WHEN pastoralist Linsday MacDonald talks about Native Title on pastoral leases, she talks about morality and honesty.

"Bush families are being made morally responsible for the rest of the nation," she says from her Blackall property, one of two belonging to her family under Native Title claim.

"To make Native Title on pastoral leases a part of the reconciliation agenda is intellectually dishonest, because reconciliation is a moral issue. Native title on pastoral leases is a legal issue."

The MacDonalds have felt powerless to make any improvements on their properties or to plan for the future since first being notified about a claim in September, 1996.

"As a family, it's something hanging over our head all the time. I feel we've been traumatised by it. It has been extremely stressful - the feeling of being abandoned by the nation."

Like many people on the land, her complaint is not with local Aboriginal people but with those she doesn't know making claims she doesn't understand.

"We try to have good relations with the local Aboriginal people," she says. "They often come to people's places - they often come to our place and we don't have a problem with that. They're our friends. But the claims are so broad and so wide-ranging. We're told they're ambit but we just don't know. They talk about exclusive possession and restricting our rights. Because there are no legal definitions and nobody trusts what people say anymore, it's hard to know what to believe."

Like many established grazing families, the MacDonals believed they had exclusive possession of their land.

Understanding an alternative view is not easy.

"All of our lives we've believed that two and two equals four.

"Suddenly, the court has said you were wrong, it equals five. We Can't come to terms with that."

Monto graziers Warren and Syliva McLachlan believe reconciliation between Indigenous and non-indigenous people will not be achievable while Native Title separates the groups.

The McLachlans, who drove from Monto to attend yesterday's forum, said speakers at the forum constantly spoke about uncertainty surrounding Native Title, which they believe is largely a myth.

Mr McLachlan said the myth of uncertainly over Native Title had been allowed to spread by politicians and rural leaders who had misrepresented Native Title to the bush.

He said very few of the Native Title claims lodged to date would succeed and many Aboriginal people, based on the advice of high-priced lawyers, were seeking rights there was no possible chance of them gaining.

Mr McLachlan said in several High Court decisions to date, the rights of pastoralists took precedence over Native Title rights and no grazier needed to worry about losing their property.

He said some pastoralists may eventually need to reach access agreements to allow Indigenous people to visit sacred sites on their properties but these agreements would not affect the rights of graziers to manage their rural businesses.

This article is reproduced with the kind permission of The Courier Mail.