Aboriginal Waterways Assessment program

56 Aboriginal Waterways Assessment — Part C Literature review
The full literature review
Traditional Owners’ claim to Country
While the historical intervention into
Aboriginal knowledge in the Basin
(Yalmambirra, 2006) presents multiple
difficulties for co-cultural science and
water planning activities, Traditional
Owners claim that Aboriginal peoples
have an inalienable relationship with
their Country. This relationship has
existed for millennia prior to the
arrival of non-Aboriginal interests in
their land, continues throughout their
impacts, and for some will survive the
consequences of this history.
Currently estimated at around 10,000
individuals on Country and half as
many in nearby urban centres, the
Yorta Yorta have maintained social,
spiritual, economic and cultural links
with Country for over 1,600 generation
(Griggs et al., undated, p. 1).
The twenty-two Aboriginal
corporate submissions to the draft
Basin Plan now included in the
Aboriginal Submissions Database
make these claims with evidence
of ownership under customary law
of unique Country, landscapes and
waterscapes, through Ancestors and
Descendent Clans and despite ongoing
dispossession (Annuscheit, 2012;
Barraparrapara, 2012; Dhudhuroa,
2012; Dja Dja Wurrung, 2012;
Gardener, 2012; Kennedy, 2012;
Murray, 2012; MLDRIN and NBAN,
2012; Ngarrindjeri Regional Authority,
2012; Nichols & Patten, 2012; Tati Tati
Traditional Owners, 2012;Taungurung,
2012; Wamba Wamba Sovereign First
Nation, 2012).
This position is given international
legal recognition by the United
Nations Declaration on the Rights
of Indigenous Peoples (UNDRIP) to
which the Australian Commonwealth
was a signatory in 2009. It underpins
Aboriginal knowledges in the Basin
(Weir, 2008) and how they are used
in assessment tools for the health and
wellbeing of Country.
A brief history of Aboriginal
participation in non-
Aboriginal water planning and
management
Deploying Aboriginal knowledges
in water assessment activities is a
difficult intention. Non-Aboriginal
considerations regarding the
management of what is understood
as ‘natural resources’ in general,
and water in particular, have
recognised Aboriginal presence and
Traditional Owners’ claims only in
the recent past.
Bound into western legal concepts
of common law, property and land
ownership, it was the landmark of
the Mabo Decision (1992), which
recognised customary economies and
the right of access to resources to
practice them (Jackson, 2008; Tan &
Jackson, 2013). Mabo provided the
ground for Common Law recognition
of Native Title (1993).
In the years that followed, state
and Commonwealth governments
have repeatedly shifted their
position resulting in ad hoc, limited
and compromised Aboriginal
participation in the water sector
(Hill & Williams, 2009; Hunt, 2013;
Tan & Jackson, 2013; National Water
Commission, 2014).
It was not until the Council of Australian
Governments Intergovernmental
Agreement on a National Water
Initiative in 2004 that Aboriginal
interests in, and local knowledge of,