![]() ![]() ![]() “There wouldn’t be a grower in the state that doesn’t want to protect Aboriginal cultural heritage,” he said. The state government has defended the changes, saying it comes after years of “extensive consultation”.īut WA Farmers president John Hassell said landowners feared the “open-ended” system could be abused. Penalties for damaging a cultural heritage site range from $25,000 to $1 million for individuals and $250,000 to $10 million for corporations, as well as jail time. Under a complex three-tiered system, anyone on more than 1100 square metres of land will be required to apply for a permit from their LACHS before carrying out certain activities, such as digging fences, planting trees or clearing tracks. The key change under the new Act is the establishment of Local Aboriginal Cultural Heritage Services, or LACHS, which will be responsible for determining whether an activity will cause “harm” to cultural heritage. Locals have warned that the Aboriginal Cultural Heritage Act 2021, which comes into effect on July 1, could bring economic activity to a halt while empowering a vast new layer of bureaucracy to “hold businesses to ransom” with costly red tape. Farmers in Western Australia are furious about sweeping new cultural heritage laws that will require them to pay an Aboriginal consultant up to $160 an hour to obtain permits to do anything on their land that might disturb more than 50 centimetres of soil.
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