This week ORIC participated in the AIATSIS Summit 2024 in Naarm (Melbourne).
The AIATSIS Summit is a forum for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Elders, leaders and youth along with native title stakeholders in academics, legal matters, the galleries, libraries, archives and museums sector, and government to come together and collaborate on issues that matter most Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people.
The summit also offers opportunities to support and strengthen Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander cultures, knowledge and governance.
ORIC hosted a stall for attendees to access information and support from us. At the stall we provided a range of fact sheets on governance topics we’re regularly asked about. We also assisted directors to connect with the Australian Business Registry Services to apply for a director ID, access and update corporation records on the Register of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Corporations, check their corporation’s status with annual reporting obligations, and ask questions about designing their governance rules and structures.
On Thursday we hosted a one-day workshop on Understanding finances for Indigenous corporations. We were pleased to offer this in-person training to people local to the Melbourne region as well as corporation people from across the country who were attending the summit. We’re pleased to share that all reported not only that they increased their confidence in financial terminology, they had fun while doing it. We strive to provide engaging and practical education experiences to build the capability of directors.
Our Registrar, Tricia Stroud, participated in a Native Title Expert Panel facilitated by Chief Justice Mortimer. The panel members were each asked to share their thoughts on key developments, bold ideas or what their role might be in native title 30 years from now.
Below we share the Registrar’s messages from that panel discussion.
ORIC’s vision is for well-governed and self-determining Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander corporations achieving their economic, social or cultural purposes.
ORIC’s role is as a corporate regulator for registered native title bodies corporate [also known as prescribed bodies corporate or PBCs]. Much of how I hope to see our role as regulator for the sector in years to come is reflected in the principles underlying our current regulatory approach. Our first Regulatory Posture outlines our commitment to risk-based regulation and is underpinned by:
- encouraging and supporting self-regulation and self-remediation
- recognising and respecting corporations as autonomous self-determining entities while holding firm that autonomy and self-determination have obligations – particularly to preserve the legacy of member-controlled corporations born from protests for rights and in the case of PBCs, to protect ancestral rights and interests in perpetuity on behalf of common law holders
- focusing regulatory action on breaches and failings that compromise the integrity of Indigenous member-controlled corporate governance
We believe the 5 key features of self-determining member-controlled PBCs are:
- Rule books are an instrument for cultural governance – they are clear on eligibility and whose mandate guides the corporation, and they appropriately reflect traditional governance and decision-making structures of the common law holders they represent. We respect that the detail of cultural knowledge and practices should not be in the rule book but the structures they inform could be.
- Members control the corporation – they are informed, engaged, meeting their obligations and exercising their rights.
- Directors have the mandate, confidence and trust of their members – they are duly elected, fulfilling their duties, and vigilant in their oversight of the corporation’s governance, purpose and financial security.
- Corporations self-govern and self-regulate – able to resolve disputes, complaints, governance flaws and accidental non-compliance with limited regulatory intervention.
- Corporate governance in a PBC is the governance of native title rights and interests – where the CATSI Act rules for internal governance provide a baseline for PBCs to extend or adapt with their cultural governance. The result being internal governance rules that uphold cultural governance and are not perceived as compromising or conflicting with the rules from the CATSI Act. There is less distinction between members and common law holders or between corporate matters and decisions, and native title matters and decisions.
Our aspirations for PBCs are to be self-determining and for our regulatory activities to support self-regulation. We recognise there is work for ORIC to achieve these things.
We also acknowledge there are matters outside of our control but which would greatly support these features:
- Legislation for Native Title and Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander corporations that better aligns with principles of self-governance and self-determination
- Native title consent determinations are clear and less ambiguous on how the common law holders are defined and therefore who the PBC is obligated to draws its mandate and obligations from.
7 June 2024