The paper undertakes a comparative overview of the law as it pertains to Indigenous rights in freshwater in four countries: the United States, Canada, New Zealand, and Australia. It is organised around four themes of particular concern to contemporary Indigenous Australians: ownership of water, water rights, commercial rights, and management rights. To date, the law, especially in Australia, has been relatively silent as to the water rights of Indigenous people.

The ABS 2006 Post Enumeration Survey was extended to include a sample of localities from the whole of Australia, thereby providing an estimate of census net undercount reflective of the enumeration in remote Indigenous settlements for the first time. The results revealed substantial undercounting of the Indigenous population in certain jurisdictions. The analytical and policy issues that arise from this revolve around a simple question: how can we be sure that we are measuring the same population over time?

This paper examines and compares two Indigenous jurisdictions in the Northern Territory and Cape York that have been subject to radical policy interventions by Federal and State Governments. The Northern Territory intervention emerged from the June 2007 release of the Ampe Akelyernemane Meke Mekarle (Little Children Are Sacred) report into child abuse and neglect. The Cape York trial, as it has become known, is a four year trial devised by the Cape York Institute and Cape York Partnerships.

Western Australia sits poised to reap huge benefits from a super-cycle of resource exploitation. Labour demand is at an all-time high and challenges in securing an adequate labour supply are already evident. It is ironic then, that the very people whose land base is exploited to generate much of this wealth, who are often located in regions of high labour demand, and who have sizeable cohorts moving into working-age groups, are so poorly situated to share in the benefits of economic growth for want of adequate capacities to participate.

The announcement by the Australian and Western Australian governments of funding for Stage 2 of the Ord irrigation scheme brings into focus the role of the Yawoorroong Miriuwung Gajerrong Yirrgeb Noong Dawang Aboriginal Corporation in developing strategic economic development priorities associated with financial and other benefits flowing from the Ord Final Agreement. It also provides impetus to the Ord Enhancement Scheme which is charged with addressing the adverse social and economic impacts of Ord Stage 1 on Aboriginal people.

This report presents preliminary research about fresh water governance arrangements in the Maningrida region of some 10,000 square kilometres in Arnhem Land, Northern Territory. The report begins with a discussion of methodology before turning to a description of the region’s water resources. The focus is on three linked broad perspectives on water: a historical analysis of the political economy of water; a sectoral analysis of water in the regional 'hybrid' economy; and a spatial analysis of water governance in Maningrida and the hinterland.

This paper sets out to document the scale of Indigenous housing need as recorded in the most recent (2006) Census at a regional level and how this level of need changed between 2001 and 2006. What the results show is that the issue of Indigenous housing presents two challenges for government: catch-up and keep-up. Regarding ‘catch-up’, using an internationally recognised occupancy standard, the Indigenous population is still experiencing substantial overcrowding with the percentage living in overcrowded households 4.8 times that of the non-Indigenous population.

A range of Indigenous population dynamics play out underneath the demographic picture that can be constructed from official statistics. Primary among these are temporary mobility practices. Although temporary movements are largely 'uncaptured' by conventional statistical measures, they are pervasive in public life and thought. Words like 'walkabout' and 'nomadic' are commonly used in public discourse to characterise Indigenous people as highly mobile over the short-term, and such movement is regularly constructed as problematic for mainstream health, education and housing providers.