June 17, 2026 — 5:13pmGina Rinehart’s Hancock Prospecting has confirmed it is cutting jobs at its iron ore operations in Western Australia as the company looks to extend the life of its Roy Hill mine by a decade.Hancock Iron Ore produces about 70 million tonnes of ore annually.The move comes less than a year after the merger between Atlas Iron and Roy Hill to form Hancock Iron Ore.While Hancock Prospecting declined to comment on the number of workers impacted by the cuts, the Australian Financial Review has speculated it to be between 300 and 500, or as much as 10 per cent of its 5000-strong workforce.In a statement, a Hancock Iron Ore spokesperson said the company was working through the impact and would work with all workers affected.“Hancock Iron Ore has recently completed its annual life of mine planning, identifying opportunities to optimise how ore is mined, processed, and blended across its operations,” the spokesperson said.“We continuously look at optimising our mine plan and the latest iteration extends our life of mine by 10 years, maximising how much of the orebody we can turn into product and reduce the amount of waste we mine.“The result is that we need to reduce our mining activity at the Roy Hill mine while still maintaining our production rate above 63 million tonnes per annum for the Roy Hill system.”Federal Resources Minister Madeleine King said the news of the job cuts was a disappointing turn of events.“First and foremost, my thoughts and thoughts of the government are with the workers and their families who will be affected by these job losses,” she said.“It’s a deeply stressful time when people’s jobs are changed or lost in that fashion.“We would expect that Hancock Prospecting will ensure that those workers do receive and receive promptly all the entitlements that they have earned and truly deserve.”The merger between the Roy Hill and Atlas Iron was announced in July last year in a move that was expected to streamline operations across its Pilbara mines.Earlier today, Rinehart announced that Hancock Prospecting had committed to subscribe in a $20 million placement in rare earths hopeful St George Mining after it had called for firm commitments to raise $60 million to develop its Araxá project in Brazil.In a statement to the ASX, Rinehart said she was pleased to be able to support the junior explorer.“Hancock Prospecting is pleased to be able to support St George as the largest shareholder in the company with this additional investment and looks forward to seeing the Araxá project develop into an important part of the global critical minerals supply chain,” RInehart said.The placement gives Hancock Prospecting around a 10.5 per cent share in St George.Earlier this week Hancock Prospecting announced it had bought a $US1 billion ($1.4 billion) stake in SpaceX – the biggest investment outside iron ore in the private miner’s history.In a statement, Rinehart said she recognised the need for the west to keep leading the world in technology and innovation.“This is a significant investment for Hancock, and we are pleased to have received an allocation in what has been an extremely popular and oversubscribed IPO,” she said.“SpaceX is yet another clear example of why the world needs more enterprise, more builders and much less bureaucracy. It has delivered lower costs and greater capability by moving with the urgency and discipline that bureaucracy too often delays or prevents.”More:MiningPerthPilbaraGina RinehartHancock ProspectingFrom our partners