Forrest at legal loggerheads with WA over native title

In documents filed with the High Court, the WA State Solicitors Office argues the Fortescue application should be dismissed because of major flaws in the Fortescue case.

Fortescue is fighting Federal Court rulings which effectively mean the company built its Solomon iron ore mining hub in WA's Pilbara region without agreement with the native title holders.

In October, five Federal Court judges unanimously threw out a Fortescue appeal against a 2017 ruling which paved the way for the Yindjibarndi to launch a separate compensation claim that could run into hundreds of millions of dollars.

Fortescue chief executive Elizabeth Gaines said the WA Government's opposition would not sway the company in trying to have the previous court rulings overturned

"It doesn't change anything for us. We still think there are important points of law that need to be addressed," she said.

The 2017 Federal Court ruling granted exclusive native title over 2700 square kilometres to the Yindjibarndi, effectively recognising them as private owners with a spiritual connection that allowed them to decide who came onto the land.

Fortescue has said the Federal Court rulings lower the bar for what is required to establish exclusive possession under native title and that the rulings have potential implications for future mining, agriculture and tourism development.

In its application to the High Court, Fortescue says the special leave question it wants resolved is whether it is necessary for a claimant group like the Yindjibarndi to "demonstrate on the evidence an ability to effectively exclude all others, or whether it is is sufficient to prove an ability to exclude people from neighbouring Aboriginal groups".

The WA State Solicitors Office says: "Special leave should be refused because the way in which the question is farmed wrongly assumes that 'native title rights and intersts' may only be demonstrated by evidence of an ability to exclude others from the land."

YAC is preparing its response to the Fortescue application and has foreshadowed launching a major compensation claim if the Federal Court rulings stand.

Mr Forrest indicated at the recent Fortescue annual general meeting that he had no intention of reaching a financial settlement with YAC and claimed Roebourne, the town where the community is based, was suffering from alcohol and drug abuse and "wanton misbehaviour".

"That is not a community I'm going to empower with tens of million of dollars of your cash," he told shareholders.

Mr Forrest, who has been accused of dividing the community by supporting a breakaway group know as the Wirlumurra Yindjibarndi Corporation, was embraced and thanked by several Aboriginal people on Tuesday as Fortescue marked the graduation of its latest batch of apprentices.