MINING ROYALTIES FOCUS IN NEW TRUSTS LEGISLATION

GEOFF VIVIAN

From Port Hedland, Nyamal woman Sharon Westerman congratulated the WA Government for new legislation to regulate Charitable Trusts, which Native Title Groups often set up to handle mining royalties.

"It's not favouring these trustees because you've got companies that have got control over billions of dollars in mining royalties and basically the way it sits right now they can use it for just about anything they want,” she said.

Attorney General John Quigley introduced the bill this month after Ms Westerman’s concerns about the Njamal People’s Trust prompted him to set up an inquiry.

"A lot of the work that I did was around collecting that evidence, getting the evidence from community members, ensuring their voices were heard in the whole inquiry process,” she said. The evidence that was provided to the Attorney General's inquiry team was quite significant. There was a lot."

Ms Westerman said her participation throughout the two-year process came at a personal cost.

"As the person who was the public face of all that I copped a lot of the flak from the community as well. I was targeted a lot on a lot of things."

Mr Quigley said the final report into the Njamal People's Trust recommended a raft of reforms to the current legislation.

“The Charitable Trusts Bill 2022 addresses a series of gaps in the current framework identified in the Report,” he said.

Mr Quigley said under the existing law he had no power to summons anyone to give evidence about a charitable trust.

The legislation is expected to pass into law later this year.

Nyamal Aboriginal Corporation has declined to comment.