I would like to begin by acknowledging the Gadigal people of the Eora Nation, the traditional owners of the land we meet on today. I would like to thank them for allowing me to speak on their country.

The two reports launched in Adelaide today provide a scorecard on how Australian governments are meeting their obligations to ensure that Australia's Indigenous peoples can fully exercise their rights and interests.

I'd like to welcome the Human Rights and Equal Opportunity Commission to Arrernte country. In particular, I welcome Dr William Jonas, the Social Justice Commissioner. We are here this afternoon to launch the Social Justice and Native Title Report 2001.

The right of Aboriginal people to control what happens on their land was acknowledged in the Woodwood Commission report into the protection of Aboriginal land in the Northern Territory. The report recognised that ownership of land was a meaningless concept if the owners were not able to control access to their land.

Social Justice Commissioner Dr William Jonas… Minister John Ah Kit…Commissioner Hill …Professor Bin Salik … Ladies and Gentlemen… Good evening.

Both are written by Dr William Jonas, who is here today. As you would know he is the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Social Justice Commissioner.

This is an acknowledgement that has been made by many other speakers today, and to commence my presentation what I want to do is to reflect on what it means to provide such acknowledgement, because it has a lot to do with the topic for this session.

I would like to welcome you all to Parliament House this morning and thank you for coming along. I would like to acknowledge that we are meeting on Ngunnawal land, and I pay my respects to the Ngunnawal People as represented here by Matilda House.

The terms of reference for the inquiry into reconciliation that was established yesterday by the Senate directly responds to the concerns raised in my latest Social Justice Report to the Parliament.

1. In what follows I have not ventured into the history of proposals for a treaty between the aboriginal peoples of Australia and the Government of Australia. Others here will know this much better than I. Nor do I wish to suggest in detail what such a treaty might contain, if it were possible to bring it about. My purpose is to address the nature of treaties in international law, the possibility of treaties between state and non-state parties, and some contemporary forms of treaty-making in the international arena that might offer some helpful models or analogies.