Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Heritage Protection Act 1984 (Cth)
Notice of an application under s 10 of the Act for the protection of five areas located within the proposed Shenhua Watermark Coal Mine, Breeza, New South Wales
Invitation to make representations
I, Susan Phillips, hereby give notice as follows:
The Minister for the Environment, responsible for the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Heritage Protection Act 1984 (Cth) (the Act), has received an application made under section 10 of the Act seeking to protect five areas located within the proposed Shenhua Watermark Coal Mine, Breeza, New South Wales on the basis that they are areas of traditional significance to Aboriginal people, and appointed me to provide a report to him under section 10(1)(c) of the Act.
The applicants
The application is made by a group known as the Gomeroi Traditional Custodians.
The purpose of the application
The application seeks the preservation or protection of the area specified in the application, and further below, from injury or desecration. Section 10 of the Act enables the Minister to decide whether to make a declaration to preserve and protect the specified area, if the Minister is satisfied that the area is a significant Aboriginal area and is under threat of injury or desecration. In the Act, the term ‘significant Aboriginal area’ refers to an area that is of particular significance to Aboriginals in accordance with Aboriginal tradition. Section 3 of the Act provides definitions of ‘significant Aboriginal area’ and other relevant terms including ‘Aboriginal tradition’ and ‘injured or desecrated’. The area specified for protection, the claimed significance of the area, and the claimed nature of the threat of injury or desecration is set out below.
Matters the report is required to deal with
The Minister will consider my report under section 10 of the Act in relation to the area specified for protection before deciding whether to make a declaration under section 10 of the Act. Under section 10(4) of the Act, the report is required to deal with the following matters:
(a) the particular significance of the area to Aboriginals;
(b) the nature and extent of the threat of injury to, or desecration of, the area;
(c) the extent of the area that should be protected;
(d) the prohibitions and restrictions to be made with respect to the area;
(e) the effects the making of a declaration may have on the proprietary or pecuniary interests of persons other than the Aboriginal or Aboriginals on whose behalf the application is made;
(f) the duration of any declaration; and
(g) the extent to which the area is or may be protected by or under a law of the State of New South Wales, and the effectiveness of any remedies available under any such law.
The area sought to be protected (the 'specified area')
The applicant specifies five areas for which protection is sought on the basis of their traditional significance, located within the proposed Shenhua Watermark Coal Mine, Breeza, New South Wales. These are:
- Watermark Mountain – The entire mountain including a grinding groove complex;
- Two grinding groove complexes; and
- Two culturally modified trees.
In addition the applicants have requested that landscape viewing corridors from the summit of Watermark Mountain looking towards the culturally significant areas identified above must not be impacted by overburden from the mine works or other significant landscape changes.
Figure 1 Map showing the specified areas in the Watermark Coal Mine project
Claimed nature of particular significance
The Applicants indicate that the specified areas are of particular significance in accordance with Aboriginal tradition because they retain immeasurable historic, social and cultural value to Gomeroi People. These values are said to arise because:
- The areas are part of the Applicant’s traditional homelands (Country) and senior Elders and traditional owners strongly identify their connection to Country with the cultural practices and memories relating to the areas.
- There are continued historic and contemporary cultural practices relating to the areas, including hunting and gathering of medicinal plants and vegetation for bush tucker purposes and gathering of materials for cultural arts. Grinding grooves contained within the specified area have been attributed to the preparation of both food sources and stone artefacts.
- The interaction between connection to Country and cultural identity is highly important as traces and memories of the past contribute to maintaining distinctive Gomeroi and Aboriginal culture and spirituality, and cultural interaction with the landscape.
- The areas and the general region have a history of continued camping and social, cultural and spiritual importance and connection, while also having a number of relationships to dispossession and violence, including against women, children and families.
- The general region has a history of Gomeroi (also identified and referenced as Kamilaroi) resistance and organised frontier warfare.
- The general region has a history of massacres against Aboriginal people which requires acknowledgement, reconciliation and healing.
- Trees within the areas have cultural value because of their historic utility. For example, trees were used for water extraction and as food larders.
- There is evidence of multiple use, and ingenuity in the use, of resources for cultural purposes.
Claimed threat of injury or desecration
The application indicates that the potential injury or desecration is attributed to the development of the Watermark Coal Mine near Breeza, New South Wales, by Shenhua Watermark Pty Ltd. The application claims that the large scale open cut coal mining project will irreversibly desecrate or destroy the specified areas.
Invitation to make representations
Interested persons are invited to furnish representations in connection with my report to:
Susan Phillips
Barrister
13th Floor St James Hall
169 Phillip Street
Sydney NSW 2000
Telephone: (02) 9335 3063
Email: phillips@stjames.net.au
Representations must be made in writing by close of business by 11 October 2016 or within such further period as may be allowed. You should not send your representations directly to the Minister.
If you wish to claim confidentiality over any part of your representation, please identify why you are claiming confidentiality and how you want confidentiality to apply. Representations will be provided to the Minister for the Environment and Energy, and the Department of the Environment and Energy, along with the section 10 report. Representations, even those subject to confidentiality, may be disclosed where it is authorised or required by law, to meet procedural fairness requirements, and in response to a request by a House or Committee of the Parliament of the Commonwealth.