It doesn't matter what the dictionary says it matters what the...

It doesn't matter what the dictionary says it matters what the legislation says. It is clear and unambiguous that if the purposes of the work are for the discovery of minerals then it is excluded.

Here are the facts:
MRD has claimed a total of $1.9 million in R & D grants over the 2015 and 2016 FY
The rebate is equal to 45 cents for every dollar spent on R & D so that means MRD has claimed it spent $4.2 million on R & D over this period.
The Annual Reports indicates that the total amount spent on exploration in that period is $4.2 million.
Therefore MRD has claimed that 100% of its exploration expenditure was R & D
It has not reported any R & D programmes to shareholders and yet claim to have spent $4.2 million on it
It has reported to the ASX that it spent the $4.2 million on mineral exploration.
Mineral exploration is excluded from the R & D grants.

My conclusion is that have potential exposure to $1.9 million tax liability regardless of whether they believe they have carried out R & D or not. They have claimed the R & D but reported it as mineral exploration.

You don't have to be Chartered Accountant to see that this may not end well. It's too bad that the auditors didn't do their job properly in the first place considering that they would never treat a cash deposit from the Government as a simple line item.