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Reconciliation

Reconciliation is a term which refers to a process whereby Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples, non-Indigenous Australians and the nation of Australia can forge a new relationship based on mutual understanding, recognition and respect.

The Reconciliation process began in 1991 with the formation of the Council for Aboriginal Reconciliation, mandated under legislation which set a 10 year timeframe to advance a national process of reconciliation. The Council's formation was an acknowledgment of the past and ongoing failure of government policy to recognise and address the cultural, social and economic needs of Indigenous Australians. It was also a recognition that progress also required a sea change in the understanding and involvement of non-Indigenous Australians.

Progress on the reconciliation process has been mixed.

The Council has had considerable success in putting the issue of reconciliation on the nation's political and social agenda, and mobilising significant public support for the process. This was demonstrated by the 250,000 people who took part in the Sydney Harbour Bridge Walk for Reconciliation, and the estimated one million involved in similar bridge marches around Australia.

However, judicial, legislative and political developments have impacted negatively on the reconciliation process.

Significantly, the reconciliation process has been impacted by the recognition in 1992, after 214 years, of Indigenous native title rights - overturning the legal foundations of Australia's colonisation. However, while native title offered a powerful symbolic and practical opportunity to build new relationships based on recognition and coexistence, the opportunity has been largely squandered. Instead, a fear campaign in the non-Indigenous community has led to political and policy responses based on restricting and extinguishing native title rights in a racially discriminatory manner. Increased community conflict and division has resulted.

The 1995 Bringing Them Home Report on the stolen generations also received a disappointing response from the federal government, which generated community division over the recommendation for a formal national apology to members of the stolen generations affected by past policies of removal. The Howard Government has stubbornly refused to issue such an apology and has also actively opposed legal test cases by stolen generation members seeking compensation for the devestating impacts of past removal policies on their lives. The proposal for a Reparations Tribunal to deal with stolen generations compensation issues and thereby avoid traumatising and costly court processes, has also been opposed by the Government.

In many ways, the failure of political leadership represented by such outcomes has encouraged action at the community level, resulting in what has been termed the 'people's movement' for reconciliation. The formation and success of ANTaR and the Sea of Hands, the Sorry Books campaign of 1998, and the extraordinary 'bridge marches' of 2000 are testimony to the importance and potential of community-based action in advancing reconciliation.

However, progress at a formal level remains thwarted.

Dismissing the rights components of the 'unfinished business' agenda outlined by the Council and Indigenous leaders, the Howard Government has proposed an alternative policy agenda - 'practical reconciliation' - in practice little more than a meagre rehash of the old policy framework of inadequate, paternalistic programs in health, housing, education and employment. That is, the provision of the basic entitlements of all citizens.

The 'unfinished business' agenda of reconciliation looms as the greatest challenge during the next stage of the reconciliation process.

At the end of 2000, the Council for Aboriginal Reconciliation released its final report, with recommendations stressing the need for comprehensive action to address the significant issues of 'unfinished business'. This included a recommendation that the government initiate a process to unite Australians by way a formal agreement or treaty. Indigenous calls for a treaty process in Australia had re-emerged during 2000, in part prompted by the Council's consultations over its final recommendations. Recommendations for a treaty process were also included amongst 14 recommendations on reconciliation in the Social Justice Report 2000, by the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Social Justice Commissioner.

In January 2001, the Council for Aboriginal Reconciliation was replaced with a new private body, Reconciliation Australia. Federal Government funding for the new body and for the reconciliation process as a whole has been dramatically reduced (Reconciliation Australia received a once-only seed grant equal to approximately six month's operation costs for the former Council for Aboriginal Reconciliation).

Criticism also emerged over the federal government's 'Reconciliation Place' (a combined reconciliation memorial and new premises for Reconciliation Australia in Canberra), because of inadequate consultation with Indigenous people and concerns about the depiction of the stolen generations.

Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Social Justice Commissioner, Dr Bill Jonas, in his Social Justice Report 2000, reported critically on the lack of progress in implementing reconciliation, commenting that "There is an urgent need for the federal government to commit, in meaningful terms, to the final recommendations of the Council for Aboriginal Reconciliation".

The Federal Government took almost two years to formally respond to the Council's recommendations. The Government's response, delivered in September 2002, was disappointing, confirming its 'practical reconciliation' agenda and rejecting most of the Council's recommendations, including those which set out processes for formally advancing the reconciliation process. Even before release of the Government's response, Prime Minister Howard flatly rejected the idea of even discussing the merits of a treaty process, branding the initiative as inappropriate and divisive.

Successive reports of the Social Justice Commissioner have commented adversely on the Government's response to reconciliation. Concern has also been raised repeatedly by the UN Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination (CERD). In its Concluding Observations on Australia in 2000, the CERD Committee cited the "loss of confidence" of Indigenous people in the process.

In view of such concern, the Social Justice Commissioner recommended that the Parliament conduct an inquiry into progress towards national reconciliation, particularly the response of the Federal Government. An inquiry by the Senate Legal and Constitutional References Committee was set up and presented its report to Parliament in October 2003. ANTaR's submission to the Inquiry can be found here. The Committee's report was scathing of the Government's approach to reconciliation, particularly its lack of consultation or engagement with indigenous people in developing its Indigenous policy.

Reconciliation has continued to languish at the national level and is now widely regarded as off the national agenda. Adverse changes to Indigenous policy made without Indigenous approval, including abolishing ATSIC (Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Commission), the national Indigenous elected body, and policy changes relating to the return of Indigenous programs to mainstream departments, have soured relations further and blocked prospects for progress on reconciliation at the national level.

Currently, moves are underway to work towards a National Reconciliation Convention in 2007 - 10 years on from the first Convention in 1997.

Further information:
Council for Aboriginal Reconciliation
Council for Aboriginal Reconciliation Final Report
Reconciliation Australia
Social Justice Report 2000
Social Justice Report 2001
Reconciliation: Off Track report
Why 'Practical Reconciliation' is Bad Policy
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