Mining (Validation and Amendment) Act 1986

In relation to the leases identified in the Schedule to this Part, it is hereby declared —

that each such lease —

was granted under the Mining Act 1904, which conferred a right to renew such a lease at the expiration of the term subject to the Acts and regulations relating to such leases in force at the time of the renewal; and

was deemed, by the operation of clause 2 of the transitional provisions in the Second Schedule to the Mining Act 1978, to be a mining lease granted under that Act subject to the terms and conditions on which the lease was formerly granted under the Mining Act 1904 (save that an application for renewal of a mining lease was, by the regulations then in force, required to be made during the final year of the term);

that having regard to —

the status of the lessee as an applicant, being the former holder of the mining tenement sought to be renewed;

the fact that had such an application been made at the time required by the regulations it would have had priority over any other application relating to the land affected;

regulation 104 of the Mining Regulations 1981 which conferred on the Minister a discretionary power to extend the time in which those regulations (as in force at the relevant time) required an act to be done by the applicant for, or holder of, a mining tenement; and

doubts which had arisen as to the applicability of the law in force from time to time to the respective leases and the requirements for the making of applications for their renewal,

that the acts of the Minister in —

extending the time within which the lessee named in the first column of the Schedule to this Part might apply for renewal of the lease (or of the deemed mining lease derived from that lease) identified in relation to that lessee in the second and third columns of that Schedule; and

granting to that lessee under the Mining Act 1978 a renewal of the term of that mining lease for a further term of 21 years following the expiry of the final year of the original term,

Where in relation to any of the leases identified in the Schedule to this Part —

a document setting out the provisions of the relevant lease was not issued by the Minister, or executed by the lessee, the Governor and the lessee being deemed pursuant to the Mining Act 1904 to have entered into the covenants and to be subject to the conditions prescribed in accordance with section 80 of that Act; or

an instrument setting out the terms and conditions applicable to such lease was not issued by the Minister, or executed by the lessee, in respect of a lease deemed to have been granted under the transitional provisions of the Mining Act 1978,

In relation to the lease granted under the Mining Act 1904, the mining lease deemed to have been granted consequent upon the transitional provisions of the Mining Act 1978, and the lease the term by way of renewal of which was ratified by subsection (1) (which together shall be taken to constitute a lease for a continuous term of years), as regards land to which this section applies —

the lessee shall be deemed during the term of that lease always to have had exclusive possession of the land to which the lease related or relates for the purposes of mining and the right to and property in any minerals mined, worked or found on or in that land; and

no action, claim, demand, appeal, review or other proceeding by a person other than the lessee lies, or shall be commenced or heard, before a warden or any court or tribunal —

in pursuance of any application or purported application by any person for a mining tenement other than that lease;

as to the purported right of any person other than the lessee to any mining tenement in that land or the property in any mineral mined, worked or found on or in that land; or

in respect of such a lease, or any matter relating to the grant of such a lease,

For the purposes of this section a reference to “the lessee” includes a reference to any person deriving title through a person who is or was the holder of the lease in question.

Where an application is made for a mining tenement but in respect of the whole or any part of the land to which the application relates —

a person who in relation to that land was formerly the lessee of a mining lease the term of which has expired, or is a person deriving title through such a former lessee, subsequently applies (in the manner prescribed for the purposes of section 78 notwithstanding that the application was not made during the final year of the term of that lease) for the renewal of that mining lease with effect from the expiry of the preceding term and the Minister, being satisfied that the requirements of that expired mining lease and of this Act in relation to that lease had been substantially observed (other than as to the timing of an application for renewal) and that the applicant has continued to observe those requirements as if the term of the lease had not expired, determines that the subsequent application for renewal of the expired lease should be approved and grants that renewal; or

the Minister is satisfied on reasonable grounds in the public interest that —

the land should not be disturbed; or

the application in question should not be granted,