The basic reason behind these shameful act of separation of Aboriginal and
Torres Strait children from their parents was an overwhelming and misplaced
sense of superiority of one race against another. Lack of respect for
language, culture, law and social structures, made it inevitable that when
there was interface between the races, there would be unbridled attempts at
integration. Non conformity to European standards would be seen as non
compliance with a universal standard, such was the overwhelming
ethno-centricity of the day.
Governments reflected these attitudes and discriminatory laws and practices
followed immediately.
Standards adopted by the dominant society which were based solely on
doubtful premises of economic, geographic and social progress would inevitably
lead to a collision of laws.
We would expect that the Governments which were the chief players in this
sorry story, would be willing to admit their grave deficiencies.
We the Priests and Brothers of the Society of the Catholic Apostate
(Pallottines) unreservedly apologise to all Aboriginal and Islander people who
have been taken from their heritage of family, community, culture and language
and in particular for any role which any of our group might have played in
such activities.
We hope that we are and will continue to do all in our power to remedy this
situation.
We promise to do all in our power to fight any measures by Government or other
agencies which would prolong or continue these shameful practices which have
shattered the integrity of Aboriginal communities and caused such hurt to the
resultant isolated individuals.
As a group involved in this area of activity, we will attempt to publicise the
facts and undertake to work with the wider Australian community to outline the
history of this practice, identify the flawed thinking behind it and attack
those community attitudes which allowed Government to carry out such
practices.
We undertake to scrutinise the behaviour of our group to make sure that we
will carry out this task in the most effective manner to highlight past
injustice and prevent any repetition of such harmful practices.
We freely admit our mistakes. Our attitudes were in some ways typical of
the prevailing mindset of the general population.
We also assert that in many cases our members were outstanding in their
approach to these matters. Their work on language, custom, the field of Social
Welfare and education of the wider community on the unique character of the
indigenous people and the almost intractable problems produced by cultural
conflict has had positive results in changing attitudes of the general
community which underpinned such practices and in some cases helped reverse
the legislation.
We would hope that the general community attitudes which certainly
tolerated and possibly even drove legislative and operational procedures, will
be clearly exposed, identified, acknowledged and corrected by a concerted
effort of government and those agencies with the necessary knowledge,
expertise, insight and moral courage to undertake this basic task. Without
this effort, history will not be acknowledged and the basic flawed thinking
behind these aberrations could well appear in other guises to the detriment of
our total community and the prolonged suffering of indigenous people.
We in no way wish to denigrate the memory of a dedicated group of men whose
sacrifices, good will and commitment to indigenous people is documented and
well appreciated by many people in the wider Australian community and by many
Aboriginal people. Without their efforts we are convinced the plight of many
Aboriginal people would have been considerably worse and In a society which
did not reckon Aborigines as part of the national census, the efforts of some
groups was even responsible for the very life of Aboriginal people. The
tragedy is that due to inadequacy and flawed programmes of government their
dedication was expended in ways which subsequent history has proved, did deep
and abiding damage. The tragedy is the lack of forethought and insight in
those who set the parameters of action. The present inquiry Is testimony to
this fact.
We see in our present society many examples of the ethno-centricity which
lead to these tragedies and an ongoing lack of respect for language, social
structures, law and culture which differs from the mainstream of society.
We acknowledge the richness of law, culture custom and social structure in
Aboriginal society and will do all in our power to spread this message in the
wider community to help further enrich the total Australian ethos.
In particular we reflect on and will endeavour to make our own the words of
Pope John Paul II which he spoke at Alice Springs in 1986 to the Aboriginal
people and said: