On June 30th, 1993 (before the Native Title Act became law in December 1993) the Wik Peoples made a claim in the Federal Court of Australia for recognition of native title rights over land on Cape York Peninsular in Queensland.
The Thayorre People joined the action, claiming native title rights to an area partly overlapping the Wik People's claim. The land claimed by the Wik Peoples and the Thayorre People included land where two pastoral leases were granted by the Queensland government.
The Wik Peoples and the Thayorre People argued that 'native title' co-existed with the pastoral leases.
On January 29, 1996, Justice Drummond in the Federal Court made a decision that the claim of the Wik and Thayorre Peoples could not succeed over the areas as they were subject to pastoral leases. The Judge's reason was that he considered that the grant of pastoral leases under Queensland law extinguished any native title rights.
The Wik People went to the High Court to appeal that decision. The appeal was against answers which Justice Drummond had given to several legal questions.
The most important of those questions related to the two pastoral leases. The question asked in the case of each pastoral lease was:
"Does the pastoral lease confer rights to exclusive possession on the grantee (i.e. the pastoralist)?"
The High Court in their judgement, handed down in late 1996, said:
The High Court did not make a decision in the Wik case about what native title rights the Wik Peoples or the Thayorre People have, but because of its judgement, the Wik People were able to then go to the Federal Court and present evidence to prove their native title rights. The High Court in the Mabo case said that native title rights must be proved by evidence of the customs and traditions of the native title claimants.
And the High Court decision opened the door for other groups to seek recognition of their native title rights through the Federal Court.
Earlier in 1996 there had been a change of government at the Federal level, so immediately following the release of the High Court Wik judgement, the Coalition parties began spreading misinformation throughout the community that people were going to lose their backyards, and that 70% of the Australian continent would be controlled by Indigenous people.
The debate around Native Title galvanised a grassroots movement of people concerned to see that the rights recognised by the High Court were not extinguished or diminished.
Several groups were formed to educate the wider community about what Native Title really meant, groups such as Women for Wik, WikEd, and Landowners for Native Title.
Existing local reconciliation groups found new energy for their educational activities within their communities, and new groups formed with the issue of Native Title as their main focus
e.g. Australians for Native Title & Reconciliation (ANTaR) and Australians for Native Title (ANT).