Rio Tinto’s destruction of the 46,000 year-old Juukan Gorge cave and rock shelters in the Pilbara should be the catalyst for the revamp of Western Australia’s dated heritage laws proposed by the nation’s first Indigenous Treasurer, Ben Wyatt.

Mr Wyatt’s plan involves narrowing the definition of Indigenous heritage sites to better protect sites of great cultural or spiritual importance to Indigenous people, as opposed to sites of archaeological significance.