"Our nation Australia has reached such a time and that is why the parliament is today here assembled. To deal with this unfinished business of the nation. "To remove a great stain from the nation's soul and in the true spirit of reconciliation to open a new chapter in the history of this great land Australia.''


'We apologise'

"We apologise for the laws and policies of successive parliaments and governments that have inflicted profound grief, suffering and loss on these our fellow Australians," the apology read.

"We apologise especially for the removal of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander children from their families, their communities and their country.

"For the pain, suffering and hurt of these Stolen Generations, their descendants and for their families left behind, we say sorry.

"To the mothers and the fathers, the brothers and the sisters, for the breaking up of families and communities, we say sorry.

"And for the indignity and degradation thus inflicted on a proud people and a proud culture, we say sorry."

Yes Mike, and a moving speech to go with the apology and the scene having been set the day before I feel with his reference to it having taken until the 42nd opening of parliament (this one) to have an indigenous component in the opening.

My concern, and that was even also voiced by some indigenous people, is what comes next?, and their concerns that the apology/speech will just be words without significant improvements.
Sure, in his accompanying speech Rudd outlined goals on housing health and some education, but a lot has already been done in those areas, and is still being done, some rejected.

One thing for sure is that the expectations have been raised some notches.

I personally feel that there could always be a lot of problems whilst larger settlements remain and then what can be done for employment in those settlement areas, and that approach to housing needs to be addressed.

I also feel our parliamentarians and their advisors must be somewhat ignorant and perhaps they still suffer from what their forebears did in another way, or the reverse.
Our ancestors probably realised that the welfare of indigenous peoples had significant issues for the future, and sought to address it in what they perceived as their way of assimilation for the day, there having been some terrible stuff go along with it.
Now in a different way, we have the descendants saying we must pull the indigenous peoples up to our standards! - we have assimilated many different peoples here in Australia, and so why can't it be done with our indigenous Australians? - so is it here we go again with different terrible stuff?

On the indigenous front, SBS ran an interesting doc late last night - Kanyini - the word itself means "connection" and it focused with narration by an elder on how indigenous people have been disconnected from what they knew, and oh so true.
Earlier in evening there was an article on some indigenous tribes people in Africa still living a lot like they had always, and you couldn't but help to think what is right and what is wrong re what path should be followed for indigenous peoples in a modern world.

I suppose you could go on and on, and that is the dilemma re indigenous people and to me how do you determine what should be done when you have so many different tribes.

It is a moving speech, but as we all see on the news, some indigenous people need more that "Sorry", they have been taken something that no words nor money can repay...

Let's hope that they won't stop here with just saying sorry, sorry is not enough, it'll never be enough, if sorry can solve problems there will be no hate and anger in this world. But this is a huge step towards a better future for indigenous Australian..

__________________
cheap travel insurance in Australia