Aboriginal Land Rights (Northern Territory) Act 1976

The Aboriginal Land Rights (Northern Territory) Act 1976, given royal assent on December 16, 1976, was the first Australian law to legally recognize Aboriginal systems of land ownership, letting Aboriginal people in the Northern Territory claim land based on traditional occupation. It created inalienable freehold title, meaning land granted under the Act cannot be sold or mortgaged, established Aboriginal Land Trusts to hold that title and Land Councils to manage the land, regulated mining on Aboriginal land, and directed mining royalties into the Aboriginals Benefit Account. It followed a 1974 recommendation by Justice Edward Woodward that Aboriginal land be granted as communal freehold as, in his words, simple justice to a people who had been deprived of their land, and it has been amended many times since, with major revisions in 2006 and 2021.