Native Title

Native Title

Native title decisions regarding Indigenous land claims in Australia have been and still are very contentious issues. Native title is the term used by Australia’s high court to describe the common law interests in land of Indigenous Australian people. It wasn’t until a decision in the high court in 1992 that the longstanding legal fiction that the continent was terra nullius – a land belonging to no one was reversed (Butt, 1996:22). For the first time, the common law rights of Australia’s indigenous people in land were documented. Indigenous Australians who have maintained a continuing connection with their lands or waters in accordance with their traditions hold native title. Native title may be extinguished by valid grants of land or water to people other than Native titleholders. (ATSIC, 1997:15) There is an obligation for the commonwealth or state to provide compensation on “just terms” to such people if Native title rights have been lost or exting...