Aboriginal heritage committee reversed decision to knock back Roe Highway works, WA Parliament told

source: abc news

Aboriginal heritage committee reversed decision to
knock back Roe Highway works, WA Parliament told

A controversial Perth highway extension project was initially knocked back by a committee set up to assess whether Aboriginal cultural sites would be disturbed, it has been revealed.

The extension of Roe Highway from its current Kwinana Freeway terminus to Stock Road is part of a wider plan to construct the $1.6 billion Perth Freight Link, which the WA Government says will remove up to 5,000 trucks a day from Perth's other roadways transporting goods to the Fremantle port.

Aboriginal Affairs Minister Peter Collier confirmed in State Parliament that the Aboriginal Cultural Material Committee initially recommended heritage approval not be granted for the Roe Highway Stage 8 works.

The Department of Aboriginal Affairs committee scrutinised construction of the highway extension because it runs partly through an area sacred to Indigenous people.

"The Committee ... resolved to recommend to the Minister for Indigenous Affairs that consent not be granted based on the ethnographic significance of the sites the subject of the notice and the objections to the Purpose raised by the majority of Aboriginal [sic] consulted," the committee said in the minutes of its initial 2013 decision, released to Parliament.

But that decision was revisited in June 2015, with the committee recommending that conditional consent be granted.

"The applicant has indicated that the purpose will be designed and constructed in a manner to minimise the road footprint and impact on Aboriginal sites and places," the committee later said.

The route runs through the North Lake and Bibra Lake region, which is considered by Indigenous people to be sacred because of the legend of a giant serpent called Waugul.

Mr Collier granted Aboriginal heritage approval for the project, saying extensive consultation was conducted and arguing the importance and significance of the area will not be disturbed any more than had already occurred.

He told Parliament it was appropriate for the committee to re-consider the matter, because he had been prevented from assessing it until this year while environmental approval was pending, and significant time had passed since the 2013 assessment.

The Minister also said new information about the "archaeological heritage places on the land" had been received for the second consideration.

But Greens MLC Lynn MacLaren described the sequence of events as deeply concerning, and said an investigation was needed to clear up several aspects.

"The fact that an archaeological survey was ordered by the department between 2013 and 2015 smacks of the department trying to shop around for a different outcome, which is what they eventually got," Ms MacLaren said.

"Clearly Aboriginal heritage in this area is significant and important and should be respected over and above any other values, and our system of heritage protection has failed."

Here is the link to the original news article from ABC NEWS