Speech given in the Great Hall of Parliament House in Canberra for Sorry Day 2007 (24.5.07)

Mark Bin Bakar

Chair of the Kimberley Stolen Generation Aboriginal Corporation
Deputy Chair, National Stolen Generation Alliance

"Institutional Deafness"

I would like to acknowledge the traditional owners of this area, the Ngunnawal people.

I would like to acknowledge my Elders, our Patrons (Lowitja O'Donoghue and Malcolm Fraser), and our politicians; along with the dignitaries from the international community.

Welcome everybody.

My own mother was taken as a three-year-old when she never returned from a visit to hospital, sent instead to an orphanage.

I dedicate this speak to my mother Phyllis and her to mother and to their community at Margaret river near Derby in the Kimberley.

Throughout the world many Indigenous peoples have been mistreated and humiliated through acts of dominance carried out by people and their governments who were essentially alien invaders. Australia is not any different to the rest of the world, except that we do now have the democratic ability to assist in healing by taking the responsibility as a country for the suffering inflicted on our Indigenous peoples; even though Aboriginal democratic rights has only been a political reality for the last forty years. Of course some people think that in itself is reason to celebrate; but the fact of the matter is that so much remains to be done.

In my home State of Western Australia the laws that enabled the authorities to remove children were established over a hundred years ago. Those laws and the related policies and practices remained effective for over seventy years. In WA alone, literally thousands of Aboriginal children were separated from their families and from their communities.

However, the issue of the "Stolen Generations" is not only about the children who were separated from their families and communities. It is also about the mothers who lost children. The countless mothers who have gone to their graves longing for their children and those who are still alive today, who still with earnest heartfelt desires to re-connect with their child or children who were taken. Something that is simply beyond their reach. This is the ultimate abuse of woman.

Shame Shame Shame

The impact on the children who were separated is substantial. Loss of family, both birth family and extended family. Loss of country and loss of knowledge of that country. Loss of languages and loss of the Dreaming, stories and songs associated with country. Loss of law and loss of culture.

The majority of all our social problems today are because of the breakdown of family structures, the loss of identify, a sense of ostracism by the broader society.

The most important thing any great leader can do is to heal their country and heal its people, thereby uniting the country into a oneness. We long for that special leader of Australia, who will one day show that leadership. As Indigenous people, we can wait and bear the pain, as we are numb from the ignorance of various administrations and are used to being last in line.

However, we are confidant that in the future; Indigenous and Non Indigenous younger generations of people who are and will be ashamed of our Australian past and who will lead this country into a new era that will forever seal the pride that we should hold united as Australians. We believe in the future young people that will one day be Australia's voice with a clear conscience. It takes time to relieve pain, we know.

History exists in people's intelligence; we need to learn from our past, and I hope that I can witness this in my life time.

One of the greatest things about history is that the truth will always prevail. Stories can be handed down and recorded, even changed, but you can not change the truth. We as Indigenous people of this country are fully aware of the atrocities and social experiments that had been carried out on our people.

Our old people never ever forget.

Our old people have witnessed many things; some remember the outcomes of that referendum, and some even remember the way things were before that.

We are now living in a time of economic prosperity. I come from the north of Western Australia and Perth is currently a boom town; with some people making millions of dollars from it.

I travel all over Australia; I have been to the big cities, but I have also traveled to many small towns and some very remote communities. Some of those communities are right in the midst of country where all of that wealth is coming from.

Yes, that is right and cause for reflection; because the wealth of Australia comes from the land. Gold from Kalgoorlie, iron ore from the Pilbara and diamonds from the Kimberley: with countless other minerals from all over the place. Aboriginal people are in all of those places, often in third world conditions. If we look back at the history of most (if not all) of those communities and towns – the removal of children was undertaken at the behest of Government policies.

As I move around those places I meet many people who were removed as children. I meet others whose parents, grandparents and even great grand parents were removed.

We cannot over estimate the impact of those removal policies on families and communities for generations. I think that this is something the Governments likes to ignore. I call it "Institutional Deafness".

These people are living like refugees in their own land.

When the Bringing Them Home report was tabled in Federal parliament in 1997, it was a watershed moment that provided a sea-change opportunity for many in the community, particularly for a lot of non-Aboriginal people who had no idea of this shared history. In the nineteen nineties Aboriginal people and their place in Australian society was very much a part of our national consciousness. We had the reports from the "Royal Commission Into Aboriginal Deaths in Custody" (from which come the whole concept of reconciliation); we then had the High Court decision known as "Mabo" (which led to a maelstrom of debate about Native Title); after that we had the tabling of the Bringing Them Home Report". This report touched an emotional nerve in the community that Deaths in Custody and Native Title could never touch. People could brush aside those things because they were outside of their experience, but the Stolen Generations issue was different because everyone has a Mother and most of us have children. Australians could connect with it emotionally and we saw that through a whole range of things.

Many were positive things, and some were negative. Who here today could forget that this period of our shared history gave rise to the ugly and dismissive term: the "Black arm band view of history"? That would make an interesting comparison with the holocaust deniers.

A decade later most of the report's recommendations have been ignored. Now, Stolen Generation people feel like they're the second poor cousins and it is really sad. Now they're becoming elderly people in our community and there's a feeling there that governments have just been sitting there, waiting for Stolen Generation people to die away.

The Bringing Them Home report was important and very accurate as a document but it's failed to make much difference for Aboriginal people. It has not lived up to people's expectations.

It's failed in a big way because everything to do with the Stolen Generation movement had been mainstreamed, meaning that Stolen Generation people themselves have missed out, have continued suffering after delivering their own personal stories to the report and not much has come out in a positive way for them. It is strange that good policy has not flowed from a report that got it so right. I honestly believe that there is more than ignorance involved in this, there's the fear of having to pay out compensation.

I am the producer behind "Mary G", a character based on the experiences of Stolen Generation women. Mary G, is a fantastic lady from the Kimberley. Mary came into my life one night when I was doing radio and she walked into the studio and kind of took over the show. Mary stirred up the whole community and everyone jumped on the bandwagon saying: "This is fantastic! We love Mary!"

The ultimate goal of Mary is really to rekindle and re-establish the reconciliation process and make Australia accountable for its past and to heal the country as a whole. The weekly program goes out to over one hundred community radio stations nationally and into most capital cities.

Mary is not a leader of Aboriginal people; as some people may want to label her. Nor am I, as Mary's producer, you know? We're not leaders. We are just doing a job, trying to make a difference for the goodness of our community and country, Indigenous and non-Indigenous; but coming from an Aboriginal perspective.

Having said that, it is absolutely fascinating to see how the work of Mary in healing and reconciliation has touched and moved people from all over the country. Mary receives hundreds and hundreds of messages and emails from people from right around Australia. Here are just a few of examples:

From Tyson in Roebourne: "Waiba Mary, You are an absolute legend and I admire all that you do, like giving it to the Pollies but with a bit of humor thrown in."

Candice From in Kuranda wrote: "Hey Mary! I listen to u every Wednesday night over here in Far North Queensland on Bumma Bippera! You are so deadly; I always have a good laugh for you when we drive in the car to pick my brother up from work!! You should visit FNQ some day; all them fellas will go mad for you!!!

And from Rosie in Canberra: "Hey Queen Mary, love ya heaps. My dad was also stolen, but my sister and I were lucky."

People love Mary and what she stands for. People are looking for change and they are looking for healing. As well as doing radio Mary does live shows and she sings.

Mary has given me permission to sing this to you today, although she is very jealous that I am here and not her!

The song is called "Calling".