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15-05-2026
SYDNEY: The Indigenous traditional owners of land in north-western Australia have been awarded a record AU$150.1 million ($108.3m; £79.9m) payout after a court ruled one of the country’s most well-known billionaires mined their land without permission.
The verdict amounts to the biggest native title payout ever awarded in Australia and concludes a protracted legal battle between the Yindjibarndi people and Andrew Forrest’s mining company Fortescue.
Since 2013, Fortescue’s mines have generated tens of billions of dollars in revenue by extracting iron ore from Yindjibarndi land in remote north Western Australia.
The Yindjibarndi group had sought AU$1.8bn compensation.
That figure, they argued, would constitute 1% of the production value profit of the mines, as well as compensation for the loss of around 250 cultural sites and cultural connection to the land.
Acknowledging that the Yindjibarndi had a “deep and visceral connection” to their land which affected all aspects of their lives, Federal Court Justice Stephen Burley on Tuesday found Fortescue liable for economic loss valued at AU$150,000 and cultural loss valued at AU$150m.
Burley characterized the latter “as compensation for loss or diminution of traditional attachment to the land or connection to country and for loss of rights to gain spiritual sustenance from the land”.
The claim against Fortescue was first lodged in 2017, after a court awarded the Yindjibarndi Ngurra Aboriginal Corporation (YNAC) exclusive native title rights over a 2,700-sq km area in the mineral-rich Pilbara region.
At that time, Fortescue had already spent several years establishing its lucrative Solomon Hub mines on the land, with permission from both the government and a local Aboriginal representative group, but not from YNAC.
Failure to negotiate a land use agreement between YNAC and Fortescue led to the almost 20-year legal battle which culminated on Tuesday.
While the historic payout is almost three times the amount of the next biggest court-mandated compensation payout to native title owners in Australia, however, some elders expressed disappointment at the figure.
Speaking outside the court on Tuesday, Yindjibarndi elder Wendy Hubert described the payout as “peanuts” compared to the Fortescue’s immense earnings over the years, according to the Australian Broadcasting Corporation (ABC).
Those earnings for the mining company are expected to continue for at least another decade, before the mine is set to close in the mid-2040s.
Aboriginal group launches legal bid to stop Brisbane Olympic stadium
Last year, an Indigenous group has launched legal action to stop a 63,000-seat stadium for the 2032 Brisbane Olympics being built on culturally significant land.
The Queensland government announced in March that a new A$3.8bn ($2.5bn; £1.8bn) stadium would be built with federal funding at Victoria Park, a 60-hectare site. The Yagara Magandjin Aboriginal Corporation (YMAC) and Save Victoria Park group are requesting the federal environment minister to determine the park as a culturally significant site, which could protect the land from development.
Victoria Park is “of great significance and history” for Indigenous and non-Indigenous people, YMAC spokeswoman Gaja Kerry Charlton explained.
“We are very concerned there are ancient trees, artefacts and very important ecosystems existing there. There may be ancestral remains.”
A spokesperson for the federal government confirmed it had received the request to designate the site under the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Heritage Protection Act. (Int’l Monitoring Desk)
