Sophie Scamps (Mackellar, Independent) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Just this week, we've seen yet another example of people power in Mackellar. With nearly 50 hectares of beautiful bushland at Lizard Rock in Belrose under threat from an unsustainable housing development, the tireless efforts of several community groups, including local Indigenous people, have been rewarded. The New South Wales government has backflipped and promised to protect this precious bushland. At the 2022 federal election, the community told me that protecting Lizard Rock was a huge priority. Since then, I've worked hard to support these community groups in their fight to protect this beautiful bushland. Now, local community independent candidates in the New South Wales election have continued that work and made protection of Lizard Rock an election issue in New South Wales. However, we need a real solution to the protection of this precious bushland, not just an election commitment. My community of Mackellar wants to see an outcome where this land is protected from all future planning proposals, and the owners of the land, the Metropolitan Local Aboriginal Land Council, are fairly recompensed. People power and the power of community backed independents have forced the New South Wales government to come to the table. It's now crucial that both sides of politics in New South Wales go one step further and commit to turning the land at Lizard Rock into an Aboriginal owned national park, just like the MLALC proposed in 2013.