Muckaty Station

Coordinates: 18°37′40.4″S 133°52′17.2″E / 18.627889°S 133.871444°E

Muckaty Station
Location in Northern Territory

Muckaty Station, also known as Warlmanpa, is a 2,380-square-kilometre (920 sq mi) Aboriginal freehold landholding in Australia's Northern Territory, 110 kilometres (68 mi) north of Tennant Creek, and approximately 800 kilometres (500 mi) south of Darwin. Originally under traditional Indigenous Australian ownership, the area became a pastoral lease in the late 19th century and for many years operated as a cattle station. It is traversed by the Stuart Highway, built in the 1940s along the route of the service track for the Australian Overland Telegraph Line. It is also crossed by a natural gas pipeline built in the mid-1980s, and the Adelaide–Darwin railway, completed in early 2004. Muckaty Station was returned to its Indigenous custodians in 1999.

The area comprises semi-arid stony ridges, claypans and a stony plateau, and experiences a sub-tropical climate, with a wet season between January and March. The vegetation is mostly scrubland, including spinifex grasslands. The fauna is generally typical of Australian desert environments, and includes the red kangaroo, the eastern wallaroo, the northern nail-tail wallaby, and the spinifex hopping mouse.

A site within Muckaty is being considered for Australia's low-level and intermediate-level radioactive waste storage and disposal facility. Indigenous custodians of Muckaty Station are divided over the proposal, which has also met resistance from environmental organisations and the Northern Territory government. The plan is subject to a Federal Court challenge due to be heard in 2014.

History

An old wooden telegraph pole standing in a semi-desert grassland plain with low scrub in the distance
Australian Overland Telegraph Line poles near Muckaty Station

Indigenous Australians have lived in parts of the Northern Territory for around 40,000 years. Pre-European settlement numbers are not known with any precision, although the Indigenous population of the Northern Territory has been estimated at "well over 10,000".[1] The area now known as Muckaty Station (often referred to as just "Muckaty", though the origin of this name and near variants such as "Mucketty" is unknown) was – and is – the responsibility of seven clans of traditional Indigenous owners: Milwayi, Ngapa, Ngarrka, Wirntiku, Kurrakurraja, Walanypirri and Yapayapa.[2] The country is known by the Indigenous name Warlmanpa, which is also the name of a local language.[3]

Although there had been several unsuccessful attempts by British or colonial authorities to settle in the Northern Territory, there was no permanent European presence until surveyor George Goyder in 1869 established what is now known as Darwin.[4] The timing was auspicious: in October 1870 the South Australian government decided to construct an overland telegraph line, from Port Augusta on the continent's south coast, to the new settlement just established in the country's tropical north.[5] The line traversed what is now Muckaty Station, with repeater stations built at Powell's Creek to the north and Tennant's Creek to the south.[6] At the same time as the telegraph line was completed in August 1872,[7] a cattle industry was beginning to develop in central and northern Australia. The first pastoral lease in the Northern Territory was granted in 1872, and by 1911 there were at least 250 such leases covering over 180,000 square miles (470,000 km2) of the jurisdiction.[8] The Muckaty pastoral lease was created in the late 19th century.[9] Currently the property is surrounded by other leases including Powell Creek to the north, Helen Springs Station to the east with Philip Creek and Banka Banka Stations to the south.[10] In the 1930s, the Australian government was sufficiently concerned about the condition and lack of development of these leases that it held two inquiries between 1932 and 1938. Historian Ted Ling's accounts of those inquiries, however, make no mention of Muckaty, which was not singled out for comment by either investigation.[11]

Throughout the history of Australia's pastoral industry, Indigenous Australians were a major part of the workforce. In 1928 for example, 80 per cent of Indigenous people with jobs were employed on the stations, including Muckaty, with many living on and travelling across the pastoral leases.[12][13][14] The local language, Warlmanpa, was recognised in some publications from the 1930s onward, while anthropologists and administrators made some records of language and population in the region of Muckaty Station. Only one record from the period lists both Muckaty Station as a location and Warlmanpa as a language. A record of Aboriginal wards of the state, it showed only three Indigenous adults living on Muckaty, compared to almost fifty on Banka Banka Station, to the east.[15] This reflects the fact that, by 1940, "Warlmanpa country had been depopulated".[16]

By the 1940s the lessee at Muckaty was Fred Ulyatt.[17] The 1940s also marked a significant change in the region's road infrastructure. A dirt track had been formed to service the telegraph line in the late nineteenth century. This became the Stuart Highway, crossing the eastern part of Muckaty, and it was upgraded to an all-weather road in late 1940,[18] before being bitumenised in 1944.[19][20] Sources do not say who leased the property between the 1940s and 1982, at which point the lease was held by James and Miriam Hagan. In 1988 it was transferred to Hapford Pty Limited and Kerfield Pty Limited.[21] Between 1985 and 1987 a natural gas pipeline was built across the station, carrying gas from Palm Valley in the Amadeus Basin to Channel Island near Darwin.[22]

In 1991, the cattle station was taken over by the Muckaty Aboriginal Corporation. The Corporation focused on rehabilitating the land, which had been degraded by excessive numbers of cattle,[14] and by late 1993 Muckaty had been destocked of cattle for several seasons.[23] On 20 December 1991, the Northern Land Council lodged a claim over Muckaty on behalf of traditional owners under the Aboriginal Land Rights Act 1976. The claim was made by members of the seven groups that each has responsibility for different sites and dreamings in the area.[24] In 1997, the Aboriginal Land Commissioner recommended that Muckaty Station be handed back to the traditional owners,[25] and in February 1999, title to the land was returned. At the time there were about 400 formal traditional owners, among 1,000 people with traditional attachments to the land; some lived on the station, but others were elsewhere in the region, including in the nearby towns of Tennant Creek and Elliott.[14] As Aboriginal Freehold land it is inalienable communal title, and cannot be bought or sold.[26] The pastoral lease holder and manager of the station since 1997 has been Ray Aylett.[27][28] The Adelaide–Darwin railway, which passes through the western part of Muckaty Station, was completed in early 2004.[29]

Geology and geography

straight railway tracks bisect a grassy plain with red soil
The Adelaide–Darwin railway in the region of Muckaty Station

Muckaty Station covers an area of 2,380 square kilometres (920 sq mi)[30] and lies 110 kilometres (68 mi) north of Tennant Creek, in Australia's Northern Territory. It includes a homestead that lies 8 kilometres (5 mi) west of the Stuart Highway and 60 kilometres (37 mi) east of the railway.[31] The residence has associated cattle yards, an airstrip, and workers' accommodation.[26] It is adjacent to Banka Banka Station to the east, and Powell Creek Station (also referred to as an outstation) to the north.[32]

The climate is subtropical, with a wet season between January and March, during which the area receives monthly rainfall of between 50 and 125 millimetres (2.0 and 4.9 in). For the rest of the year there is usually less than 10 millimetres (0.4 in) of rain each month.[33]

The station's geology is dominated by the Tomkinson Group, a formation comprising sedimentary rocks of the Paleoproterozoic era that is over 1.6 billion years old.[34] The Tomkinson Group includes layers of coarse sandstones and conglomerates, with some claystone and siltstone, deposited in a fluvial to shallow marine environment. There are also Cambrian basaltic rocks, particularly near the homestead.[35] The eastern parts of the station form a stony plateau within the Ashburton Range. The central parts are flat and include claypans, while to the west are stony ridges. The region is drained by an ephemeral waterway, Tomkinson Creek,[36] and is considered a good candidate to contain manganese deposits, the mineral having been extracted in the 1950s and 1960s at the Mucketty mine just east of Muckaty Station.[37]

The region is semi-arid, and the vegetation is generally scrubland.[36] Muckaty Station lies at the boundary of two bioregions, Tanami and Sturt Plateau. The Tanami bioregion is made up primarily of sandplains vegetated with bootlace oak (Hakea lorea), desert bloodwoods (Corymbia species), acacias and grevilleas, together with spinifex grasslands. The Sturt Plateau bioregion also includes spinifex grasslands, but with a canopy of bloodwood trees.[38]

Most of the region's fauna is typical of desert environments. Species include the red kangaroo, the eastern wallaroo (also known as the euro), the northern nail-tail wallaby, and the spinifex hopping mouse. The central pebble-mound mouse also occurs in the region, and other mammal species including the Forrest's mouse, desert mouse and short-beaked echidna have been predicted by biologists to occur on the station.[39] The station may lie within the range of the critically endangered Night Parrot (Pezoporus occidentalis).[40] There is relatively high diversity and abundance of reptiles, including the military dragon (Ctenophorus isolepis gularis) and the sand goanna (Varanus gouldii flavirufus).[41]

Radioactive waste facility

The search for a site at which to dispose of or store Australia's low and intermediate-level radioactive wastes commenced in 1980.[42] A formal public process of site selection that had commenced in 1991 finally failed in 2004.[42][43] On 7 December 2005, the Australian government passed legislation, the Commonwealth Radioactive Waste Management Act, to facilitate the siting of a radioactive waste facility in the Northern Territory. Section four of the Act allowed the Australian government to schedule potential sites for a waste facility, and three Northern Territory sites were proposed under the legislation. Following criticisms made by the Northern Land Council,[44] in December 2006 the legislation was revised to also allow Aboriginal Land Councils to nominate potential sites for a facility.[45] In May 2007 the Northern Land Council, on behalf of Ngapa clan traditional owners, nominated a small area within Muckaty Station (for which the Ngapa had traditional responsibility) to be considered as a possible site for the facility. In September 2007, the government accepted the nomination, bringing the total number of possible sites to four.[46][47] The Government of the Northern Territory opposed the nomination, but could not prevent it.[48] Ngapa clan members have volunteered a 4-square-kilometre (1.5 sq mi) area to be considered for the facility, which is expected to require 1 square kilometre of land.[49]

A parliamentary inquiry[50] and media reports[51][52] indicated that the Indigenous traditional owners of Muckaty Station were divided over whether it should host a radioactive waste facility. Some members of the Ngapa clan supported hosting the facility, while other traditional owners of Muckaty opposed it.[52][53][54] There were also claims that some members of the Ngapa clan were among those who had signed a petition opposing the facility.[55] Political scientist Rebecca Stringer criticised the federal government's approach to the siting of the waste facility, arguing that it undermined the Indigenous owners' sovereignty and control of their own lands.[56] Environmental organisations and the Australian Greens are opposed to using the site for a dump.[57]

In 2009, the Australian government received a consultant's report that examined Muckaty Station as one of four possible sites for a nuclear waste facility in the Northern Territory.[58] The report was released in 2010.[59] As of February 2012, the Muckaty Station site was the only one still under consideration by the government.[60][61]

Legal action

In 2010, Mark Lane Jangala and other traditional owners instructed law firms Maurice Blackburn, Surry Partners (a firm that includes human rights lawyer George Newhouse), and lawyer Julian Burnside to commence legal proceedings against the Northern Land Council and the Australian government in the Federal Court of Australia to stop the nomination of Muckaty Station as a nuclear waste storage facility.[62][63] The Federal Court challenge was due to commence early in 2013 before Justice Tony North, who handled the Tampa affair. According to a June 2012 report in The Age, some indigenous owners "will testify they were never consulted, while others [will] say that they were not properly consulted and never consented to the nomination".[64][65] The court began hearing the case on 2 June, for what was expected to be a five week trial.[66] However, on 18 June, the Northern Land Council withdrew the nomination of Muckaty as part of a legal settlement between the parties.[67] The Australian government indicated there would be a three-month period during which the Northern Land Council and traditional owners could determine whether they wished to nominate an alternative site for the dump elsewhere on Muckaty Station.[68]

See also

References

Notes

  1. ↑ Langfield 2001, p. 4.
  2. ↑ Gray 1997, pp. 17–37.
  3. ↑ Gray 1997; Nash 1992, pp. 2–3.
  4. ↑ Carment 1996, pp. 2–4.
  5. ↑ Carment 1996, p. 4.
  6. ↑ Shepherd 1996, p. 43.
  7. ↑ Carment 1996, p. 5.
  8. ↑ Ling 2009, p. 29.
  9. ↑ Nash 1992.
  10. ↑ "Northern Territory Pastoral Properties". Northern Territory Government. 2003. Retrieved 4 April 2015.
  11. ↑ Ling 2009; Ling 2010.
  12. ↑ Gray 1997, p. 57.
  13. ↑ McLaren and Cooper 2001, pp. 162–178.
  14. ↑ 14.0 14.1 14.2 "Outback station returned to traditional Aboriginal owners". Media release. Northern Land Council. 18 February 1999. Archived from the original on 12 February 2011. Retrieved 16 March 2010.
  15. ↑ Nash 1992, pp. 5–7.
  16. ↑ Nash 1992, p. 5.
  17. ↑ Nash 1992, p. 6.
  18. ↑ McLaren and Cooper 2001, p. 136.
  19. ↑ "Memories of the Stuart Highway". ABC Alice Springs (Australian Broadcasting Corporation). 1 August 2008. Archived from the original on 27 June 2012. Retrieved 24 September 2010.
  20. ↑ "Stuart Highway". Litchfield Council. Archived from the original on 5 October 2010. Retrieved 24 September 2010.
  21. ↑ Gray 1997, pp. 3–4.
  22. ↑ Gray 1997, pp. 5–8.
  23. ↑ Gray 1997, pp. 1, 14.
  24. ↑ Gray 1997, p. 17.
  25. ↑ Gray 1997, p. 70.
  26. ↑ 26.0 26.1 Parsons Brinckerhoff 2009b, p. 43.
  27. ↑ "NT property could be chosen as nuclear waste dump site". ABC Rural (Australian Broadcasting Corporation). 19 February 2010. Archived from the original on 23 February 2010. Retrieved 4 October 2010.
  28. ↑ Everingham, Sara (2 March 2007). "Division among Muckaty traditional owners". Stateline (Australian Broadcasting Corporation). Archived from the original on 6 March 2007. Retrieved 4 October 2010.
  29. ↑ Munday, Jane (21 January 2005). "Completion of the Adelaide to Darwin railway line". Year Book Australia, 2005 (1301.0). Australian Bureau of Statistics. Archived from the original on 28 June 2012. Retrieved 16 March 2010.
  30. ↑ Ferguson, The Hon. Martin (14 March 2012). "Nation Needs NT Nuclear Waste Facility". Australian Financial Review. Archived from the original on 26 August 2012. Retrieved 28 June 2012.
  31. ↑ Parsons Brinckerhoff 2009, p. 30.
  32. ↑ Gray 1997, p. 3.
  33. ↑ Parsons Brinckerhoff 2009, p. 82.
  34. ↑ "Tomkinson Creek Group". Australian Stratigraphic Names Database. Geoscience Australia. 18 February 2010. Archived from the original on 26 August 2012. Retrieved 28 June 2012.
  35. ↑ Parsons Brinckerhoff 2009, p. 77.
  36. ↑ 36.0 36.1 Gray 1997, p. 14.
  37. ↑ Scriven, NH; TJ Munson (2007). "Manganese in the sand and spinifex, Bootu Creek area, Northern Territory". In Munson TJ and Ambrose GJ. Proceedings of the Central Australian Basins Symposium (CABS), Alice Springs, Northern Territory, 16–18 August 2005. Special Publication 2. Darwin: Northern Territory Geological Survey. pp. 60–70. ISBN 978-0-7245-7112-3. Archived from the original on 28 June 2012.
  38. ↑ Parsons Brinckerhoff 2009, p. 83.
  39. ↑ Parsons Brinckerhoff 2009, pp. 83–84.
  40. ↑ Pavey, Chris (2006). "Night Parrot, Pezoporus occidentalis". Threatened Species of the Northern Territory. Northern Territory Department of Natural Resources, Environment and the Arts. Archived from the original on 28 June 2012. Retrieved 16 March 2010.
  41. ↑ Parsons Brinckerhoff 2009, p. 84.
  42. ↑ 42.0 42.1 Holland, Ian (2002). "Consultation, Constraints and Norms: The Case of Nuclear Waste". Australian Journal of Public Administration 61 (1): 76–86. doi:10.1111/1467-8500.00260.
  43. ↑ Keane, Bernard (22 February 2010). "How to site a nuclear waste dump". Crikey. Archived from the original on 5 October 2010. Retrieved 17 March 2010.
  44. ↑ "Statehood set back over radioactive waste facility". Media Release. Northern Land Council. 21 October 2005. Archived from the original on 12 February 2011. Retrieved 16 March 2010.
  45. ↑ Holland, Ian; Matthew James (29 January 2008). "Radioactive waste and spent nuclear fuel management in Australia". Background Note. Parliament of Australia Parliamentary Library. Archived from the original on 27 June 2012. Retrieved 16 March 2010.
  46. ↑ Wilson, Ashleigh (26 May 2007). "Owners offer land for N dump". The Weekend Australian. p. 11.
  47. ↑ Breusch, John (28 September 2007). "Nuclear waste dump option No. 4". Australian Financial Review. p. 20.
  48. ↑ "NT Govt Oppose Muckaty Dump". Media Release. Northern Territory Government. 25 May 2007. Archived from the original on 27 June 2012. Retrieved 16 March 2010.
  49. ↑ Statham, Larine (3 March 2010). "Nuclear waste dump is a duty: Ferguson". The Age. Archived from the original on 27 June 2012. Retrieved 16 March 2010.
  50. ↑ Senate Standing Committee on Environment, Communications and the Arts (18 December 2008). Commonwealth Radioactive Waste Management (Repeal and Consequential Amendment) Bill 2008 – Report. Canberra: Department of the Senate. ISBN 978-1-74229-033-1. Archived from the original on 28 June 2012.
  51. ↑ "McAdam goes out swinging over Muckaty dump". ABC News. 31 July 2008. Archived from the original on 27 June 2012. Retrieved 16 March 2010.
  52. ↑ 52.0 52.1 Murdoch, Lindsay; Tom Arup (27 February 2010). "Land owners out of mind, out of site". Sydney Morning Herald. Archived from the original on 5 June 2011. Retrieved 16 March 2010.
  53. ↑ Carrick, Damien (20 July 2010). "Muckaty Land Trust litigation". The Law Report (Australian Broadcasting Corporation). Archived from the original on 22 July 2010. Retrieved 19 August 2010.
  54. ↑ "NLC welcome Radioactive Waste Management law". Media Release. Northern Land Council. 23 February 2010. Archived from the original on 28 June 2012. Retrieved 16 March 2010.
  55. ↑ "Muckaty Station nuclear waste site". Stateline (Northern Territory) (Australian Broadcasting Corporation). 26 February 2010. Archived from the original on 27 June 2012. Retrieved 16 March 2010.
  56. ↑ Stringer, Rebecca (2007). "A Nightmare of the Neocolonial Kind: Politics of Suffering in Howard's Northern Territory Intervention". Borderlands ejournal 6 (2). Archived from the original on 25 July 2011.
  57. ↑ Hayward, Andrea (8 May 2010). "Nuclear waste dump report flawed: Greens". Sydney Morning Herald. Archived from the original on 28 June 2012. Retrieved 19 August 2010.
  58. ↑ Parsons Brinckerhoff 2009, pp. ii, 1, 77–88.
  59. ↑ "Environment—Commonwealth Radioactive Waste Dump—Proposed sites—Order for production of documents—documents". Senate Journal 115: 3301. 11 March 2010. Retrieved 27 June 2012.
  60. ↑ Gibson, Jano; Kirsty Nancarrow (24 February 2010). "Nuclear waste likely to be dumped in NT". ABC News (Australian Broadcasting Corporation). Archived from the original on 28 June 2012. Retrieved 17 March 2010.
  61. ↑ SBS Staff (8 February 2012). "Factbox: Muckaty Nuclear Waste Dump". Special Broadcasting Service (SBS). Archived from the original on 26 August 2012. Retrieved 22 July 2012.
  62. ↑ "NT landowners appoint firm to nuclear waste legal action". The New Lawyer. 27 July 2010. Archived from the original on 5 October 2010. Retrieved 4 October 2010.
  63. ↑ Bourchier, Daniel (3 June 2010). "Legal challenge to nuke dump launched". NT News. Archived from the original on 27 June 2012. Retrieved 4 October 2010.
  64. ↑ Farah Farouque (26 June 2012). "Nuclear dump court battle begins". The Age. Archived from the original on 27 June 2012.
  65. ↑ Whyte, Sally (20 November 2013). "Crikey Clarifier: should nuclear waste be stored at Muckaty Station?". Crikey. Retrieved 21 April 2014.
  66. ↑ Lee, Jane (3 June 2014). "Federal court case opens on Muckaty Station nuclear waste dump". Sydney Morning Herald. Retrieved 5 June 2014.
  67. ↑ Laughland, Oliver (19 June 2014). "Muckaty nuclear dump plan shelved by Northern Land Council". The Guardian. Retrieved 20 June 2014.
  68. ↑ "Muckaty Station: Northern Land Council withdraws nomination of site of first nuclear waste dump". ABC News (online) (Australian Broadcasting Corporation). 19 June 2014. Retrieved 20 June 2014.

Bibliography

External links