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Board for the Protection of Aborigines
The Governor can order the removal of any child to a reformatory or industrial school. The Protection Board can remove children from station families to be housed in dormitories. -
Aboriginal Protection and Restriction of the Sale of Opium Act
Law that allows the ‘Chief Protector’ to remove local Aboriginal people onto and between reserves and hold children in dormitories. From 1939 until 1971 this power is held by the Director of Native Welfare; the Director is the legal guardian of
all Aboriginal children, whether or not their parents are living, until 1965. The legislation is subsequently imitated by South Australia and the Northern Territory. -
Western Australia Aborigines Act
Under this law, the Chief Protector is made the legal guardian of every Aboriginal and ‘half-caste’ child under 16 years old. Reserves are established, a local protector is appointed and rules governing Aboriginal employment are laid down. -
South Australian Aborigines Act
The Chief Protector is the legal guardian of every Aboriginal and ‘half-caste’ child under 21 years old. The Chief Protector also has control of where the child lives. The Chief Protector is replaced by the Aborigines Protection Board in 1939 and guardianship power is repealed in 1962. -
Northern Territory Aboriginals Ordinance
The Chief Protector is made the legal guardian of every Aboriginal and ‘half-caste’ child under 18 years old. Any Aboriginal person can be forced onto a mission or settlement, and children can be removed by force. -
NSW Aboriginals Protection Board
The NSW Aborigines Protection Board is given powers to remove Aboriginal children without a court hearing. This power is repealed in 1940, when the Board is renamed the Aborigines Welfare Board. -
Aboriginal Population
Aboriginal population is estimated to be at its lowest at 60,000 - 70,000. It is widely believed to be a ‘dying race’. Most Australians have no contact with Aboriginal people due to segregation and social conventions. -
Australian Aboriginal Progressive Association
Australian Aboriginal Progressive Association is formed in Sydney to oppose New South Wales Aborigines Protection Board. Its inaugural president is Fred Maynard. -
Federal Tax for Aboriginal People
Federal law for family endowment excludes Aboriginal people and instead payments go to Aborigines Protection Board. Aboriginal people are denied maternity allowance and old age pension. -
Conniston Massacre
Conniston Massacre in the Northern Territory. Europeans shoot 32 Aboriginal people after a European dingo trapper and a station owner are attacked by them.
A court of inquiry rules the Europeans’ action ‘justified’. Aboriginal people are refused legal aid by the federal government. -
Start of Assimilation
Queensland Protector of Aborigines recommends to the federal government that Aboriginal people be assimilated where they are in contact with European society and that inviolable reserves be established for tribal people. -
Assimilation
Under the Aborigines Act, Aboriginal people can apply to ‘cease being Aboriginal’ and have access to the same rights as ‘whites’. -
Western Australia Aborigines Act
Western Australia Aborigines Act is amended to permit Aboriginal people to be taken into custody without trial or appeal and to prevent them from entering prescribed towns without a permit. -
Assimilation Policy Starts
Aboriginal Welfare - Conference of Commonwealth and State Authorities called by the federal government, decides that the official policy for some Aboriginal people is assimilation policy. Aboriginal people of mixed descent are to be assimilated into white society whether they want to be or not, those not living tribally are to be educated and all others are to stay on reserves. -
Day of Mourning
150 years after European occupation the Aboriginal Progressive Association declares a Day of Mourning. An Aboriginal conference is held in Sydney. These are the first of many Aboriginal protests against inequality, injustice, dispossession of land and protectionist policies. -
Cummeragunja Walk-off.
he first-ever mass strike of Aboriginal people in Australia occurs, called the Cummeragunja Walk-off. Over 150 Aboriginal people pack-up and leave Cummeragunja Aboriginal Station in protest at the cruel treatment and exploitation of residents by the management. They walk 66kms and cross the border from New South Wales into Victoria in contravention of the rules of the New South Wales Protection Board. The opera Pecan Summer tells the story of the walk-off. -
WWII
World War II begins. Although Aboriginal people are not recognised as citizens, two Aboriginal military units are established and some Aboriginal people serve in other sections of the armed forces as formally enlisted soldiers, sailors or airmen. Aboriginal people serve in Europe, the Middle East, the Pacific and New Guinea. -
White Australia policy
White Australia policy succeeds: 99% of Australia’s 7 million people are white -
Medicial Certificate
Aboriginal children need a medical certificate to attend public schools. -
Commonwealth Citizenship and Nationality Act
The Commonwealth Citizenship and Nationality Act for the first time makes all Australians, including all Aboriginal people, Australian citizens. But at state level they still suffer legal discrimination. -
Right to enrol and vote at federal elections
Aboriginal people are given the right to enrol and vote at federal elections provided they are entitled to enrol for state elections or have served in the armed forces. -
Gwoya Jungarai
The portrait of Gwoya Jungarai (ca.1895-1965) of the Warlpiri people, Central Australia, appears on the 8 1/2 pence (8 1/2d) and two shillings and sixpence (2s.6d, issued 1952) definitive stamps. The stamps become widely known as “One Pound Jimmy” because when asked the price of his artefacts for sale he always replied “One Pound”. -
Formal schooling for Aboriginal children
The first formal schooling for Aboriginal children in the Northern Territory is provided. Lack of facilities is rationalised by the claim that children “beyond the age of 10 couldn’t keep up with white children anyway”. -
Commonwealth Electoral Act
The Commonwealth Electoral Act is amended to give franchise to all Aboriginal people, extending the right to vote to Aboriginal people in Western Australia, Queensland and the Northern Territory. The Aboriginal Affairs Act in South Australia reconstitutes the Aborigines Protection Board and South Australian Department of Aboriginal Affairs. The Act also limits mining on reserves by non-Indigenous people. Aboriginal people in Queensland, Western Australia and the Northern Territory are given th -
Integration policy
Integration policy is introduced, supposedly to give Aboriginal people more control over their lives and society. Northern Territory patrol officers ‘bring in’ the last group of Aboriginal people - the Pintubi people - living independently in the desert. They are relocated to Papunya and Yuendumu, about 300 kms north-west of Alice Springs. The Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanders’ Affairs Act, passed in Queensland, gives the Director of Aboriginal Affairs considerable power over ‘assisted Ab -
Walk off Wave Hill
Stockmen and women walk off Wave Hill cattle station owned by British aristocrat Lord Vestey, about 700 kms south of Darwin in the Northern Territory, in protest against intolerable working conditions and inadequate wages. They establish a camp at Watti Creek and demand the return of some of their traditional lands. This begins a seven-year fight by the Gurindji people to obtain title to their land. The South Australian Prohibition of Discrimination Act is the first of its kind in Australia and -
Commonwealth 1967 Referendum
In the Commonwealth 1967 Referendum more than 90% vote to empower the Commonwealth to legislate for all Aboriginal people and open means for them to be counted in the census. Hopes fly high that constitutional discrimination will end. It also empowers the federal government to legislate for Aboriginal people in the states and share responsibility for Aboriginal affairs with state governments. All states except Queensland abandon laws and policies that discriminate against Aboriginal people. The -
Aborigines Welfare Board in NSW is abolished
Aborigines Welfare Board in NSW is abolished. By 1969 all states have repealed the legislation allowing for the removal of Aboriginal children under the policy of ‘protection’. In the following years, Aboriginal and Islander Child Care Agencies (AICCAs) are set up to contest removal applications and provide alternatives to the removal of Indigenous children from their families. -
Policy of self-determination
The Whitlam Government abolishes White Australia Policy and introduces a policy of self-determination. The change means having the right to cultural and linguistic maintenance and management of natural resources on Aboriginal land. -
Aboriginal Tent Embassy
The ‘Aboriginal Tent Embassy’ is pitched outside Parliament House in Canberra, demonstrating for land rights. -
Commonwealth Aboriginal Land Rights (NT) Act
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First Aboriginal Australian to address the United Nations
Michael Anderson, one of the founders of the Aboriginal Tent Embassy, becomes the first Aboriginal Australian to address the United Nations. -
Aboriginal Land Rights Act NSW
Aboriginal Land Rights Act (NSW) recognises dispossesssion and dislocation of NSW Aboriginal people, sets up local-regional-State land council network with land tax funding as compensation. The Aboriginal Child Placement Principle, developed principally due to the efforts of Aboriginal and Islander Child Care Agencies (AICCAs) during the 1970s, is incorporated in NT welfare legislation to ensure that Indigenous children are placed with Indigenous families when adoption or fostering is necessary -
Royal Commission into Aboriginal deaths in custody
A Royal Commission into Aboriginal deaths in custody begins in response to high rate of Aboriginal incarceration and deaths. Imparja Television Company receives the first TV Broadcasting license issued to an Aboriginal organisation. ‘Goondiwindi riot’ results in the first public inquiry for the new HREOC - the Toomelah Inquiry which investigates the wider causes of racial conflict in New South Wales and Queensland border towns of Toomelah, Boggabilla and Goondiwindi. Significant resources are -
Native Title Act 1993
The federal government passes the Native Title Act 1993. This law allows Indigenous people to make land claims under certain situations. They cannot make claims on freehold land (privately-owned land). -
Going Home Conference
Over 600 people removed as children, from every state and territory met to share experiences, and expose the history of the removal of Aboriginal children from their families and the effects of this policy on Aboriginal people. -
National Inquiry into the Separation of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Children from Their Families
The National Inquiry into the Separation of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Children from Their Families is established to examine the effects of separation, identify what should be done in response, find justification for any compensation and look at the laws of that time affecting child separation. -
Bringing Them Home Report
Publication of the Report Into the Separation of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Children from Their Families, more commonly known as the Bringing Them Home Report. An abbreviated version is called ‘Bringing them Home - Community Guide’. The inquiry made 54 recommendations, e.g. reparations and an apology to Aboriginal peoples. -
Sorry Books campaign
Australians for Native Title (ANT) launches the Sorry Books campaign where Australians can sign who want to do something in response to the federal government’s refusal to make a formal apology to the Stolen Generations -
Sorry Day
Inaugural Sorry Day. The Bringing Them Home Report had suggested "to commemorate the history of forcible removals and its effects" on May 26 . Sorry Day offered the community the opportunity to be involved in activities to acknowledge the impact of the policies of forcible removal on Australia’s Indigenous populations. -
statement of deep and sincere regret
Federal Parliament issues a statement of deep and sincere regret over the forced removal of Aboriginal children from their families. -
Apologising to the Stolen Generations
The Australian Parliament apologises to the Stolen Generations. Both the government and the opposition support the apology and say ‘sorry’ to Aboriginal people who were taken away from their families from 1900 to the 1970s. The apology has no legal effect on the ability of Aboriginal people claiming compensation. -
Reconciliation Policy
March: Hamersley Iron and the Gumala Aboriginal Corporation finalise a unique regional land use agreement making the way of the $500 million Yandicoogina iron ore mine in the Pilbara region of Western Australia. The agreement was the result of 20 months of consultation and negotiation. 10 March: Alcan South Pacific Pty Ltd enters into a detailed Heads of Agreement with the Aboriginal community in Weipa, Cape York, for a proposed bauxite mining and shipping operation from Alspac’s existing minin