Although much has been said on self determination, little has been achieved in the past decade towards self determination policies.

Although the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Commission (ATSIC) has been established as an incremental structure for self determination there is little evidence that ATSIC is achieving its intended goals. For example:

• Regional Councils do not have global control over ATSIC expenditure in their regions,

• the ATSIC budget is controlled by the government in the same way as departmental budgets,

• ATSIC Board of Commissioners is to continue under the control of a government appointee, and

• the Howard government has already tried to officially limit the decision making powers of ATSIC.

We believe in self determination as a right. This means that Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people must be able to make the important decisions regarding their future.

We support the directions set by the Aboriginal Provisional Government. This includes the assertion that the sovereign rights of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people are not and cannot be usurped by the Australian nation. The sovereign rights of our Peoples were not overtaken by conquest, they have not been negotiated by any government in he past two hundred years, and they have not been given up by our Peoples.

Although our rights of sovereignty are repugnant to the Australian government, and there is much effort made to counter any arguments of sovereignty, there is a lack of argument as to how our sovereignty was ever overtaken by the British or Australian Government. The substance of the government's position, and this was also presented by the High Court in its ruling on Mabo, is that the creation of the Australian nation over our territories, our resources and our peoples has been physically applied. The defence of this position is that other countries will not acknowledge 'nations within nation'.

This simplified view of sovereignty however does not take a true account of the history, the present and the future of the world's contemporary nation states. There is evidence that the relationship between the indigenous peoples and the modern nations, especially the former British colonies, are being redefined and renegotiated.

In Australia we have been kept insulated from the development of indigenous rights in New Zealand, USA and Canada. Although indigenous rights in those countries are still being denied, there has been greater progress towards self-determination goals than in Australia. Ironically, the Keating government presented ATSIC to the other countries as the model for self determination.

The APG has proposed that a referendum be held for the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people to ascertain their intentions for the future. This has similarity to the referendum conducted in Hawaii where the indigenous people are deciding on whether they are willing to cede their territories and rights to the USA.

We are in support of this referendum and we will propose that a committee be established to prepare the wordings of the referendum. The referendum should ascertain the indigenous people's view on the continuation and exercise of sovereign rights.

FAIRA Aboriginal Corporation Phone +61 7 3391 4677 • Fax +61 7 3391 4551 • email letterbox@faira.org.au Post Office Box 8402 Woolloongabba Q 4102 Australia 37 Balaclava Street Woolloongabba