Terra nullius

The Crown takeover of all the lands of Aboriginal Australia as terra nullius has affected Aboriginal lives ever since. There were good reasons to under-estimate-the smaller the population of Aboriginal Australia, the easier to justify taking the land as not being used productively, and the less the guilt. The &s;White Australia&s; policy developed from unionists&s; fears of cheap labour and was written into the Labor Party platform. A 1937 report on development in the Northern Territory stressed the &s;inviolability of the national policy of a White Australia. The frequent repetition of 1788 has tended to encourage people to think that the invasion was long ago; however, some massacres are within living memory, many more in folk memory. In 1985, the Department of Aboriginal Affairs commissioned a report on attitudes to land rights. Australian National Opinion Polls found that support for land rights was 21 per cent across the country and as low as 6 per cent in Western Australia.

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