Revocation of reserves 1909-1983
Aboriginal reserves were controlled by the Aborigines Protection Board (and later the Aborigines Welfare Board) from 1909 until 1969. During this time, many reserves were revoked. The land that had been reserved was used for other purposes or sold by the NSW government. In the late 1970s, the Government realised these revocations were invalid. In 1983, at the same time the Aboriginal Land Rights Act 1983 was being debated, the Parliament passed a law to validate the invalid revocations.
Reserves were areas of land set aside under law for Aboriginal people from the mid 1800s onwards. Reserves were initially seen as areas for Aboriginal people to live as dispossession advanced but soon became places of control, especially when they became controlled by the Aborigines Protection Board (see SUB0278, SUB0367 and SUB0503).
Why were reserves revoked?
Throughout the 20th Century many reserves were revoked. Revocation meant the land was no longer reserved and could be used for other purposes such as farmland, recreation and solider settlements.
In 1909, some reserves were revoked ‘which were found not to be of any present or future use to the aborigines’ (). Other reserves were revoked the following year after they were found to be ‘unsuitable’ ().
In 1910, the Board wrote in its Annual Report that ‘[t]he area of land already available … is so limited that every attempt on the part of Europeans to acquire these reserves for settlement purposes should be strongly opposed’ (). Despite this, revocations were approved.
In 1911, the Board began to lease reserved lands for its own revenue (). Between 1913 and 1921, the Board’s income from leasing ‘increased by 500 per cent’ ().
There was an increase in the amount of land being revoked between 1914 and 1920, with revoked land significantly outweighing land being newly reserved for Aboriginal people (see, for example, , , , , ).
At the same time, the Returned Servicemen Scheme began, which granted farms to Australian soldiers who had served in World War 1. The Board’s Annual Report for 1918 specifically acknowledged that reserves were being revoked ‘for the benefit of Returned Soldiers’ ().
The Board’s Annual Reports stopped showing how much land was being revoked or reserved after 1920.
Between 1955 and 1964, 33 reserves in NSW were revoked for various reasons.
For example, Aboriginal people had been living on Stuart Island in Nambucca Heads since it was reserved in 1883, but were relocated into a corner of the island because the local golf club had taken a special lease with the Board and cleared the rest for a golf course. The reserve was revoked and one of the fairways was built over gravesites (, , ).
Similarly, in 1958, 180 acres of Aboriginal reserve land at Yamba was revoked to allow better tourist access to the foreshores (, ).
Aboriginal people were also moved off land that was not formally reserved. In the Blue Mountains, on Gundungurra land, ‘the Gully’ in Katoomba had been an Aboriginal settlement since the early 1900s, although it was not formally reserved or under the control of the Aborigines Protection Board. Following the establishment of a tourist park, residents were forcibly removed in 1957 to make way for a raceway approved by Blue Mountains City Council (, ) .
How much land was revoked?
Between 1916 and 1927 the area of reserve lands was reduced from 10,500 hectares to 5,200 hectares. Seventy-five percent of this loss was from revocations on the north coast of NSW ().
By 1927, more than 13,000 acres of Aboriginal-controlled land had been ‘completely lost by revocation’ ().
Were the revocations lawful?
Many of the reserves were revoked by the Department of Lands under the Crown Lands Act 1884 (NSW) ().
In 1978, the Crown Solicitor of NSW was asked to provide legal advice about the lawfulness of the revocations.
The advice was that the Aborigines Protection Act 1909 (NSW) ‘operated to deprive Aboriginal reserves of the status of Crown land under the Crown Lands Consolidation Act 1913 and that a revocation was of no legal effect’ ().
This meant that many of the revocations of Aboriginal reserves throughout the 20th century were invalid, including land that later became freehold ().
Validation of revocations
In 1983 the Aboriginal Legal Service went to Court to challenge the revocations (). In the same year the NSW government passed the Crown Lands (Validation of Revocations) Act 1983 (NSW) which said that any revocation of a reserve that was invalid is ‘deemed to have been validly effected’ ().
This meant all invalid revocations became valid, without legal recourse.
The validation law was debated at the same time the Parliament debated the Aboriginal Land Rights Act 1983 (NSW) (, ). The Aboriginal community had no notice about the validation law and was not consulted about it being passed alongside the land rights law (). Some members of Parliament criticised the Bill, describing it as ‘legislation for the retention of stolen property’ ().