Land councils, also known as land and sea councils, are Australian community organisations organised by region that represent the Indigenous Australians who occupied that region before the arrival of European settlers. They have historically advocated for recognition of traditional land rights, and also for the rights of Indigenous people in other areas such as equal wages and adequate housing.
Most Land Councils provide representation and organization of native title for Indigenous Australians, and receive funding from the Australian Commonwealth Government to do this work. Most land councils were formed since the late 1970s to gain native title, and most propositions for land councils have been put forth to the state governments since the 1990s, particularly after the downfall of the terra nullius legal precedent in Mabo v. Queensland (1993).
Some land councils can be governed by other, larger councils, which federate multiple local land councils for representation at the state and federal level.
Famous quotes containing the words land and/or council:
“The land is the appointed remedy for whatever is false and fantastic in our culture. The continent we inhabit is to be physic and food for our mind, as well as our body. The land, with its tranquilizing, sanative influences, is to repair the errors of a scholastic and traditional education, and bring us to just relations with men and things.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)
“Parental attitudes have greater correlation with pupil achievement than material home circumstances or variations in school and classroom organization, instructional materials, and particular teaching practices.”
—Children and Their Primary Schools, vol. 1, ch. 3, Central Advisory Council for Education, London (1967)