Federal Environment Minister Murray Watt has rejected two urgent First Nations appeals aimed at stopping work linked to the planned Victoria Park Brisbane stadium from starting on Monday. His decision clears the immediate path for construction preparations at the site, where the Games Independent Infrastructure and Co-ordination Authority is due to take ownership of the land.
The appeals were lodged under section 9 of the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Heritage Protection Act and sought to halt work on the proposed 65,000-seat stadium and National Aquatics Centre before it began. Watt said he had considered whether a significant Aboriginal area was under serious and imminent threat of injury or desecration, but was unable to be satisfied that either application met the legal test for a declaration.
That decision landed on Sunday afternoon, just as more than 1000 people gathered at Victoria Park for one of the biggest anti-stadium protests yet held at the site. Opponents had turned out for a last-ditch rally on the final day before the park was closed to the public, demanding that work be stopped at least until separate section 10 applications were decided.
Gaja Kerry Charlton, an elder who made one of those section 10 applications, welcomed protesters to Barrambin and said the message needed to be heard beyond Brisbane. “We wanted to give that message to the government, to the nation, to the world, that this action is deeply wounding us and many different First Nations people here on Yagara Country,” she said.
Watt still has four section 10 applications under consideration, along with another section 9 application. Those outstanding cases remain the only immediate legal path that could still alter or delay the project, even after Sunday’s ruling cleared the way for Monday’s handover of the land. The site has become the flashpoint in the Brisbane 2032 Olympic and Paralympic Games stadium plan, and the next decision from Canberra may decide whether the fight over Victoria Park Brisbane ends there or moves into a longer legal battle.
