Leader of The Nationals David Littleproud has welcomed the Western Australian Government’s decision to scrap its controversial Cultural Heritage Laws.
WA Premier Roger Cook announced that the state government would restore its 1972 Act with some amendments, moving away from the Cultural Heritage Act, which came into effect on July 1.
Under the act, landholders with a property bigger than 1100 square metres would require cultural surveys for digging a hole more than 50 centimetres, or lifting more than 20 kilograms of dirt, with surveys, expected to cost between $120 to $160 an hour or $1200 a day, plus travel expenses.
The Premier’s decision comes after campaigning from The Nationals, including the recent Let Farmers Keep Farming event, which attracted hundreds of farmers to the regional WA town of Katanning.
Mr Littleproud said it was pleasing to see common sense prevail in WA but reaffirmed calls for the federal Labor Government to rule out repeating similar laws across the country at a federal level.
“This is a victory for the people of Western Australia who made their feelings clear during the Let Farmers Keep Farming event in Katanning, that they did not support this major government overreach,” Mr Littleproud said.
“It is pleasing to know that The Nationals played a major role in helping to achieve this outcome, but the job is not done yet. We must now get a guarantee from the federal Labor Government that it will not implement similar laws on a national scale.”
