People across Australia would understand how bad it would feel if the government came in and tried to change things in their backyard, without their agreement.

We need time to have a good look at amendments being made to important laws that affect us, but the new Territory CLP government is rushing to put in new regulation without us being given time to have a proper say.

The decision to give substantial powers to a Territory Coordinator, allowing the sidestepping of important laws designed to protect cultural heritage, water, plants and animals, and the current proposal to rewrite the Territory's sacred sites laws, are good examples.

Unfortunately, this new government has a rush, rush, rush attitude.

Aboriginal people and the wider community have only been given a week to make a submission to a parliamentary scrutiny committee on sacred site law changes which came to light less than a fortnight ago.

If there are sacred sites the first priority for developers should be to protect them. If it was a church, no one would let it be knocked down.

Sacred sites are like an important dictionary book for us. They help educate us and explain our culture. We are responsible for looking after them.

But the CLP government is set on opening the Territory up for development like big farming, cotton and mining, where they have to clear everything off the land.

Knocking down trees for gas, cotton and farming will put our water at risk of contamination and flooding will wash away the land.

If there's a lot of development at the head of rivers, experience shows this will damage ecosystems and destroy rivers such as the Roper and the Daly. If this occurs, what will happen to our pastoral industry? Cattle drink water, not gas.

Water is life and we view waterways as sacred. If sacred sites are damaged, nature will make us pay for it, through damage to the country.

If the Territory government wants to make new laws, the Minister should drive out to where Traditional Owners live and sit down with them and ask them what they think, not fast-track things.

Rushing to change laws, without giving people time to understand them, is short-sighted and will only see bad outcomes for all Territorians.

Co-written by Chair of Nurrdalinji Aboriginal Corporation and Djingili Elder Samuel Janama Sandy and Aboriginal pastoralist Frank Shadforth, who owns and runs Seven Emu cattle station on the Savannah Way in the Gulf of Carpentaria.

Samuel Janama Sandy and Frank Shadforth, National Indigenous Times, April 4, 2025