In 1995 the government launched an Inquiry into a tragic episode in Australian history - the practice of removing Aboriginal children from their families with the aim of assimilating them into Western culture. This practice went on throughout most of this century until the late 1960s.
To chair the inquiry, the government chose a former High Court judge, Sir Ronald Wilson, a West Australian who flew Spitfires during World War II, and then pursued a legal career with distinction.
By the time the Inquiry reported, an election had brought in the new government of John Howard. Their view was that Aboriginal interests had won too many concessions, thanks to an undue sense of guilt among white Australians, and they took steps to 'swing the pendulum back'. Then Sir Ronald's report, Bringing them home, landed on their desk. Its 680 pages told in heart-rending detail of the agony endured by Aboriginals as a result of government policy.
The policy was not just wrong, the report stated. It was 'genocidal'. This was not a judgement on the families and institutions in which the children had been placed-some were well cared for, though many were not. But the policy's aim was the disappearance of Aborigines as a distinct group; and this was genocide, as defined in the Convention on Genocide ratified by Australia in 1949. A national apology was called for, and measures for reparation.
Australians have grown up believing that Aborigines were altruistically taken out of wretched conditions, to be offered the immense benefits of white society. Now a National Inquiry was describing the practice in terms of a horrifying crime. For eight months the government made no response except to say that there would be no national apology, and no compensation would be paid.
Their silence was not echoed in the country. Bringing them home has sold far more than any comparable report. A shortened version has been produced, a total of 60,000 copies of the two versions are in circulation, and it is a frequent topic of media discussion. State parliaments and churches have held occasions to hear from representatives of their Aboriginal communities, and to ask forgiveness. Now the Government has announced that it will make available A$63 million over four years for counselling and family reunion services. Clearly it has been surprised by the response to the Inquiry's revelations.
One of those most affected has been Sir Ronald himself. 'This Inquiry was like no other I have undertaken,' he said. 'Others were intellectual exercises, a matter of collating information and making recommendations. But for these people to reveal what had happened to them took immense courage and every emotional stimulus they could muster.
'At each session, the tape would be turned on and we would wait... I would look into the face of the person who was to speak to us. I would see the muscles straining to hold back the tears. But tears would stream down, still no words being spoken. And then, hesitantly, words would come.
'We sat there as long as it took. We heard the story, told with that person's whole being, reliving experiences which had been buried deep, sometimes for decades. They weren't speaking with their minds, they were speaking with their hearts. And my heart had to open if I was to understand them.'
This was no easy challenge. 'I was Moderator of the Presbyterian Church in Western Australia at the time we ran Sister Kate's home, where "stolen children" grew up,' he said. 'I was proud of the home, with its system of cottage families. Imagine my pain when I discovered, during this Inquiry, that children were sexually abused in those cottages.' He and the Presbyterian Church have since apologized to the Aboriginal people.
As a result Sir Ronald has become a crusader. At the age of 75 he is stumping the country, drawing crowds in their hundreds. 'Children were removed because the Aboriginal race was seen as an embarrassment to white Australia,' he told an audience in Canberra, the national capital. 'The aim was to strip the children of their Aboriginality, and accustom them to live in a white Australia. The tragedy was compounded when the children, as they grew up, encountered the racism which shaped the policy, and found themselves rejected by the very society for which they were being prepared.'
His aim is to rouse a people's movement which will implement the recommendations of the report, beginning with an apology. 'An apology begins the healing process,' he says. 'Apology means understanding, a willingness to enter into the suffering. It implies a commitment to do more.'
He envisages a national Sorry Day at which, in town halls and rural community centres, police stations and churches, all who want to express their sorrow can meet with their local Aboriginal communities, and ask forgiveness. 'Then we can go forward together,' he says. 'The inquiry changed a hard-boiled lawyer like me, and it can change our nation.'
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