What is native title?
The Native Title Act 1993 (Cth) (NTA) is a law passed by the Australian Parliament that recognises the rights and interests of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people in land and waters according to their traditional laws and customs.
History of the Native Title Act
For an interactive timeline please click here.
Native title was first recognised in Australian law following a claim lodged in 1982 with the High Court of Australia by a group of Meriam people from the Eastern Torres Strait. They sought recognition of their peoples’ occupation and exclusive possession of Mer (Murray Island) according to their own laws and customs since before British sovereignty. Eddie Koiki Mabo was the first named plaintiff in the case, and was joined by Meriam plaintiffs David Passi, Sam Passi, Celuia Mapoo Salee and James Rice. Ten years after the claim was lodged, in 1992, the High Court upheld the claim by the Mabo plaintiffs. The landmark judgement in Mabo v Queensland (No 2) (1992) 175 CLR 1 (Mabo), acknowledged the pre-existing native title rights and interests of the Meriam people in Murray Island.
The judgements of the High Court in Mabo overturned the legal fiction of terra nullius (land belonging to no one), and acknowledged that Indigenous people have lived in Australia for many thousands of years and enjoyed rights to their land according to their own laws and customs. The Court found that those rights survived colonisation, and they are now recognised and protected by the Australian legal system.
The NTA was passed in 1993. It established a process for claiming and recognising native title lands and waters in Australia. The NTA aims to balance Indigenous and non-Indigenous peoples’ rights to land, and sets out how native title rights and interests fit within Australian law.
Charles Passi talks about the importance of the Mabo case in the following video.