A Perth Aboriginal Elder Albert Corunna and other local Nyoongar Elders fear for the destruction of a cultural heritage site complex at Red Hill in the Darling Range, north-east of Perth. Global German-based quarrying giant Hanson Construction Materials Pty Ltd (Heidelberg Cement) has recently lodged a Section 18 application with the Department of Indigenous Affairs to seek approval to destroy the sites.

The site complex includes archaeological and ethnographic sites, including the Red Hill campsite, rockshelters, grinding stones, ochre deposits, petroglyphs, ceremonial sites, Susannah Brook and its tributaries and spiritual Dreaming sites. At the centre is the Guardian Ancestral Owl Stone Boyay Gogomat which is about 20 metres high and made up of three large balancing stones in the shape of an owl.

This area is also home to rare and significant plants and animals, such as carpet snakes, eagles and chuditch. The water of the brook is the purest water flowing into the Swan River.

In an interview with the West Australian newspaper (Friday October 30, 2009) Mr Albert Corunna called on the Indigenous Affairs Minister Dr Kim Hames to reject the application.

‘We don’t want to take the risk with this ancient stone because it’s so vital to our existence in this world, to our identity, to our Aboriginal culture and we want it there,” Mr Corunna said. “I think it’s in the public interest that this stays because the wider community will also benefit from this.”