In 1976, the Commonwealth Parliament passed the Aboriginal Land Rights Act, which allowed for Aboriginal communities to be granted freehold title to land if they could show that they lived on the land for many years. Section 4 of the act gave the Minister for Aboriginal Affairs the power to establish Aboriginal Land Trusts to look after the title. The trusts would be established by publishing notices in the government gazette. In 1977, the old Petermann Reserve land was transferred to the Petermann Land Trust and to other Aboriginal land-owning corporations. The boundaries of the Petermann trust were first described in the "Gazette" on 21 July 1978. They were later made into law by Act No. 109 of 1985, which went into effect on 16 October 1985.