Examines the differences between Indigenous and non-Indigenous Australians, as well as differences by factors such as age, sex and, in particular remoteness.

Background

Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people live in all parts of the nation—from large cities to small country towns, from remote tropical coasts to the fringes of the central deserts. They speak a multitude of languages and belong to hundreds of distinct descent groups. The health and welfare of Indigenous people living in the big cities are different to those living in the Torres Strait, which are different again to those living on the outskirts of Alice Springs or those living in remote communities.

Currently, there are over 700,000 Indigenous people in Australia, accounting for 3% of the Australian population. They are the descendants of people who began to occupy Australia more than 50,000 years ago. At the time of European colonisation, an estimated 320,000 Indigenous people occupied Australia, the majority living in the southeast, and in the Murray River valley and its tributaries.

Colonisation severely disrupted Aboriginal society and economy—epidemic disease caused an immediate loss of life, and the occupation of land by settlers and the restriction of Aboriginal people to ‘reserves’ disrupted their ability to support themselves. Over time, this combination of factors had such an impact that by the 1930s only an estimated 80,000 Indigenous people remained in Australia.

Although hundreds of Indigenous people served in the Australian armed forces, especially in the Second World War, it was not until 1962 that Indigenous people had the right to vote, and not until 1967 that a national referendum recognised them as ‘people of their own country’, and included them in the national census. Also, it was not until 1992 that the High Court of Australia declared that the legal concept of terra nullius (‘land belonging to no-one’) was invalid as applied to Australia. The concept essentially assumed that Australia was unoccupied at the time of colonisation and that land could be acquired through occupation (or settlement).