Latest news with #Mabo
West Australian
26-05-2025
- Politics
- West Australian
Editorial: A reconciled Australia is a unified Australia
Along Australia's long path towards reconciliation, we've seen many milestones. Some have had immediate and lasting legal consequences — the 1967 referendum to include Indigenous Australians in official population counts and the High Court's 1992 Mabo decision which finally extinguished the damaging myth of terra nullius among them. Then there are the milestones the importance of which were rooted in their symbolism — Charles Perkins' Freedom Rides in 1965, the presentation of the Barunga Statement to then prime minister Bob Hawke in 1988, Kevin Rudd's Apology to the Stolen Generations in 2008. We wouldn't have achieved those 'practical' milestones if we didn't also see the 'symbolic' ones also. The two categories are indivisible, and both are integral if we are to achieve the long-held goal of a reconciled Australia. Rightly, when we talk about reconciliation, much of our focus is on tangible outcomes. And so it should be. It is a terrible truth that Indigenous Australians can expect to live significantly shorter lives than their non-Indigenous peers. They have fewer economic and educational opportunities. These are failures we must work hard to address with practical policies and public investment. But it will take more than money to achieve a truly reconciled Australia — one in which Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanders can look forward to the same advantages as the rest of the population and in which Indigenous culture is respected and championed. In both of these goals we have made significant progress in decades past. However, addressing the impacts of 200 years of colonialism isn't an easy or quick task. The road to reconciliation isn't linear, and it's rarely smooth. The defeat of the Voice referendum was a blow to many Indigenous Australians who had hoped it would serve as a pivotal point in race relations. That wasn't to be. But the failure of the referendum shouldn't be read as proof Australians don't want reconciliation. According to the 2024 Australian Reconciliation Barometer, 85 per cent of Australians believe the relationship between Indigenous and non-Indigenous Australians is important for our nation. And 80 per cent say that it is important to learn about the issues brought by European colonisation. That's important, because without understanding the causes of Indigenous disadvantage, we cannot hope to achieve meaningful change. Along with the tragic and the uncomfortable, we must also acknowledge the good. The history of Aboriginal Australia is a story of dispossession and disadvantage. It's also a story of survival and of a culture so rich and strong it has endured for 65,000 years. It's important that we recognise both aspects to achieve a reconciled, unified Australia
The Age
13-05-2025
- Business
- The Age
‘People around me started sprinting': the Aussie star who unwittingly became part of history
In other puff of white smoke news, Tennis Australia announced that Chris Harrop a 'lifelong tennis fan and social player … (and) advisory partner for global strategy consulting firm Bain & Company' would replace ex-Virgin boss Jayne Hrdlicka as chair of Tennis Australia. Hrdlicka's departure was something that CBD foretold back in October, when TA confirmed to us that her third term on the board would expire at the end of this year. Last month, the exec landed the top job at Dan Murphy's owner Endeavour, but no doubt the tennis gig was her favouritest thing. It allowed Hrdlicka to hold court at O, the lavish Rod Laver Arena Tennis Australia hospitality suites, where tennis legends and sporting, political, business and celebrity creatures enjoyed multi-course dinners before a door at the back of the vast suite opened straight out onto the best seats in the stadium just in time for the match of the day. For a tennis tragic like Hrdlicka, it's a lot to give up WhatAppened? The electoral winds of change have blasted through the Liberal Party, which on Tuesday, made Sussan Ley its first female leader. Although the ABC news chyron that accompanied her debut press conference was a taste of the forces she's up against. 'Ley: I will be here in three years,' it read. That's a vote of confidence! It took the Liberals long enough to enter the 21st century (many are saying they're not there yet). It took Ley's staffers a matter of minutes to purge the remnants of the old leader's office. Ley had barely left the party room on Tuesday when her media adviser, Liam Jones, quickly booted Peter Dutton 's old top spinners, Nicole Chant and Adrian Barrett, from a Coalition Campaign HQ WhatsApp group the party had used during the election to send announcements to journalists. Also gone in a flash: John Hulin, chief of staff to new deputy leader Ted O'Brien. The group chat was quickly renamed 'LOTO Ley – Coord'. CBD was told the whole change was simply a necessary matter of logistics. Whatever the motivations, a fitting symbol of changing times in the Liberal camp. More Mabo trouble Multinational mining company Rio Tinto's bankrolling of the Mabo Centre, a native title initiative at the University of Melbourne, hasn't gone down well with some family members of its namesake, pioneering Indigenous land rights campaigner Eddie Mabo. As CBD reported recently, six of Mabo's grandchildren penned a scathing open letter claiming their grandfather would be 'appalled' at the centre taking money from the company which received global condemnation for its destruction of ancient Indigenous rock sites at Juukan Gorge in 2020. The letter demanded the centre cut ties with Rio. Loading 'Anything less is a betrayal,' they wrote. In response, the centre told us the name had been gifted by members of the Mabo family following extensive engagement. But this week, Mabo granddaughter Boneta-Rie Mabo, one of the authors of the original letter, claimed that some hadn't been consulted. 'My father, Eddie Mabo Jr — the eldest son of Eddie Koiki Mabo and the most senior Mabo family member —didn't even know the Mabo Centre existed until I asked him about it after its launch,' she wrote in an article on IndigenousX. In response, the university sent us the same statement it provided a month ago, telling CBD it stood by the response. 'The centre's name was gifted by senior members of the Mabo family following extensive engagement with them,' the university said. 'The senior Mabo family members were aware of the investment by Rio Tinto ahead of the decision to gift the name.' Clearly, not everyone was. Hanging on the telephone We just have space to note this dispatch from the Geelong Advertiser, where a member of its political team tried for days and days to connect with Liberal senator Sarah Henderson. And lo, on Thursday morning a precious callback. But as the Addy recorded: 'Believing she had called her media adviser and not our intrepid reporter, Henderson launched into an almost minute-long monologue that detailed our efforts to contact her and the reasons why. 'Finally, the spin doctor was asked to convey her unwillingness to talk, for the time being at least. 'Seconds of silence were broken when our correspondent informed the hard-working senator that she had, in fact, called the subject of her spiel. ''Oh sorry, I rang the wrong person,' Henderson responded awkwardly.
The Guardian
14-03-2025
- Politics
- The Guardian
High court native title ruling may affect compensation claims nationwide, experts say
A high court decision on native title has the potential to be as significant as the Mabo case and influence even the land beneath Parliament House, experts say. The court dismissed a commonwealth appeal on Wednesday over whether it may be liable for up to $700m in compensation for bauxite mining at Gove in north-east Arnhem Land. The late Gumatj leader Dr Yunupingu, a renowned land rights activist, originally brought the case in 2019 alongside an application for native title on behalf of his people. In May 2023, the federal court found native title rights and interests are property rights, and their extinguishment is an acquisition and therefore must be made under 'just terms'. This applied to land in the Northern Territory, but there were similarities with land in the ACT. The federal court found Gumatj land was not acquired 'on just terms' before being leased to the Swiss-Australian mining consortium Nabalco in 1968. In its decision on Wednesday, the high court upheld the federal court's decision. 'Native title recognises that, according to their laws and customs, Indigenous Australians have a connection with country,' the judgment read. 'It is a connection which existed and persisted before and beyond settlement, before and beyond the assertion of sovereignty and before and beyond federation. 'It is older and deeper than the constitution.' Dr Ed Wensing, an honorary research fellow at the Australian National University's Centre for Aboriginal Economic Policy Research, said 'this decision is like Mabo 2 in many respects'. The 1992 high court decision established the principle of native title in common law. Sign up for Guardian Australia's breaking news email 'This will have long-term ramifications,' Wensing said. 'The effect of this decision, strictly speaking, is only to the NT and most likely the ACT, but will this case also affect other compensation cases in other places all over the country? Most probably.' However, Wensing said the exact ramifications could take years to emerge. Even the claim in the Yunupingu matter may take a decade to resolve, he said. Greg McIntyre SC, who was the lead solicitor in the Mabo case and is a former president of the Law Council of Australia, told Guardian Australia that the decision strengthened native title and put to rest fears that land rights principles underpinning the legislation could be unpicked or dismantled. 'There have been statements in the high court and, to a lesser extent, taken on by federal courts, saying that native title was fragile and capable of being easily turned or extinguished,' he said. 'This now stops that discussion.' Native title can be granted on freehold land or land covered by a pastoral lease, but mining leases are taken to at least partially extinguish native title. Many mining leases predate the Native Title Act. Sign up to Breaking News Australia Get the most important news as it breaks after newsletter promotion McIntyre said the decision that lands must be acquired on 'just terms' has significant implications that could mean governments may be liable for higher compensation claims. In the Northern Territory, he said, that window for compensation could date back to 1903. 'So what we're looking at is that it's potentially going to result in larger quantities of compensation,' he said. McIntyre said Wednesday's decision was the result of a hard-fought battle waged over decades by the Gumatj people. 'They've had the longest fight in the sense that they went to the Northern Territory supreme court in the late 60s. They presented their bark petitions to the parliament,' he said. McIntyre said while the decision specifically concerned the NT, it could have implications for the ACT. 'Obviously, the ACT hasn't always been there,' he said. 'It only came into existence after federation. So it'll be from the time the ACT was established that this decision [will have effect] – that's when you start calculating your compensation.' The Northern Land Council has several current native title matters before the federal court, but declined to comment this week about the high court's finding. The attorney general, Mark Dreyfus, said in a statement on Wednesday that complex issues remained in the case. 'The commonwealth appealed to the high court to settle critical constitutional issues in this case,' he said. 'This decision clarifies the constitution's application to those issues for parties to this and future matters. 'While the high court has considered significant aspects of this matter, the case will now return to the federal court to resolve other remaining complex issues.'
