Page 1766 - Week 07 - Tuesday, 15 June 1993
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Hume Cafeteria
MS ELLIS: Madam Speaker, my question is directed to the Minister for the Environment, Land and Planning. What has been the outcome of objections made to the operation of a cafeteria at a warehouse in Hume?
MR WOOD: Madam Speaker, members would be aware that an adjoining lessee had complained about what he saw as illegal trading in that cafeteria and a contravention of the lease purpose clause. The department made orders against the lessee and the sublessee of Cannons Hume to cease activities which were considered to be outside the lease purpose clause. As was his right, the lessee took the matter to the Administrative Appeals Tribunal. The matter was not heard quickly, I have to say. It was taken to the AAT on 25, 26 and 27 May and 7 June. The nature of the appeal involved the interpretation of the lease purpose clause. The appeal has now been finalised by the tribunal. As a result of that appeal, the department's order has been reworded to reflect the views of the AAT and that new order will be made shortly. That order instructs the lessee to abide by the lease purpose clause and prohibits sale from the cafeteria to members of the broader public. That has been the outcome. I expect that when that order is issued it will be observed.
Native Land Titles
MR WESTENDE: Madam Speaker, my question is directed to the Attorney-General. I refer to comments last week in the media about the Minister for Urban Services suggesting that the Mabo decision might facilitate land claims over Namadgi National Park. Is the Government prepared to entertain such a claim, and how much compensation would be payable to the traditional owners if it will not grant the claim?
MR CONNOLLY: The Attorney-General always agrees with comments by the Minister for Urban Services. The comments Mr Westende is referring to were indeed made by me. I was attempting to explain the effect of the Mabo decision. It is something that members opposite would do well to listen to closely, and hopefully learn. The High Court decision in Mabo is complex. It is 170 pages of very closely written argument. Fundamentally, what the court has decided is that the old doctrine of terra nullius no longer applies. That is the legal doctrine that said that Australia was an empty continent; that the Aboriginal people were not people; that they belonged to a level of civilisation so low as not to warrant recognition by the English common law. That is an offensive way of putting it, but that is what the law said. That was the old international law doctrine of terra nullius developed by European international lawyers in the seventeenth century to justify the acquisition of territory in South America, in Asia and eventually throughout Australasia.
The High Court has noted that that doctrine in international law is no longer acceptable and has been ruled out, in effect, by the International Court of Justice in the Western Sahara case. International law thus allows only two methods of acquiring territory - secession or conquest. What the court has effectively said is that Australia was, for practical purposes, a conquered territory; that is to say, there were in Australia, when European settlers first arrived and asserted sovereignty, developed systems of indigenous civilisation with developed links to
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