Indigenous Australian heritage on private land: an examination of guidance provided by local government authorities of NSW

ABSTRACT

Throughout Australia, large numbers of Indigenous Australian heritage sites, which exist on privately owned agricultural properties, have neither been recorded or documented and are not being actively managed. Anecdotally, some of this occurs in NSW due to uncertainties and fears held by the landholders. This paper examines the responses provided by several NSW Local Government Authorities (LGA) to a simulated enquiry by a landholder who may wish to remain anonymous but desires to obtain guidance on how to manage Indigenous Australian heritage sites on his/her property. The information (and forward links) provided on LGA websites was found to be generally poor. Direct enquiries were found to provide accurate information, but this entailed the loss of anonymity. Suggestions for improvement of the status quo are offered.

KEYWORDS:

• Indigenous Australian heritage
• heritage planning
• local government policy
• public information

Acknowledgements

We are indebted to David Gordon (Senior Heritage Information Officer [Aboriginal], NSW OEH) for the provision of the AHIMS summary data.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.