In a test case, the eight Aborigines, who worked on the Lutheran Church-run Hopevale and Wujal Wujal missions between 1975, when the Racial Discrimination Act was introduced, and 1986, appealed against a decision by Justice John Dowsett in August last year in which he found the Government had not been in breach of the act in underpaying the workers.

The Queensland Government has acknowledged that until 1986 Aborigines were not paid award wages, and offered a $7000 one-off payment to those who had worked on government-run missions. But the Government refused to extend it to church-run missions, claiming the churches were responsible for the underpayment of wages.

In upholding the appeal against the Dowsett judgment, Justice James Allsop said it was difficult to accept that any discrimination was not "based on race".

He said the Government paid award rates to its workers who were not on Aboriginal missions. "It was a factual circumstance relevant to what had been exposed for trial - that the calculation and payment of the grants (paid by government to missions) involved a distinction based on race. There was no suggestion the missions were for non-indigenous Australians."

Hopevale residents were buoyant yesterday. Great-grandmother Ella Woibo, 73, recalled the long years she and her husband struggled to feed and clothe their eight children. She was one of the eight litigants who will receive the money, which she earned as a health clinic nurse.

"My husband and I took every little job that came past to make ends meet," she said.

Mrs Woibo said she did not know at the time that she was receiving only a fraction of the salary she was owed.

Karen Gordon, 43, was 17 when she began work at the Hopevale post office. She said she was "happy in a way, but sad, because some of the people that were fighting with us have passed away".

Mrs Gordon, who runs a children's health program at Hopevale, said she was living with her parents during her time at the post office and the money she received was just enough to contribute to family meals.

Wujal Wujal Mayor Desmond Tayler, whose uncle Frank Tayler will be paid back wages, said the court victory was "a shot in the arm for people not fairly paid when the community was still a Lutheran Mission".

Hopevale Mayor Greg McLean said he asked Queensland Premier Peter Beattie months ago to pay members of his community the $7000 he paid the others.

"He said he would wait for the court decision, and now they will get five times that much", Mr McLean said.