KEYNOTE ADDRESS BY

EVELYN SCOTT
CHAIRPERSON
COUNCIL FOR ABORIGINAL RECONCILIATION

AT THE
WHY RECONCILIATION CONFERENCE

HOSTED BY THE
MULTICULTURAL EDUCATION ADVISORY COMMITTEE (S.A)

TANDANYA CULTURAL INSTITUTE, ADELAIDE
FRIDAY 24 MARCH 2000

Thank you Professor Smolicz.
Mr Buckby, Ladies and Gentlemen, students.
Before I do anything else, I’d like to say a special thank you to you children from Kalaya, for your wonderful welcome to Kaurna land. I’m proud to be on your land, and honoured to be given such a warm welcome to it.
I’d also like to thank Professor Smolicz and his committee for inviting me to be part of this important conference. You know, I come to South Australia quite often, and I think one of the reasons is the enthusiasm for reconciliation I find in the State.
I see that enthusiasm and commitment especially in South Australia’s education systems, all the way from you students to to the top people in the administration of education.
Now let me get started with the job you’ve asked me here to do.
Why reconciliation? It’s a big question isn’t it, and I’m sure you’ll all enjoy working on your contribution to the answers during the day.
What I’d like to do is offer a few thoughts on the question from my perspective as Chairperson of the Council for Aboriginal Reconciliation. In other words, I’ll be looking at the issues from a national angle, but I hope you’ll find in what I have to say some useful ideas that can be applied in your schools and communities.
To my mind, the answer to the question "Why Reconciliation?" can best be found by looking at exactly what reconciliation is. What does it mean?
There are three main things to think about when you approach that question.
The first is a set of historical facts that shows us that the need for reconciliation has arisen.
The second is a more recent set of facts that shows us that the Australian people have recognised that the need exists.
And the third is to look at how our society has responded to that need – what are we doing about it?
You can trace the need for the process right back to 1788, when the British began the long process of colonising the continent we now call Australia.
On the 26th of January 1788, the British claimed sovereignty over the whole of mainland Australia.
By doing that, they put their own Common Law (as it’s called) above the traditional laws and customs of all the Aboriginal peoples who occupied the land when they arrived.
As the most important part of that claim, they denied the existence of any form of Aboriginal ownership of land. That was the original cause of the need for reconciliation.
The need grew stronger as each new Indigenous community was disrupted. Their people were taken from their traditional lands, their children were taken from their mothers, they were punished for using their own laws, cultures and languages. And their physical health was devastated by new diseases brought in with the settlers and convicts from another part of the world.
In time, the need took on another dimension. As the British way of doing things began to dominate, it became possible to see just how badly off Indigenous people were, as measured by the Europeans’ own yardsticks.
It wasn’t only the effects of settlement on health, of course. We now know that Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people are easily the most disadvantaged group in our society in terms of housing, education and employment as well. And along with all that, we have the indefensible situation where Indigenous people – kids in particular – make contact with the criminal justice system at a level that’s way out of proportion.
These injustices, these inequities, made up a real need for something to be done to repair relations between Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples and the wider society.
Then along came the realisation of that need. It’s a matter of debate when that started to happen. Some say the referendum of 1967 was the turning point. In that referendum, more than 90 per cent of Australian voters agreed that Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people should finally be counted as part of the population. They also agreed that the Federal Parliament should have power to make laws for Aboriginal people – a power previously held only by State Governments.
Within the decade after 1967 some important things happened – like the Racial Discrimination Act in 1975, the Northern Territory land rights law in 1976, and the beginnings of federal programs trying to deal with the disadvantages of Indigenous people that I mentioned a moment ago.
That was part of Australia’s realisation of the need for reconciliation – it was the recognition of the desperate plight, in social and economic terms, that many modern-day Indigenous people found themselves.
And in that Northern Territory land rights legislation, we saw the beginnings of another recognition that was necessary before reconciliation could really be attempted.
That is, more and more people began to see the links between past injustice and present disadvantage, and they began to see just how important traditional lands and waters were to the cultural identity of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people.
Many of those links, between the history of cultural, economic and physical mistreatment and the present pain of social and economic disadvantage, were laid out in full detail for the first time in 1991 probably around the time that many of you were just starting school. That was in the report of the Royal Commission into Aboriginal Deaths in Custody.
The very last recommendation of the Royal Commission was that the nation should attempt a formal process of reconciliation, and that’s where the Council for Aboriginal Reconciliation comes into the story.
Soon after the Royal Commission reported, Federal Parliament voted unanimously to set up the Council, with a fair spread of Indigenous and non-Indigenous members and a fair spread of people from different walks of life.
Now we’re nine years down the track, and my Council has only a few more months before we go out of existence on January the first next year – the Centenary of Federation.
So what has the Council, and the nation, actually done so far in its quest for reconciliation?
One of the Council’s problems in its early years was that there were still a lot of Australians who could not see the need for reconciliation. People had to be told more about their own history. If they knew the full story, Indigenous and non-Indigenous Australians would be better able to come together – to be reconciled – and forge a united future.
This is an area where I think we’ve made a lot of progress, and for a number of reasons, so I want to talk for a couple of minutes about why I think that.
Some of the reasons for our improved understanding of Indigenous issues stem from the work of the Council for Aboriginal Reconciliation, and through other significant and remarkable events.
One such event was in 1992, with the High Court’s famous decision in the Mabo case. As you probably know, the court decided in that case that the British were wrong when they made that assumption, back in 1788, that no-one owned the land they were colonising.
Indigenous peoples did own the land at the time, and Eddie Mabo and his friends still own their land on Murray Island which is an island in the Torres Straits - under what the court described as native title. What’s more, similar native title probably still existed in some other parts of Australia where Indigenous peoples could show a continuous cultural association with the land.
Of course not many Aboriginal people could, because of the long history of forced removal from their traditional lands, but the judgment certainly made a lot of Australians sit up and take notice. It was a great breakthrough.
Among its other ramifications, the judgment was supremely important in telling all Australians that they had an Indigenous heritage; that Indigenous law and culture not only had existed, but did still flourish, at least in some communities.
The other big outside event that helped my Council’s work came in 1997, when the nation heard the full story of what we now know as the "Stolen Generations".
Many, many Australians had no idea about the full extent of this practice of taking children from their Indigenous mothers and sending them to institutions. They had no idea that the practice went on for many decades, and they were very saddened when they heard about the terrible effects it had on the thousands of families that suffered it.
The practice was tragically misguided, but its public exposure in 1997 again, like Mabo, forced many Australians to think a little harder about their own history, to reflect on how the last two centuries might look through the eyes of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people. Once again, and through this tragic part of our history, people recognised the need for reconciliation.
Meanwhile, the Council for Aboriginal Reconciliation continued to bring about reconciliation between Indigenous peoples and the wider Australian community.
Some of what we’ve done has been up-front and widely publicised. Other things, we had to work for quietly and patiently, helping to build co-operation between other groups who could really get something practical done.
I think one of the most important decisions the Council has made was back in 1993, when it decided to set up and support a genuine People’s Movement for Reconciliation.
When people in local communities get together to hear each other’s stories, to understand each other’s cultures, to work through the issues that concern them – then they’re paving the way for real reconciliation in their own backyards.
It’s been one of the big jobs of my Council to get this message through to communities all over Australia, and to support local communities when Indigenous and non-Indigenous people do get together.
From small beginnings in 1993, there are now hundreds of local reconciliation groups all over Australia, quietly but effectively creating understanding where there was ignorance, co-operation where there was antagonism, and most impotantly, bringing together people who, in their everyday lives may never have met.
This community-based commitment has spread through churches and other faith groups, into workplaces and a variety of other organisations.
The People’s Movement for Reconciliation is now a powerful force within Australian society.
Those local groups, like gatherings such as today’s, inspire me and my colleagues on the Council. They help to keep us motivated and moving forward as we strive to maintain the momentum for reconciliation at the national level.
A much more publicised initiative of the Council is our proposal for a National Document for Reconciliation, to be embraced by the nation as a highlight of our celebrations of the Centenary of Federation.
The idea of a formal document was an option that Parliament specifically asked the Council to look at.
We have looked at it and we concluded that a reconciliation document could truly uplift and unify the nation. We think a document can celebrate the achievements of reconciliation so far and shine a bright light on the path ahead for all parts of Australian society.
We’ve spent several years talking to the Australian people about what might be in such a document, and many months of hard, careful thought have gone into its form and its wording.
You may have seen our first version of the draft document that we released for public comment last year. In fact I do hope you’ll find some ideas in there that you can adapt for your own purposes in the Charter you’ll be working on this afternoon.
I can tell you that many local communities around Australia have adopted their own agreements or charters on reconciliation, and they are proving to be useful both in practice and as symbolic statements of unity between Indigenous and non-Indigenous members of those communities.
You may have also read recent media reports, suggesting that Australians may not quite be ready for the national commitment that we propose.
Those media reports were based in part on some research that the Council itself commissioned, and I want say just two things about that.
First, the research findings contain a lot of very positive and encouraging results as well as the negatives that the media, reported on. I’ll come back to a couple of the findings in a minute.
Second, the Council for Aboriginal Reconciliation is definitely pressing ahead with plans to launch our final proposals for the document, at a big event called Corroboree 2000 in Sydney at the end of May.
It’s then up to the nation – its people and its Parliaments – to make the contents of this document a living reality. I believe, and I certainly sincerely hope, that Australia will rise to the challenge and make what would be a proud statement about its mature national identity.
Having said that much, I’m afraid you’ll have to wait ’til May to find out about our final proposals.
Finally I want to say something about those recent research findings of ours – something that I hope will give you plenty of encouragement for what you’re doing here.
In 1992, the Council took an opinion poll which suggested that just 42 per cent of Australians thought reconciliation was a significant issue.
In our research earlier this year, 81 per cent of the people surveyed believed reconciliation was an important issue for Australia. We’ve come a long way in eight years!
More specifically, there is a trend in our research data that gives me a lot of encouragement.
It’s the tendency for young people to be noticeably more positive about reconciliation and about issues such as the recognition of Indigenous rights and the special place of Indigenous peoples in the heritage of this country.
For example, 57 per cent of the overall population favour a document of reconciliation. The proportion who favour a document among 18 to 24 year-olds is 72 per cent. That’s a very big difference.
And again, a very disappointing 38 per cent of all people recognise the connection between current disadvantage and the way Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people were mistreated in the past. In the 18 to 24 years group, that recognition factor is 51 per cent.
So it goes on. It seems that young people are more aware of the real issues involved in reconciliation, and they want it to happen in their own communities as well as in the nation as a whole.
This may well have something to do with what young people are learning about Indigenous issues – and Australian history – in schools today.
I’d be very interested to hear your thoughts on the way you are taught history, but I have no doubt it’s a lot more balanced and accurate than it was less than one generation ago.
In any case, gatherings like yours today will reinforce that trend I was talking about, and for that reason if no other I’d like to thank you all for being here and listening to me trying to explain a topic that some people find pretty complicated.
You’re playing a constructive part in building up knowledge, understanding and trust between Indigenous and non-Indigenous Australians.
Knowledge, understanding and trust:– they are basic building blocks for the ultimate success of reconciliation and the creation of a more just Australian society.
I hope each and every one of you gains a lot from today’s discussions, and please, take whatever you gain with you, to help your families, friends and neighbourhoods to a better appreciation of what reconciliation is all about.
Thank you.
But what’s important now is that you people. the people going through our schools today, are probably better equipped to understand and deal with the issues involved in reconciliation than any previous generation of Australians.
That’s because at long last, our schools have started to offer students at least some insight into Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander history and culture. The shared history of the last two centuries is being put into perspective – the perspective of the previous 40,000 years of Indigenous custodianship of this land, and the perspective of Indigenous experience, as well as European experience, of the last two centuries.
That’s a great breakthrough in our education system, and it’s happening at the tertiary level as well as in schools.
And I’m very pleased that the breakthrough was really reinforced in recent months. Australia’s two biggest non-government school systems, the Catholic and the Independent schools, both made national commitments that will increase the quantity and quality of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander studies courses, and promote the ideals of reconciliation in their schools.
So, we’re moving in the right direction, and I have no doubt that your Convention will add more to the momentum towards reconciliation among young Australians.

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