Senator MINCHIN (Special Minister of State;Minister Assisting the Prime Minister) (9:32 PM) —I move:

(3) Schedule 1, item 9, page 14 (lines 23 to 28), omit subsection (9), substitute:

Exclusion of acts benefiting Aboriginal peoples or Torres Strait Islanders

(9) An act is not a previous exclusive possession act if it is:

(a) the grant or vesting of any thing that is made or done by or under legislation that makes provision for the grant or vesting of such things only to, in or for the benefit of, Aboriginal peoples or Torres Strait Islanders; or

(b) the grant or vesting of any thing expressly for the benefit of, or to or in a person to hold on trust expressly for the benefit of, Aboriginal peoples or Torres Strait Islanders; or

(c) the grant or vesting of any thing over particular land or waters, if at the time a thing covered by paragraph (a) or (b) is in effect in relation to the land or waters.

Note: The expression Aboriginal peoples is defined in section 253.

Exclusion of national parks etc.

(9A) An act is not a previous exclusive possession act if the grant or vesting concerned involves the establishment of an area, such as a national, State or Territory park, for the purpose of preserving the natural environment of the area.

Effect of exclusions

(9B) To avoid doubt, the fact that an act is, because of any of the previous subsections, not a previous exclusive possession act does not imply that the act is not valid.

(4) Schedule 1, item 9, page 19 (after line 21), at the end of Division 2B, add:

23JA Attribution of certain acts

If:

(a) a previous exclusive possession act or a previous non-exclusive possession act took place before the establishment of a particular State, the Jervis Bay Territory, the Australian Capital Territory or the Northern Territory; and

(b) the act affected land or waters that, when this section commences, form part of the State or Territory;

then, for the purposes of this Division, the act is taken to be attributable to:

(c) the State; or

(d) if the Territory is the Jervis Bay Territory—the Commonwealth; or

(e) if the Territory is the Australian Capital Territory or the Northern Territory—that Territory.

Note: The meaning given to the expression attributable by section 239 will apply for the purposes of this Division to all other previous exclusive and non-exclusive possession acts.

(5) Schedule 1, item 12A, page 123 (lines 3 and 4), omit subparagraph (1)(b)(ii), substitute:

(ii) the area is held expressly for the benefit of, or is held on trust, or reserved, expressly for the benefit of, Aboriginal peoples or Torres Strait Islanders; and

(6) Schedule 1, item 12A, page 123 (line 13), omit "creation of the trust", substitute "doing of the thing that resulted in the holding".

(7) Schedule 1, item 12A, page 123 (line 16), omit "on trust".

(8) Schedule 1, item 12A, page 124 (line 13), omit "declaration", substitute "dedication".

(9) Schedule 1, item 49, page 140 (line 24), omit paragraph (1)(a), substitute:

(a) anything set out in Schedule 1, other than:

(i) a mining lease; or

(ii) an interest created by or under legislation that creates interests only for the benefit of Aboriginal peoples or Torres Strait Islanders; or

(iii) an interest created expressly for the benefit of, or held on trust expressly for the benefit of, Aboriginal peoples or Torres Strait Islanders; or

(iv) any other interest created in relation to particular land or waters, if at the time an interest covered by subparagraph (ii) or (iii) is in effect in relation to the land or waters; or

(10) Schedule 1, item 49, page 141 (after line 3), at the end of section 249C, add:

Regulations to cover exclusive possession interests only

(3) Before the Governor-General makes a regulation for the purposes of paragraph (1)(b) declaring a particular interest to be a Scheduled interest, the Minister must be satisfied that the interest confers a right of exclusive possession that extinguishes all native title rights and interests over the land or waters concerned.

Government amendment 3 will replace subsection 23B(9) with a new subsection that ensures that certain acts, including grants specifically for the benefit of Aboriginal people, are excluded from the confirmation of extinguishment provisions. Government amendment 4 rectifies a gap in the confirmation of extinguishment provisions by enabling a state or territory to confirm the effect of previous exclusive possession acts and previous non-exclusive possession acts that took place over land that now forms part of that state or territory but did not at the time the grant was made. Amendments 5 to 7 make minor amendments to section 47A to ensure that that provision, which enables certain extinguishing acts to be ignored when a native title claim is being determined, applies to areas which have been granted or vested, whether on trust or otherwise, expressly for the benefit of indigenous people.

Government amendment No. 8 replaces the word `declaration' in section 47B with the word `dedication', simply to ensure that the terminology used in 47B to refer to land reserved for a purpose is consistent with the terminology used elsewhere in the bill when referring to reserved land. Both amendments 9 and 10 affect the definition of `scheduled interest' set out in proposed section 249C in the bill: the grant of a scheduled interest before 23 December 1996 can be confirmed to have extinguished native title.

We are putting these amendments in good faith. We think they should be supported by the Senate; the confirmation regime was passed through the Senate last time. These amendments do pick up some anomalies which we have identified in discussions with all the other parties and with the various interests. While there may be those in the chamber who do not like the confirmation provisions at all, I would have thought they would see these as acceptable and sensible improvements to the confirmation regime.