Boral Constructions has pled guilty in a Hobart court to interfering with Aboriginal relics at a southern Tasmanian site.
The case was brought after court documents filed in 2021 by the then Department of Primary Industries, Parks, Water and Environment alleged Boral interfered with a "scatter of stone tool artefacts" without holding a permit to do so at a Bridgewater address in March 2018.
After years of waiting, the construction materials company appeared in the Hobart Magistrates Court for a hearing relating to 23 original charges on Wednesday.
Previous to the hearing, Boral had attempted to have all charges overturned in 2022 through a legal technicality before maintaining its not guilty plea in 2023.
On Wednesday, crown prosecutor Emily Bill told Magistrate Chris Webster all but two counts of interfering with a relic would be dropped, with the prosecution tendering no evidence.
The two remaining charges related to the excavation of the top layer of soil at the 1 Parkholme Drive Bridgewater address to test for the presence of sand.
Boral's lawyer, Chris Gunson SC, said the company would plead guilty to two remaining charges after a "position had been reached that seemed fair".
The company's subsidiary, Boral Construction Materials, owns a mining lease for the Bridgewater site which was excavated by Boral employees in 2018.
Unearthed through the excavation were Aboriginal relics including a mudstone notched scraper, banded hornfels scraper and mudstone blade.
The prosecution said the excavation area and most of the Boral site had been "identified by multiple consultants as highly significant and is preserved on the Aboriginal Heritage Register".
"Expert Aboriginal assessment was not undertaken of the sand mining site until 2019 and it was undertaken after Aboriginal Heritage Tasmania had already notified Boral of the presence of relics at their site," Ms Bill said, The Mercury reports.
"The defendant used an old Aboriginal Heritage report from 2009, which showed areas of significance in the area surrounding the site, but not specifically of the site owned by Boral.
"This report indicated several 'highly significant' sites around the Parkholme Drive property, but not any areas of significance in those boundaries."
In response, Mr Gunson disputed the relics were 'highly significant', saying Boral proceeded with excavation testing based on the 2009 report in an "administrative error".
"The case is largely an administrative error in the sense that Boral received a copy of the 2009 report that did not record in the report the presence of scatter which it is now charged with interfering with," he said, as reported by The Mercury.
"Prosecution has said this is a 'highly significant' site but hasn't said why it is highly significant within the meaning of the Aboriginal Heritage Act."
Mr Gunson said Boral's "ultimate error was not doing another search of the Aboriginal Heritage Tasmania Register" for an updated report.
Boral executives including National Aboriginal Affairs Manager, Vince Scarcella, and General Counsel and Company Secretary, Jean-Paul Wallace, appeared in court for the hearing.
