Dr Ros Kidd
Historian - Consultant - Writer
Launch of ‘Trustees on Trial’
Brisbane Writers Festival
Thank you Alf. And my thanks also to Dr Fiona Paisley and Professor
Anna Haebich of Griffith University’s Center for Public Culture and
Ideas for their support, including a six-month research fellowship, for
both the task I set myself in undertaking this adventure and also for
their support for the stolen wages struggle generally. And for hosting
the launch here today.
And thanks to the staff at Aboriginal Studies Press – in particular
director Rhonda Black and her deputy Gabby Lhuede. I have benefited
greatly from their imagination and professionalism, but also from their
friendship, honesty and humour in helping me translate a grand vision
into a finished book. There wouldn’t be many authors who were
encouraged to email god – and who received such a prompt reply.
Thanks as always to my supportive family who seem totally unperturbed
that their wife, mother and nanna is gradually disappearing under an
ever increasing avalanche of paper and books. I am very aware how lucky
I am to spend my days inventing impossible journeys and setting off with
the goal firmly in mind but absolutely no idea how I might get there.
I
am really touched that so many people have travelled so far for this
launch. Senator Andrew Bartlett, a staunch fighter for Stolen Wages,
has escaped from Canberra for the day; Gary Highland, national director
of ANTaR, has come from Sydney, and Giselle has come from Melbourne
representing the Australia-Asia Workers Links. I’d like to make
particular mention of Fred Edwards (Normanton), Yvonne Butler and
Lillian Willis (Townsville), Margaret Lawton and her sisters
(Rockhampton), Tennyson Kynuna (Cairns), Peter Guivarra (Mapoon), a
great group of fighting women from Cherbourg and of course Alf Lacey
(Palm Island). To friends and colleagues who have made the trip
locally, my heartfelt thanks for coming today. Research and writing can
be a very solitary pastime and I am overwhelmed by this expression of
your support.
I
was thrilled when John von Doussa agreed so promptly to launch
Trustees on Trial, even though, as it initially seemed, he would
travel from Adelaide for a ten-minute speaking spot. But he generously
organised to make time yesterday for a meeting with Stolen Wages
campaigners and claimants which was much appreciated. Given his eminent
role as president of HREOC and, in another life, a judge on the federal
court, I greatly value his appraisal of my book, which suggests new
strategies to achieve justice for thousands of Aboriginal families whose
lives were impoverished by government policies, failures and greed.
I
do not make this journey on my own. I share the experiences of
thousands of people who guide me through this vast historical
landscape. Some might think the voices of the past are not heard except
in the memories of their families and friends; but for me the realities
of their lives speak from countless letters and reports. It is this
human dimension which is crucial to understanding this incredible,
immense, appalling social experiment where a handful of men gave
themselves the power to control people’s lives for most of the 20th
century – and wielded that power with such disastrous effect. The past
and present voices of those whose lives were controlled demand that we
confront those who still lie about the past, that we insist the truth be
proclaimed, that we force those who wield the power to be accountable
for their words and their actions.
I
don’t see anything unusual in a middle-class white woman undertaking
such a journey. For me colour is irrelevant; it’s our shared humanity
that matters. The adults and small children I read about, contracted to
live and work in environments of physical and sexual abuses, of
starvation rations and lousy conditions – these sufferers might be any
one of us here, in another time and another place. We are all human, we
all feel pain and shock in enduring such hardships or in learning of
them. I believe that in knowing these things now we can choose either
to turn our backs and walk away, or to link arms and say we will walk
together on a journey to bring truth to our national history.
Whether I succeed or fail in my task, I can look my children and
grandchildren in the eye and say I have tried to play my part in
righting a terrible wrong. I am only one of many, and many were already
fighting for justice when I lived in ignorance. My hope for this book
is that it might offer a strategy to force our governments to be held
accountable in our courts of law, to settle this sorry saga on just
terms which do not cheat people of their rights. I would like – just
once in my life – for those premiers and prime ministers who supposedly
act in my name to act with integrity, with true compassion, with
honour. Ah well, I always was a dreamer.
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