The Aus­tralian resource indus­try amounts to an esti­mat­ed 75% of the country’s exports, con­tributes sig­nif­i­cant­ly to Australia’s work­force and is a lead­ing influ­ence on Australia’s stan­dard of liv­ing, ris­ing incomes and flour­ish­ing economy.

We have deep indus­try expe­ri­ence which allows us to sup­port clients across the whole life-cycle of a min­ing oper­a­tion. Our team can advise you on any aspect of your project from explo­ration and approvals to social licence issues, M&A, financ­ing, mine devel­op­ment and con­struc­tion, process plants, infra­struc­ture, ship­ping, mar­ket­ing, pro­duc­tiv­i­ty improve­ments and mine care and main­te­nance or closure. 

We know the com­mer­cial pri­or­i­ties in min­ing indus­try invest­ment, eco­nom­ic and tight project time­lines require strate­gic insight. Help­ing you to plan for the next stage of the devel­op­ment in a com­plex reg­u­la­to­ry and busi­ness envi­ron­ment is crit­i­cal. Under­stand­ing the con­text in which our clients oper­ate enables us to pro­vide advice at the strate­gic and oper­a­tional levels.

NSW has many projects in the pipeline that, once under­way, will sig­nif­i­cant­ly boost the state’s eco­nom­ic and employ­ment per­for­mance. In par­tic­u­lar, NSW is rich in min­er­als such as coal, gold, cop­per, sil­ver, lead, zinc, cobalt and lithi­um. Major coal deposits are found across the whole Syd­ney-Gunnedah Basin. While the Cow­al open pit gold mine in the Cen­tral West­ern Plains region is the biggest mine in NSW.

Our full project life cycle expe­ri­ence includes:

  • Plan­ning approvals
  • Financ­ing
  • Green­field & brown­field projects
  • Com­mu­ni­ty social licenses
  • Site recla­ma­tion
  • Waste reg­u­la­tions
  • Cli­mate change and ESG 

Use­ful links:

No mat­ter how rou­tine or com­plex the busi­ness issues you face, Mer­i­tas’ net­work of law firms is with you every step of the way. Mar­ket-lead­ing firms offer a full range of legal ser­vices, which enable you to do busi­ness any­where. Wise coun­sel and prac­ti­cal solu­tions are just a phone call or e‑mail away. Dis­cov­er the breadth and depth of the prac­tice and indus­try sec­tor capa­bil­i­ties avail­able to you through Meritas.

Publications

Cur­rent state of the con­struc­tion and infra­struc­ture market

The build­ing and con­struc­tion indus­try is sig­nif­i­cant and com­plex, with a land­scape which is con­stant­ly changing.It is cur­rent­ly char­ac­terised by: sig­nif­i­cant pub­lic invest­ment in…

Q&A with Swaab's new building and construction partner, Mark Glynn

Why did you choose Swaab?When I first met with Mary Digiglio, Swaab’s man­ag­ing part­ner and Helen Kow­al, part­ner con­struc­tion and stra­ta and…

Might a Receiv­er of a dis­tressed devel­op­ment project owe a duty of care to sub­se­quent own­ers of the lots when completed?

Upon tak­ing pos­ses­sion and con­trol of an incom­plete dis­tressed devel­op­ment asset, a secured financier will more often than not look to…

In the News

Michael Byrnes is quot­ed in the arti­cle, Pro­posed non-com­pete ban could back­fire on work­ers, firm warns”, pub­lished in Lawyers Week­ly on 20 May 2025

Michael Byrnes is quot­ed in the arti­cle, ​“Pro­posed non-com­pete ban could back­fire on work­ers, firm warns”, pub­lished in Lawyers Week­ly…

Press Release | Swaab’s James Skel­ton Appoint­ed Chair of Glob­al Emerg­ing Lead­ers Advi­so­ry Board at Mer­i­tas AGM in Mex­i­co City

In this piv­otal lead­er­ship role, James will guide ini­tia­tives to strength­en rela­tion­ships among Emerg­ing Lead­ers across Mer­i­tas’ 175 glob­al mem­ber…

Press Release | New Part­ner Appoint­ment — Mark Glynn

With over two decades in the indus­try, Mark is a recog­nised front-end con­struc­tion lawyer spe­cial­ist with­in the build­ing and con­struc­tion indus­try. Mark…