THE indigenous leader who brokered Woodside Petroleum's aborted $1.5 billion native title deal in the Kimberley says Aborigines are being condemned to live in poverty while the gas giant chases bigger returns for shareholders and high-profile environmentalists retreat to their "beautiful houses in Sydney".

Wayne Bergmann, the former head of the Kimberley Land Council, said it was "incomprehensible" that Woodside had last week abandoned the 2011 native title deal, saying the benefits package would have been life-changing for Aboriginal people.