It is 40 years since the first land rights claim by Aboriginal people was instituted in Australia. It was dismissed: Milirrpum v Nabalco Pty Ltd (1971) 17FLR 141 (the Nabalco case). This loss was a great disappointment to those who had devoted their lives to claims that Indigenous Australians had land rights at the time of British settlement and that where those rights still existed they should be recognised and the land returned to that community