Federal Resources Minister Martin Ferguson announced on Tuesday that he intends to pursue plans for a nationalradioactive waste repository at Muckaty, 120km north of Tennant Creek in the Northern Territory. It wasn't until the following day that he announced his intention to give himself sweeping powers to override state and territory laws and bypass federal environmental and Aboriginal heritage laws. Ferguson asserted that he was restoring ''fairness'' to the difficult issue of managing Australia's radioactive waste.

Elements of the minister's announcement do just that in particular the repeal of the 2005-06 CommonwealthRadioactive Waste Management Act, which permitted the imposition of a dump in the absence of consultation with or consent by traditional owners.

However, the minister's new legislation entrenches another unfair process which began under the Howard government. Section 11 of the National Radioactive Waste Management Bill 2010 gives the minister the power to override any and all state/territory laws which might impede his nuclear waste dump plans.

The bill also allows the minister to override the Environmental Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act and the Aboriginal and Torres Straight Islander Heritage Protection Act 1984 in relation to site selection. Ferguson is pursuing an approach scarcely less draconian than the Howard government's.

It is an authoritarian approach, not a fair or democratic one.

Ferguson falsely claims that Ngapa traditional owners support the nomination of the Muckaty site. He well knows that many of them oppose the dump - as well as numerous requests for meetings, he received a letter opposing the dump in May 2009 signed by 25 Ngapa traditional owners and 32 traditional owners from other Muckaty groups. When quizzed about the letter on ABC Radio on Tuesday, Ferguson quickly changed the topic.

Ferguson is also well aware of the unanimous resolution passed by the NT Labor Conference in April 2008 which called on the Federal Government to exclude Muckaty on the grounds that the nomination ''was not made with the full and informed consent of all Traditional Owners and affected people and as such does not comply with the Aboriginal Land Rights Act''.

And Ferguson knows that fellow ministers Jenny Macklin, Kim Carr, Peter Garrett and Warren Snowdon, among others, have acknowledged the distress and opposition of many Muckaty traditional owners. Traditional owners opposed to the dump will continue fighting to keep their country clean.

Muckaty traditional owner Dianne Stokes has been speaking against the proposal since its inception. ''We have been writing letters to the government body, signed by the traditional owners.

We have been asking for someone to come and sit with us so that we can talk to them face-to-face.

We want to keep talking about it and continue to fight it until we are listened to. The big capital NO.'' How should we handle the contentious issues surrounding nuclear waste? A little common sense wouldn't go astray.

Firstly, it needs to be shown that radioactive waste is not being produced unnecessarily.

Since the Lucas Heights research reactor is the major source of the waste in question, a government serious about waste minimisation would be exploring non-reactor options for medical and scientific applications. Another sensible minimisation strategy would be to curb the profit-driven overuse of diagnostic imaging technologies in private medical practices.

Secondly, all options for radioactive waste management need to be considered - not just ''remote'' repositories (always more remote for some people than for others). This includes the option of ongoing storage at the LucasHeights site, which is operated by the Australian Nuclear Science and Technology Organisation.

All relevant organisations have acknowledged that this is a viable option even Ferguson's own department.

Requiring ANSTO to store its own waste is the best and perhaps the only way of focussing the organisation's mind on the importance of waste minimisation principles. Thirdly, if a site selection process is required, it ought to be based on scientific and environmental criteria, as well as on the principle of voluntarism. When the federal Bureau of Resource Sciences conducted a national repository site selection study in the 1990s, the Muckaty area did not even make the short- list as a ''suitable'' site.

Natalie Wasley is a campaigner with the Arid Lands Environment Centre in Alice Springs.

Dr Jim Green is the national nuclear campaigner with Friends of the Earth.