Land Rights Act not an impediment: Peris

Nova Peris has rejected claims the Aboriginal Land Rights Act is holding indigenous people back. Source: AAP

NORTHERN Territory Senator Nova Peris has rejected claims the Aboriginal Land Rights Act is holding indigenous people back.

THE NT Minister for Community Services Bess Price said at a development conference in Darwin on Monday the Act has locked Aboriginal land away.

"It's clear it has now become outdated and a hindrance to moving forward in our communities," she said."I plead with the Prime Minister Tony Abbott and Senator Nigel Scullion (Minister for Indigenous Affairs) to give Aboriginal people their land back. When Aboriginal people are free to trade and deal with their lands, social, business and economic opportunities will flow."But Senator Peris said there were a number of things preventing Aboriginal economic development, such as a lack of infrastructure."For someone in Bess Price's position, when she opens her mouth she does speak for Aboriginal people but what she's saying is totally untrue," she told ABC radio, but admitted the approvals process was too slow.Under the Land Rights Act in the NT, landowners must negotiate with a land council for an Indigenous Land Use Agreement before they can sell or use their land for commercial purposes, and lending institutions prefer longer 99-year leases in order to guarantee funds for people to buy their own homes or launch businesses, which can only be approved by the federal minister.But land councils do not always act in the interests of traditional owners, said Senator Nigel Scullion."Sometimes a land council has a particular agenda and can assist with economic development; other land councils have other agendas and perhaps might not be so helpful because they have some fundamental opposition to independence from particular groups," he told ABC."There's no doubt that the system needs some adjustment but I don't agree with Bess that it's in the actual Land Rights Act. I can't see any circumstance that the (Act) can't assist with; it's supposed to be enabling legislation."Both the Northern Land Council and the Central Land Council have indicated that they don't like 99-year township leases "and they're actively working against the interests of traditional owners in some cases", Senator Scullion said."It's my task to make sure that land councils as commonwealth agencies dance to the beat of the traditional owners' drum, that's their role."They should be facilitators, not necessarily having particular fundamentalist views themselves."Indigenous people around the world would love to have a piece of legislation like the Land Rights Act to protect them, said Northern Land Council CEO Joe Morrison."The Land Rights Act is a very unique piece of legislation ... I know indigenous people around the world would love to have something like (it) that gives them communal property rights," he told AAP."We need to maintain that position and work on the strengths of the Land Rights Act to empower people."He said Ms Price and her government have been preventing Aboriginal people from participating in economic advancement by not setting up a strategic water reserve for indigenous people to access water allocations from an aquifer to irrigate and develop their lands."Because there's a separation of land and water titles, just having land doesn't mean you can develop it, you need water to be able to develop agricultural enterprises and the NT government's position has been to effectively shut out Aboriginal people from that process," Mr Morrison said.

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