LETTER FROM SYDNEY
They have remained in Australia's collective memory as the "Stolen Generations." Between 1910 and 1970, the authorities forcibly removed tens of thousands of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander children from their parents, placing them in institutions or with white foster families as part of official assimilation policies. Former prime minister Kevin Rudd condemned a "blemished chapter in our nation's history" in 2008. However, half a century after the Stolen Generations ended, other reasons are still causing Aboriginal Australians to have their children removed by child protection services at an alarming rate. These services, in the eastern state of New South Wales in particular, have been the subject of fierce criticism.
On May 2, this state's inhabitants discovered yet more shortcomings in the interim report published by the Advocate for Children and Young People, an independent administrative authority that had investigated emergency accommodation in hotels and other local temporary shelters. In this document, minors testified to having been left to their own devices, lumped in with potentially dangerous people, or even to having been sexually assaulted. One of them said he had felt like "a dog in a pound, moving from cage to cage." A few days earlier, a children's court heard the striking story of a six-year-old Aboriginal boy. Placed in care for half of his short life, the boy, to whom the courts had given the pseudonym "Ray," had been moved around repeatedly – up to 26 changes of place of residence in one year – was denied dental care despite teeth full of cavities, and was found to have a worm-infested intestine.
"We have begun the work to repair the system, but we have a long road to travel," defended the state's families and communities minister, Kate Washington, on May 2. These reforms are all the more essential for Indigenous people, given that their children, who account for just 4.5% of New South Wales' child population, represented 47% of young people put into care in the state over 2023. A figure that has risen steadily over the past decade and is a major source of concern for these communities.
'Excessive surveillance perpetuating stereotypes'
"Today, we no longer have a strategy of assimilating the Stolen Generations, but we can see that First Nations people are subject to increased surveillance by child protection systems, health systems, education systems and other government systems which, together, exert excessive surveillance, perpetuating stereotypes and applying racial prejudice towards Aboriginal families," criticized BJ Newton, a researcher at the University of New South Wales and head of the Bring Them Home, Keep Them Home project on Aboriginal family reunification, when interviewed by Le Monde.
You have 53.28% of this article left to read. The rest is for subscribers only.