Junior miners welcomed Tony Abbott's $418 million election pledge, saying the incentive will help lessen the damage to exploration investment confidence caused by Labor's resource tax.

In a final push to secure support in the mining states of Western Australia and Queensland, Mr Abbott pledged in Perth a week before Saturday's election that a Coalition government would commit $418.3m to incentives for the resources sector. These include a $150m exploration development program beginning in 2011, which would be handed via tax credits to Australian resident shareholders.

Coalition's promise to back the sector would restore confidence in the industry and aid juniors secure finance, which companies had been struggling to get since the mining tax was announced, according to Simon Bennison, chief executive of the Association of Mining and Exploration Companies.

"Something has got to get capital flow back into the market and a lot of small exploration companies are really struggling at the moment," he said.

"So this sort of initiative is welcome, because it is on the back of what we have been trying to advocate for the last 10 years with a flow-through shares scheme."

"It is disappointing that this (Labor) government has broken promises to deliver on a flow-through shares scheme and now we have this mess of a tax," Mr Bennison said.

Kevin Rudd had pledged incentives for the resource sector during the last election campaign, but failed to deliver before he was ousted from leadership. Ms Gillard's talks with BHP Billiton, Rio Tinto and Xstrata to design the mineral resource rent tax did not recognize the earlier commitment.

Mr Abbott underscored a report issued last week that found Australia had plunged to 13th place in a survey of the safest countries for mining investment.

"Now it is safer to invest in Argentina, in Tanzania, in Zambia and Ghana and in Botswana than it is to invest in Australia," he said.

"This is Labor's legacy to the Australian mining industry."