INformation
Jingeri Danggan Balun Mibin!
This page is repository of information for claimants, below you will find some background and privy information only claimants should be accessing.
Native Title
A Native Title Claim is a court case against the State, like any court case an Applicant (Us) puts forward a statement of claim (our Native Title claim) against the Respondent/s (The State), we are seeking a judgement that we have Native Title, these are legal proceedings and are to be taken very seriously. Danggan Balun is seeking a Consent Determination, if we are successful the case will not need to go to trial. To get a Consent Determination, the State must consent to our claim, in order to do this they must have the evidence that we are indeed the people of this country and that we have maintained our society since colonisation. The evidence we need to submit includes our genealogies, affidavits of our community knowledge, historical material, and a connection report that explains our evidence to the Court. Please read the below information carefully and if you are able to contribute to the evidence gathering, please fill out the form below.
Genealogies
When our claim was filed, we defined our Danggan Balun Claim Group with 19 Apical Ancestors, in addition to naming our old ones we must also provide evidence that they are our ancestors. These are our genealogies, and these family trees are a vital part of the evidence. If your family have not already done so, please contact Susan O’Brien at QSNTS to provide your family trees. Her email is: susan.obrien@qsnts.com.au
Community Knowledge
Community knowledge is information, practises, stories, and other topics that relate to our culture, ways of living, beliefs, etc. This information is typically provided in the form of an affidavit. Affidavits may be quite large or even a few pages, all information is appreciated. If you or someone you know believes they’d be suitbale to provide an affidavit please fill out the form at the bottom of the page.
Historical sources
Historically source material is done by the specialist team at QSNTS, but claimants can assist by forwarding any useful documents such as birth, marriages or death certificates to our researchers.
Connection Report
The connection report is also prepared by the expert witnesses, this is essentially an academic paper that tells our story (as it relates to Native Title) to the court, this report will use our affidavits, genealogies, and historical sources as references in the report to prove our connection, so it is important the team preparing the report have as much information as possible.
Current Status:
Draft Connection report due in October
Cultural Heritage
The filing of our Native Title Claim made us the Native Title Party for the area, which designates us the Aboriginal Party for matters under Queensland’s Cultural Heritage Act 2003. The Danggan Balun Applicant has been fielding Expressions of Interests for Cultural Heritage Workers and Co-Ordinators, please go to the Claimant Material page for the EOI forms if you are interested.
The Cultural Heritage work is vital for the protection of our heritage and sacred sites, in addition it supplies some employment opportunities, and a source of income for the Claim Group; money earned from Cultural Heritage has been invested in a Danggan Balun Trust Fund
Trust fund amount (as at June, 2019):
$53’000
Cultural Heritage Projects
Information about Cultural Heritage Projects is regularly updated, search the projects below!
Proscribed body corporate (PBC)
Our Native Title, once recognised, will need to sit with a Corporation. The Applicant has incorporated the Danggan Balun Aboriginal Corporation (DBAC) to serve as our future PBC, this will also be the Cultural Heritage body, and submissions to the Minister will be made soon.
Current Status:
DBAC incorporated 24th June, 2019
Got a question? Want to contribute to the research?
Fill out the form below and we’ll be in touch!