Campaigner Noel Pearson believes ‘disgraceful’ government management has left Indigenous Australians the poorer with as much as $15 billion wasted over a 15-year period.

Talking to the Australian Finance Review, Mr Pearson said two big government funds set up to benefit Indigenous communities without native titler rights were badly managed over many years.

The co-founder of the Cape York Land Council told the AFR money had been wasted when it could have been used to benefit many indigenous communities.

The problem, he said, was due to Native Title groups growing income in trusts rather than distributing it to communities and he suggested more mono should be distributed annually.

“A scheme like that would enable a formula-based distribution rather than a discretion-based one,” he told the business newspaper.

“This would limit the capacity of trustees to make self-interested decisions.

“If you don’t have rules like that established from the beginning, then there is a likelihood that the stream is spent, as the money comes in and nothing is built, it’s just used on budget and consumption.”