A local Indigenous elder says she was pressured by the Federal Department of the Environment to minimise her claim to protect an Indigenous burial site from mining company Boral.

Indigenous elders from around the Illawarra and activist groups like the Friends of Minnamurra River have been campaigning since 2020 to put a stop to the Boral sand mine at Dunmore, which began dredging the site in October 2023 despite at least four pending applications to permanently protect the site under the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Heritage Protection Act (ATSIHP). The NSW Independent Planning Commission determined in November 2020 that it is unlikely the 1818 Minnamurra Massacre took place on the dredging site, though numerous Indigenous leaders and the community heavily dispute this determination.

In 2021, Aunty Sharralyn Robinson was one of the Indigenous leaders from the Illawarra to lodge an application to protect the area under the ATSIHP Act with the Department of Agriculture, Water and the Environment under Minister Sussan Ley from the Liberal Party.

In an email response to her application shared with The Bugle, the Department pressured Aunty Sharralyn to reduce the scope of her application to a “smaller revised specified area.”

She was told she needed to respond “by lunchtime tomorrow” as Boral was “keen to recommence as soon as possible” with dredging the massacre site.

“As you may be aware, Boral has suspended its operations in Stages 5A and 5B voluntarily, since they learnt of your applications, but we have no power to compel them to stand down while the minister considers your applications and they are keen to recommence as soon as possible,” the email stated.

Aunty Sharralyn refused to compromise her history.

She wrote back to the Department, saying:

“It disturbs me that we must take a journey, one of justifying where our Ancestors walked, gathered, and performed Ceremony. When in this Country is our word going to be enough, we have identified this place as a significant site. Yet Boral questions our word. As an Aboriginal Elder, I ask the Minister to implement the legislation that is in place to protect our sites, our burial places.”

Speaking to The Bugle, Aunty Sharralyn said she couldn’t understand why the Minister for the Environment Tanya Plibersek was dragging her feet on making a decision on the four applications under the ATSIHP when they were lodged more than two years ago.

“Approximately 15,000 artefacts have been taken from Country out there. What more evidence do you need to prove that this is a site of significance, that our people walked and worked there and gathered there?” said Aunty Sharralyn.

“The Minister came back and said there was not enough evidence to prove this is a significant area. Well let me tell the Minister and let me tell this government, both governments and anyone in the political field, I don’t care what party you belong to, let me make it quite clear to you now as an elder from this community, all country is significant to our people. But we have to go down the journey of proving what is ‘high, low and medium.’ We don’t rank our Country, but we will uphold and go by your policy procedure and legislation and [say] “OK, this area is of high significance”. The proof is in the pudding, have a look at the artefacts, it’s a massacre site.”

“We have to prove the possibility or probability that there are burials there. How dare anyone ask us to dig up our ancestors to prove they’re there. How dare they?”

In response to The Bugle’s questions as to why Boral is allowed to continue its operations while multiple ATSIHP applications are being processed, the Department only stated that it is not appropriate to comment on pending applications.

A Department spokesperson also stated that there are no statutory timeframes that ATSIHP Act applications must be processed, despite being lodged more than two years ago. These applications can take a minimum of six-to-nine months to process, and given the lifespan of Boral’s sand pit is only nine months, the site could be completely destroyed before the Department makes a determination on the multiple ATSIHP Act Applications.

The Bugle understands another application to protect the area under the ATSIHP act was lodged in late November 2023, but the applicant’s identity is yet to be revealed.

This story was updated at 6:37pm 22 December 2023 to note that the NSW Independent Planning Commission determined in November 2020 that it is unlikely the 1818 Minnamurra Massacre took place on the dredging site. This is heavily disputed by Indigenous leaders and residents of the community.

The original article also stated that Boral claims the littoral rainforest does not exist on the site. Boral's planning documents state that the littoral rainforest is generally located at least 100 metres away from the 5B dredge site, except for a very small section. We apologise for the error.