia in particular, to the point where it finds itself in the top five most desirable places to invest mining money, according to the Fraser Institute rankings, while South Africa languishes in 74th position?The answer to that usually starts with the importance of policy certainty. Mining law in Western Australia has been in place for 35 years. Although it is tweaked regularly, the basics remain the same. It is also clear and determined by what's on paper, not by officials taking decisions.
When investors put money into Western Australia, they know what the government will take, upfront. The state has the ability to sign what it calls state agreements, and has followed that route with more than 60 big mining projects. These agreements are essentially investment protection deals, with the ability to adapt the mining project's relationship with the state government to meet specific circumstances.
If we want to make mining realise one of its great benefits, namely that it continues to employ large numbers of skilled but also, importantly, semi- and unskilled South Africans, then we need a different labour dispensation.
Currently, despite our labour legislation being some of the most union-friendly in the world, our two biggest unions still intimidate or attack workers to enforce their writ.
In Western Australia most work is done on individual contracts. Mining unions have virtually fallen away. South Africa needs a dispensation where workers understand what management needs and management respects workers' needs.
It is estimated that R300-billion in mining-related value has been transferred to BEE business since the advent of democracy. There is a good argument to be made for why this had to happen, but it's come at the cost of a stunted industry and disappearing jobs.If we really want to put more wealth in the hands of black South Africans, we should concentrate on growing the industry rather than demanding that higher percentages of a diminishing cake be given to a relatively small group of oligarchs.
Our government needs to allow miners to mine. The state should concern itself with regulating only. Regulation should be clear and simple. Official decision-making should be swift. When capital is committed to a project, licensing decisions must be made quickly.
More important, licensing should be free from any taint of official corruption. It should not be overly prescriptive. Miners mine. They are not particularly good at building houses or schools or running vegetable gardens.
The government should allow them to mine and should extract its dues in taxes and royalties. The reality is that incapable municipal government means mines are often the only institutions that are capable of actually delivering basic services, but the temptation to get them to step into the breach should not be indulged.
Our mining needs social licence. Mining rights are often granted against the wishes of landowners or occupiers. We have to give them more rights to determine how mining takes place, or at least they need to be properly compensated for the effects of mining.
Our biggest problem, though, is simple to describe and difficult to solve. An Australian government official described their approach as one where the state government says to miners upfront it will help them make a profit and run a successful business.
This is the opposite of our adversarial relations, where the government sees mines as dishonest capitalist exploiters and treats them accordingly.
After all, if you were a prospective mining investor, where would you prefer to put your money?
• Lorimer is an MP and the DA spokesman on mineral resources..