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Aborigines told to swap land rights for new homes | smh.com.au

Aborigines told to swap land rights for new homes * Joel Gibson Indigenous Affairs Reporter in Cessnock Sydney Morning Herald  March 6, 2009  ABORIGINES living in remote areas throughout Australia will not get a cent of $2 billion in new housing money unless they sign away their land rights for at least 40 years under a controversial Rudd Government plan that NSW indigenous leaders called insulting and dictatorial………………………………….

The policy is a milder version of a Howard government approach in the Northern Territory, which required 99-year leases, but is being extended to all states and territories for the first time.

It represents an about-face for Ms Macklin, who argued against the Howard government policy in 2007, saying land tenure reform should not be a condition of funding for basic service………………………………..

Rick Griffiths, chief executive of the Mindaribba land council, which represents indigenous people in the Cessnock area, said it was an insult. “There’s no mention of compensation for the leases … And what happens if there’s a change of state government?” he said. “They don’t go to white communities and say this, do they?”

The state’s peak Aboriginal body said neither state nor federal governments had discussed the plan with them……………………..The activist Michael Anderson, a founder of the Aboriginal tent embassy, compared the policy with those of Zimbabwe’s President, Robert Mugabe, and the former Australian prime minister William McMahon, who took land from whites and wanted to lease land to blacks, respectively.

Aborigines told to swap land rights for new homes | smh.com.au

March 8, 2009 - Posted by Christina Macpherson | Uncategorized