Court orders traditional owners’ access to records over uranium royalties distribution

South Australia’s Chief Justice has ruled three members of a traditional lands association be allowed to inspect documents relating to the distribution of mining royalties.

Former Adnyamathanha Traditional Lands Association chief Vince Coulthard. Picture: Brad Fleet

The fate of tens of millions of dollars worth of uranium mining royalties will soon be revealed to members of the Adnyamathanha native title group, after a ­Supreme Court ruling that they get access to key financial documents.

South Australia’s Chief Justice, Chris Kourakis, last week ruled that three members of the Adnyamathanha Traditional Lands Association be given ­access to inspect and copy the ­financial documents of a “master trust” that has been used to distribute mining royalties to members of the Adnyamathanha native title group.

Chief Justice Kourakis also ruled that an inspector be appointed to investigate the administration of the master trust.

There are deep divisions within ATLA, with some members of the native title group calling for more transparency about how royalties from Heathgate Resources’ and Quasar Resources’ Beverley uranium mine in the northern Flinders Ranges are distributed.

The judgment says the royalty payments came to about $4m in the 2020 calendar year.

ATLA was placed under ­“special administration” by the ­Registrar of Indigenous Corporations in March 2020 in a bid to address what it deemed “chronic and severe’’ problems around record keeping issues relating to meetings, memberships, directorships and spending.

An issue of contention is that the royalties paid by the mining companies have been flowing through a company called Rangelea Holdings, which does not fall under the remit of the regulator, the Office of the Registrar of Indigenous Corporations.

In 2021 the then-registrar, Selwyn Button, told The ­Australian the directors of ­Rangelea continued to refuse to co-operate and open the books on what is likely to be “tens of millions” of dollars in mining royalties over more than a decade.

Former ATLA chief executive Vince Coulthard, who is a current director of Rangelea, said at the time neither the administrator nor the registrar had a right to examine Rangelea’s finances, and he would not be meeting with them.

“Rangelea is a company registered by ASIC, not by ORIC,’’ Mr Coulthard said.

“I don’t know why people are so interested in how traditional owners spend their money.

“ORIC is trying to dictate. They’re trying to become the protectors of Aborigines. Those days are gone. We’ve been down that road.’’

The recent court matter was brought on by ATLA itself and three members, Reginald Wilton, Sarah Taylor and Ivan McKenzie, who have now won the right to examine the books of the Adnyamathanha master trust, for which Rangelea is the trustee.

The court judgment documents the practice used to distribute the royalties, with the money divided among eight subgroups, and the funds being paid to the head or heads of each subgroup, who would then further distribute the funds among their members.

The judgment says three applicants told the court they had concerns the money was not being distributed fairly, and hence wanted access to the records. Mr Wilton told the court he had been paid amounts ranging from $90-$550 about every six months, “but that he was never provided with information about when payments could be expected or about the meetings of Rangelea’’.

South Australian Chief Justice Chris Kourakis. Picture: Dylan Coker

“Mr Wilton deposed that he thought he ‘was not getting paid right and that the payments were not fair’,’’ the judgment says.

“He understood that some traditional owners did not receive payments.

“Mr Wilton’s objective is to see ‘fairness and for the money to be distributed out properly and open the books for us beneficiaries’.’’

Mr Wilton told the court: “We never had any idea how much money the master trust was receiving or what Rangelea was doing with the money.”

Mr McKenzie, who is Mr Coulthard’s brother-in-law, told the court “that there were discrepancies in the payments of royalties between traditional owners’’ and “had historically received payments which he described as ‘good amounts compared to others’.’’

While making no comment as to how competently the funds have been managed, the judgment says there was “strong reason to exercise such discretions as there may be in favour of making the trust accounts of the master trust available to the Adnyamathanha applicants and ATLA and for the appointment of an inspector’’.

The judgment says that each applicant had in the past requested access to relevant records but that they were not supplied.

An argument put forward in defence of not releasing the records was that the trust was a charitable trust, not a private trust, and therefore had no beneficiaries.

The Chief Justice ruled that this was incorrect and, given that the applicants were beneficiaries of the trust, they were entitled to have access to its records.

The judgment also disagreed with a notion put forward that ORIC, as the administrator of ATLA, was improperly motivated in bringing the matter to court.

“Millions of dollars are paid annually to Rangelea by Heathgate and Quasar,’’ the judgment says.

“The native title rights from which that income is derived is the property of all Adnyamathanha common law holders.

“Yet Rangelea maintains that its management and distribution of funds must remain inscrutable to all but the select 24 and their ­alternates on the advisory committee and has refused to provide unconditional access to its trust account records.

“It is natural that persons in the position of the Adnyamathanha applicants would want to be properly informed.’’

Justice Kourakis says there is no reason to suspect they are ­motivated by a desire to replace Rangelea as trustee “other than insofar as that should appear to be necessary or if the proper administration of the master trust so requires it after production of the records’’.

“I have set out that the trust records will be made available to certain classes of persons who may then wish to seek relief from the court if they are dissatisfied with the administration of the trust,’’ the judgment says.

Justice Kourakis said he would order that Rangelea produce ­financial documents for the years ending 2018 through to 2022 and was “also satisfied that it is proper to appoint an inspector to investigate the administration of the master trust so that the secondary dissemination of the distributions made to subgroups can be identified’’.

Mr Coulthard was contacted for further comment.