RESOURCES Minister Martin Ferguson decided it was finally time to admit Labor got it wrong on the super-profits tax.

This came after an hour of copping flak from West Australian mine bosses during a fiery meeting in Perth yesterday.

"I think we can agree that with any proposed changes like this in the future, we must make sure there's a detailed process of consultation," he said with a wry smile, winning applause from some of the 150 mining executives at the breakfast gathering.

But that was about all they could agree on.

The mid-tier and small mining companies remain angry that the Labor government announced the resource super-profits tax in May without any consultation.

In some cases, as chief executives grabbed the microphone to tell Mr Ferguson yesterday, the RSPT had halved their company share prices and caused debt to swell and equity investments to dry up.

As Sandfire Resources chief executive Karl Simich put it, the process was "an absolute debacle".

The Perth mining bosses are equally upset that the Gillard government announced the new minerals resource rent tax last week after talking only to industry giants such as BHP Billiton, Rio Tinto and Xstrata.

Mr Ferguson did his best to appease the angry bosses during the breakfast meeting and earlier talks that began at 6.45am, promising to look at the prospect of excluding the fledgling magnetite sector from the MRRT and introducing incentives for minerals exploration companies.

The Resources Minister described the low-grade magnetite sector as a priority of the committee to handle the tax that will be headed by former BHP Billiton chairman Don Argus.

Mr Ferguson said he might consider reintroducing the $1.1 billion exploration rebate that was included in the RSPT but axed from last week's package, blaming the industry for its removal.

"Industry was more concerned with killing the whole tax, not trying to save the resources exploration rebate," he said.

Gindalbie Metals chief executive Garrett Dixon welcomed Mr Ferguson's pledge to consider excluding magnetite from the MRRT. "It's a low-value product so it should be exempt," he said.

Atlas Iron chief executive David Flanagan called on the government to increase the threshold at which the tax would be paid from $50 million to $100m.

Fortescue Metals Group magnate Andrew Forrest argued that the plan to apply the new tax when a company's returns exceeded the long-term bond rate plus 7 per cent was unfair to the developing mining sector.

"Our cost of capital as a developer is much higher," he said.

Source: The Australian