Dirty Business

Mining made Australia rich. This is the story of the battles to share in the incredible wealth generated by a ‘boom’ industry and living with the ever-present threat of ‘bust’. From the gold rush of the 1850s to the present day, Money charts the key battles and dramatic turning points in the epic struggle to share in the vast mineral wealth of Australia.

Mining has always been about politics. Power charts how mining has been a crucible through which both the labour movement and big business have tried to influence, infiltrate and control governments – but also how mining helped give birth to Federation and women’s right to vote. Prime ministers from Billy Hughes through to Julia Gillard have, for better or worse, been locked in a rocky relationship with mining.

Mining has long had an impact on the land and the fate of its traditional owners: the First Australians. This story charts the struggle between mining and land rights. And it reveals how mining, while destroying and dispossessing, may yet be the best hope for the future of Indigenous Australians.