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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 1997 Week 8 Hansard (26 August) . . Page.. 2373 ..

Serjeant-at-Arms: Members, Mrs Yvonne Mills, as community representative of the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Consultative Council.

MRS MILLS: Mr Speaker, I appear before the Assembly this morning, on invitation, to address the matter of apology made by the Assembly in relation to the Bringing them home report. Mr Speaker, what I will share with you all this morning is aspects of my mother's life that will give you some idea of the past policies and practices that controlled and monitored her life as an Aboriginal living in the State of South Australia. I want also to share with you aspects of my life as a result of being removed - what it was like growing up in an environment where I was different; how I lived with the story that my mother did not want me; how ashamed I was of being a ward of the state and, dare I say it, how ashamed I was because my skin was dark and I was Aboriginal; and how, finally, I learnt the truth.

Mr Speaker, the former Federal Minister for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Affairs, Robert Tickner, announced a National Inquiry into the Separation of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Children from their Families on 9 August 1995. He said at that time that the inquiry was an important contribution to the reconciliation process. In the true spirit of reconciliation, I acknowledge the apology passed by the Assembly in June of this year. The announcement of that national inquiry sent a very clear message across the country to many indigenous people like me. The message raised several issues, from one that was more personal, which was to motivate ourselves into addressing the grief and pain that have been suppressed for many, many years, to the issue of accessing personal records, including basic human rights and justice. The terms of reference of the inquiry set down four main objectives. Of particular importance to me and my family was the first objective, which read that the inquiry would "trace the past laws, practices and policies which resulted in the separation of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander children from their families by compulsion, duress or undue influence, and the effects of those laws, practices and policies".

Mr Speaker, I have been a resident of Canberra and a member of the indigenous community here since 1978. I was born in Port Lincoln, South Australia, and I am an Aboriginal. The information I pass on to you this morning is based on my own experiences, the experiences of my eldest brother and sister as told to me by them, and the limited information I have managed to obtain from records held by the State Department of Family and Community Services.

Mr Speaker, my mother was an Aboriginal woman. I say "was" because she is now deceased. My eldest brother has agreed for me to speak here this morning about our lives. Throughout my mother's life, because she was an Aboriginal, she lived under various government policies and practices such as the protection era, assimilation and integration, and in more recent years self-determination and self-management. My mother was the eldest of 12 children. Her parents were from two different tribal groups - father from Kukatja and mother from Mirning. She was born at Koonibba Lutheran Mission in 1919. Koonibba is 20 kilometres west of Ceduna, just off the Eyre Highway. She was baptised in the same year and was later educated at

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