NORTHERN TERRITORY: INDIGENOUS PARTICIPATION


The Northern Territory has one sixth of the landmass of Australia, but just one percent of the population with close to 30 percent of them Aboriginal peoples


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25. While the Territory is one sixth of the Australian land mass, it is home to just one percent of the Australian population. The proportion of Aboriginal peoples living in the Northern Territory relative to the entire Territory population is proportionally higher than in any other Australian jurisdiction at 29.8% (as at June 2011). However, at approximately 10% of all Australian Aboriginal people, it is arguable that a


disproportionate expectation rests on the shoulders of Northern Territory Aboriginals and those elected to public office to address so called Aboriginal matters .


There were an estimated 631,757 Aboriginal people in Australia as of 30 June 2011. Of these, 202,674 were living in New South Wales (NSW), or 32.1 per cent of the total Australian Aboriginal population. Only Queensland has a


comparable population, with an estimated 164,557 Aboriginal peoples living in that state. To put these results into perspective, there were more Aboriginal peoples living in NSW than the whole of South Australia, Western Australia and the Northern Territory (NT) combined (combined = 190,871, NT = 68,850). While the Northern Territory is a jurisdiction with only four MPs in the Australian


Parliament, Australia’s oldest (pre and post-colonial) jurisdiction, NSW with 60 MPs (48 Representatives and 12 Senators) and a larger population of Aboriginal residents, has no Aboriginal representation in the Federal Parliament, and has only ever had one Aboriginal member of its State Parliament. The NSW colonial Legislative Assembly became fully elected as long ago as 1856.


The Parliamentarian | 2015: Issue One | 35


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