UK returns indigenous remains to Australia

London's Natural History Museum has returned the remains of 37 indigenous Australians at a handover ceremony in the UK.

The ancestral remains of 37 indigenous people will be returned to Australia from London's Natural History Museum.

Narungga community representatives from South Australia, Douglas Milera and Professor Peter Buckskin, travelled to the UK to attend the handover ceremony on Tuesday night Australian time.

They received the remains of an ancestor who will be cared for at the South Australian Museum until the community is ready to conduct a reburial ceremony.

The SA Museum will also look after another seven repatriated ancestral remains.

The remaining 29 ancestral remains will go to the National Museum of Australia until the Ngarrindjeri, Far West Coast, Kaurna and Flinders Ranges communities are ready to lay them to rest.

"This return is a significant event for our country," Arts Minister Mitch Fifield said in a statement distributed in Australia.

He said the indigenous repatriation program had led to the return of more than 1480 ancestral remains, including more than 1200 from the UK.