Move to create Francois Peron national park at Shark Bay

Environment Minister Jim McGinty has moved in State Parliament to create a new 53,500-hectare national park at Shark Bay. 

Mr McGinty today gave notice of the formation of the Francois Peron National Park - to be located at the northern end of the Peron Peninsula. 

"The park will protect rare wildlife, spectacular coastal scenery and arid shrublands - while at the same time offering visitors a wilderness experience," he said. 

"The proposed park's south-western boundary is only a few minutes drive from Denham and is becoming more and more popular with visitors. 

"For this reason, it is important that the area is properly managed." 

Mr McGinty said the park would be named after the French naturalist Francois Peron, who visited Shark Bay with the 'Geographe' expedition in 1801 and 1803. 

The park is the ninth to be created since 1983.

"The environmental values of Shark Bay - of which the park forms a part - are already well-known and have resulted in the region's inclusion in the World Heritage List," Mr McGinty said.

He said the area covered by the park had been operated as a pastoral lease from the late 1880s until its purchase by the State Government in 1990. 

"The land was acquired because of its outstanding conservation values," the Minister said. 

"The part of the park known as Big Lagoon is an important fish breeding ground and the spectacular red cliffs of Cape Peron are a major attraction with dolphins, dugongs, turtles and manta rays often seen in the ocean below. 

"A rare bird, the thick-billed grasswren, is restricted to a small area that includes the park. 

"The area is also the home of a diverse range of reptiles and its undulating sandy plains are covered in flora such as the Shark Bay daisy and Dampiera - a blue flowering plant."

Mr McGinty said the Department of Conservation and Land Management also planned to reintroduce a variety of endangered mammal species into the park. 

"Because the Peron Peninsula is almost an island, being connected to the mainland at the narrow Tailefer Isthmus, it will be sealed with a vermin-proof fence and baited to reduce fox and rabbit numbers," he said.

Mr McGinty said the creation of the Francois Peron National Park - the sixty-first in Western Australia - was an excellent example of the Lawrence Government's commitment to conservation and the environment.