Terra nullius: Invasion and colonisation

Abstract

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 'White Australia' policy developed from unionists' fears of cheap labour and was written into the Labor Party platform. A 1937 report on development in the Northern Territory stressed the '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.