Wild Rivers bill reintroduced to Senate in Australia

(AAP) - Indigenous Australians with land rights in parts of Queensland will be able to start developing the areas should draft laws reintroduced to the Senate be passed.
Nationals Deputy Leader Nigel Scullion's original Wild Rivers bill was passed by the upper house in June last year.
But he had to reintroduce it to the chamber on Thursday because the draft laws weren't considered by the House of Representatives before the federal election and so expired.
Senator Scullion said indigenous people of Cape York, the Queensland gulf region and other areas of the state should be allowed to use or develop their land as they see fit.
"Our first Australians have steadily won land ownership only to see this land steadily locked up as national parks or reserves," he told parliament.
"This practice of denying Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people the right to control the future use, development or even protection of their land directly contradicts the intent of both the Land Rights and Native Title Acts."
Senator Scullion said the bill did not overturn the Queensland Wild Rivers laws.
"The protections, provisions and application of the Queensland legislation remain, except for the requirement that all existing Wild Rivers declarations are renegotiated and consent from traditional owners is obtained in order for the declaration to be ratified.
"If consent is not obtained, then the declaration would be revoked. Additionally, all the Wild Rivers proposals must have traditional owner consent prior to a declaration being made."
Debate on the Wild Rivers (Environmental Management) Bill 2011 was adjourned.