Documents of ReconciliationDocuments of Reconciliation > Policy > Briefing Paper > Council's work on documentsThroughout its life the Council has consulted widely on the issue of documents of reconciliation and has developed some major projects designed specifically to stimulate informed discussion. A brief summary of the main activities follows, and it should be said that the large amount of input from this process is closely reflected in Council's proposals (reported later in this document) on the form and content of national documents. 1. Key IssuesNumber seven of Council's early `Key Issues' booklets was called "Agreeing on a Document". Council invited people to respond to this publication with written submissions, and had the responses assembled and analysed by consultants. 2. Social Justice ConsultationsIn 1994 the Council and ATSIC were asked to report on ways to advance the cause of social justice for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples. Extensive consultations with Indigenous communities and organisations fed in to the submissions of both the Council and ATSIC in 1995. Documents of reconciliation was one of the issues discussed in those consultations, and the Council made recommendations to government on the question as a result. 3. 1997 Australian Reconciliation ConventionThe reconciliation convention saw 1800 participants come together from all sectors of the community for three days in May 1997 in Melbourne, seeking to advance reconciliation as a positive process for the whole community. The convention was not limited, however, to those who attended. It commenced as a series of community meetings which took place in the year leading up to the convention. More than 100 meetings involving more than 10,000 Australians took place around the country, and provided valuable input to Council on many issues including the documents question. During this lead-up period, the Council widely distributed a questionnaire to gather people's views on reconciliation, including questions on a national document, the Constitution and local and regional reconciliation agreements. More than 4,000 people responded to the questionnaire. A total of 32 seminar workshops were held during the convention and a number of them produced propositions relevant to our consideration of documents of reconciliation. Very high levels of support for documents of reconciliation were evident at the convention and in all of Council's preliminary work.
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