By Stephen Robson
PERTH — "This must be the largest record of the views of Aboriginal people and Torres Strait Islanders which has been made", commented Greens (WA) Senator Christabel Chamarette to Green Left Weekly.
The Senate's select committee on the Land Fund Bill heard from 244 witnesses around Australia during a 10-day period in January. Its report was tabled on February 9.
Chaired by Senator Ian Campbell (Liberal), the all-party committee included Chamarette, Liberals Judith Troeth and Chris Ellison, Labor's Barney Cooney and Margaret Reynolds, and Meg Lees from the Australian Democrats.
Reflecting Labor and Australian Democrat opposition to the establishment of the committee, there was a majority report and two minority reports, one by Cooney, Reynolds and Lees and a second by Barney Cooney.
"The government senators and the Democrats seem to have taken the role of defending the government bill without amendment", Chamarette explained.
The Keating government's 1993 Native Title Bill was touted by Labor as path-breaking legislation. The reality is far different. It makes significant compromises with both mining and pastoral interests, and only a small minority of Aborigines will benefit from the legislation.
The bill was projected as meeting the needs of those Aborigines who had been dispossessed of their land, and hence were unlikely to benefit from the Mabo decision.
Following the introduction of the Indigenous Land Corporation and Land Fund bill to the House of Representatives in October, the Greens (WA) indicated their opposition to the bill because it did not give justice to Aboriginal people.
The money allocated will go only a limited way towards meeting the land ownership needs of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanders. Furthermore, the principles involved in the establishment of the land fund reflected Labor's paternalistic approach.
The Senate select committee findings confirm this view. The issue of compensation was raised by many witnesses, making clear "their view that the majority of indigenous people do not regard the government's response to the High Court ruling on Mabo (as expressed in the Native Title Act, the Land Fund Bill and the projected social justice package) as an adequate means of redressing dispossession". Most of the witnesses criticised the amount of money allocated to the land fund as inadequate.
Amendments
When the bill reached the Senate, it was subject to substantial amendment, with the Liberals, Nationals and Greens (WA) succeeding in modifying the legislation.
Thirty-two amendments were considered non-contentious by the government, but 45 others were opposed by the government. It threatened to withdraw the amended bill and resubmit the original.
Labor identified the support from the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Commission (ATSIC) for the bill as support from the communities. Prime Minister Keating told the House of Representatives on August 30 that "the bill before the House is the product of wide-ranging consultation".
Over the opposition of Labor and the Democrats, the select committee was established at the end of November to determine whether the amendments would aid in assisting Aboriginal persons and Torres Strait Islanders "who will be unable to assert native title rights and interests to acquire land and manage it effectively".
Conclusions
Following the hearings, the select committee concluded that the bulk of the 45 amendments Labor objected to had the effect of improving the bill.
The committee reaffirmed amendments that would:
- broaden the categories of permissible owners from Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander corporations to include individuals and trustees;
- require the Indigenous Land Corporation to grant the land to those on whose behalf it had acquired the land;
- recognise the gaining of land may lead to benefits in the areas of health, housing, education or culture;
- recognise that the ILC is not a body to accumulate land holdings but to act for the indigenous people;
- require the ILC to report to the Aboriginal Affairs minister where matters of confidentiality or sacredness are involved;
- require the ILC to consult with those for whom the land was acquired;
- allow land-holders to dispose of land without consulting the ILC.
- make the ATSIC representative on the ILC board an elected commissioner rather than the government-appointed chairperson;
- provide broad representation on the ILC board, including elected women's representatives as well as representatives from the states and territories;
- require the Land Fund annual report to provide information requested by parliament;
- provide for triennial reviews of ILC operations;.
A number of changes to the amendments were proposed, including meeting administrative expenses from a separate fund, broadening the consultation by the ILC with traditional owners, establishing an ILC advisory council of 12-15 members and deleting the reference to the "most severely dispossessed".
The committee concluded that some sense of priority was needed and proposed instead to "incorporate the principle that those who suffer most disadvantage in access to land receive priority."
The committee also concluded that the government had "failed to consult adequately with the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people" and that ATSIC has "clearly not consulted widely or adequately with either its own network of Regional Councils, or with the 'grass-roots' indigenous people".
Next steps
The filing of minority reports by Labor and Democrat representatives on the committee is an indication that the government will reject its findings.
It seems likely that both Labor and the Democrats will continue to push for a bill that meets the needs of only a small number of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people.
The Liberals have indicated that they don't want the legislation to become a trigger for a double dissolution. This probably means they will vote with the government.
The Greens (WA) have consistently maintained their opposition to the legislation, since despite the amendments, it fails to meet the needs of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanders.