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The November 1 Federal Court ruling against a claim for native title by the Waanyi people of north-west Queensland is a victory for big mining interests. It shows the real colours of a judicial system designed to protect big business "rights" to enrichment and the hollowness of Labor's Native Title Act. Two of three judges said the Waanyi people did not have native title over a 247-hectare camping and water reserve because it had been a pastoral lease with no provision for Aboriginal use, between 1904 and 1907. The decision removed an obstacle for CRA's Century Zinc mining company to turn the land into one of the world's largest zinc mines. The ruling, regarded as a test case on whether exclusive pastoral leases can extinguish native title, was welcomed by the National Farmers Federation. Whether pastoral leases which contained areas for use by Aboriginal people — "reserves" — also extinguish native title will be determined in another test case. This case involves a claim by the Wik people of Cape York against another CRA-owned mining interest, Comalco. If the Wik people's native title is found not to be extinguished, then Comalco may be liable for compensation for its illegal use of the land since 1957. These, and other cases awaiting hearing, are a product of the federal government's Native Title Act — or Mabo legislation — which was intended to restrict the chances of land being returned to Aboriginal control. The June 1992 Mabo High Court decision overturned the idea of "terra nullius" — that the land was empty and there for the taking — but also decided that native title had survived only in certain circumstances. But even the limited circumstances prescribed were too much for Australian governments. At the behest of big business interests in the tourism, pastoral and mining industries, the federal government validated all existing land title against possible native title claims and established a system of state-controlled tribunals to hear future claims. The legislation underwent a number of retrogressive changes before it was presented to parliament.

• Any suggestion that traditional owners should be able to exercise a veto over development on their land was dropped.

• The Commonwealth agreed to validate all non-Aboriginal titles back to 1788, rather than back to 1975, when the Racial Discrimination Act was passed. This was after Queensland Labor Premier Wayne Goss, Comalco and foreign investors made all sorts of threats and accusations about the Wik claim in Cape York.

• The Commonwealth also agreed to extinguish any title on pastoral leases.

At an October 1993 public meeting, Cape York Land Council director Noel Pearson explained that the object of the government legislation was to wipe out those rights to land acknowledged by the High Court decision. As the courts go through the process of determining the existence of "legitimate" claims to native title, the worst fears of Pearson and all supporters of land rights for Aboriginal people are confirmed. As Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Commissioner Michael Dodson commented, "the now discredited concept of terra nullius [has been replaced] with an equally unjust notion of retro nullius".