Developer spends £50K on tin mine

The RDA wants to use the land for housing and leisure

Owners of a disused Cornish tin mine say they have invested £50,000 in equipment to get it started again.

Baseresult Holdings Limited says it wants to reopen South Crofty tin mine near Redruth and rising tin prices make it financially viable.

But the firm is fighting opposition from the South West Regional Development Agency (RDA).

The RDA said last year it would compulsorily purchase the land for leisure, industrial and housing use.

We are very serious about bringing the mine back to full production Kevin Williams, Baseresult

South Crofty, the last working tin mine in Europe, was closed in 1998 and bought in 2001 by mining firm Baseresult.

According to Baseresult, it can have the mine up and running in two to four years.

Managing director Kevin Williams said: "We have bought an underground loader to clear rocks from drilling and blasting.

"We are currently using it to bring rocks up to the surface which shows we are very serious about bringing the mine back to full production, which has always been our aim."

Mining tradition

He said more equipment was on the way and Baseresult hoped to employ 200 people.

When South Crofty closed it ended a 3,000-year-old tin mining tradition in Cornwall.

But the RDA and other regeneration agencies including the Camborne, Pool and Redruth Urban Regeneration Company suggested tin mining was not the sort of industry a modern county needed.

The RDA says its plans would create up to 2,000 new jobs and 600 new homes.