Planning for Agreement in Cape York Peninsula: The Pastoral Properties Planning Project

摘要: The High Court's decision in Mabo v Queensland (No 2)(1992) 175 CLR 1 (Mabo) gave legal recognition to the pre-existing native title rights of Australia's indigenous people. Mabo paved the way for the passing of the Native Title Act 1993 (Cth)(NTA) which provided a framework by which those rights could be claimed. Unfortunately, fears of an Aboriginal land grab quickly surfaced and a sustained backlash followed, based, as Reynolds (1999) argues, on the challenge to long-established patterns of hierarchy and subordination. On the national stage, this has meant that negotiations with indigenous people have been mostly difficult and costly, despite the fact that the 1998 amendments to the NTA enshrined agreement-making as the preferred method of dealing with native title claims (Neate 2004, p 178). This is particularly so in remote parts of the country such as Cape York Peninsula in Australia's north-east, where the possibilities offered by native title determinations have been most contentious.It is against this backdrop of fear about the consequences of native title that we examine a planning project that sought to capitalise on the structures and possibilities for reconciliation on Cape York Peninsula (the Peninsula). In this chapter we provide an account of the early stages of planning and negotiation involved in the Pastoral Properties Planning project (PPP). The PPP was designed to minimise the formal processes involved in native title claims under the NTA while taking advantage of NTA provisions such as those dealing with Indigenous Land Use Agreements (ILUAs). A variety of competing interests on the Peninsula meant that land rights …