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Australian Aborigianls

By caitlin.george
  • Gurindji People Demand A Better Deal

    Gurindji People Demand A Better Deal

    200 workers walked off the Wave Hill cattle station in the Nothern Territory. They wanted better wages and conditions, and their traditional lands back. The Gurinjdi eventually gained ownership of the area in 1985.
  • Freedom Riders Demand Equal Treatment

    Freedom Riders Demand Equal Treatment

    A group led by Aboriginal activist Charles Perkins made a bus tour through New South Wales. They protested about discrimination in shops, theatres, bars, clubs and swimming pools.
  • White Voters Demand A Better Deal For The First Australians

    White Voters Demand A Better Deal For The First Australians

    After a 90% "yes" vote the government gave Indigenous Australians the right to vote and be counted in censuses, and ended the protection policies.
  • Aboriginal Tent Embassy Set Up In Canberra

    Aboriginal Tent Embassy Set Up In Canberra

    The Embassy said that blacks were now going to get up and fight back on the issues of education, health, police victimisation, locking people up. Bobby Skyes, aboriginal activist.
  • Land Rights To Be Granted To First Australians

    Land Rights To Be Granted To First Australians

    A government commission recommended that Aboriginals should get back the land where they now lived and had traditionally lived.
  • First Aboriginal Land Rights Act

    First Aboriginal Land Rights Act

    However this Nothern Territory law only gave the indigenous people some areas of arid and and largely useless land. Other land claims were often thrown out by the courts.
  • The Government Denies That A 'Stolen Generation' Exists

    The Government Denies That A 'Stolen Generation' Exists

    In a Senate inquiry submission on compensation for forcibly removed children, it stated: "The government questions the reliability of claims about the 'stolen generation,' suggesting that, at most, up to 10% of children were separated for various reasons, some forcibly, some not. It argues the term is rhetorical."
  • 'Unfinished Business: Indigenous Stolen Wages' Report

    'Unfinished Business: Indigenous Stolen Wages' Report

    This event received "compelling evidence that governments systematically withheld and mismanaged Indigenous wages and entitlements over decades". It also found that these practices "were still in place in the 1980s".
  • The Australian Parliament apologizes to the Stolen Generations.

    The Australian Parliament apologizes 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.
  • Mick Dodson receives Australian of the year

    Mick Dodson receives Australian of the year

    Aboriginal law professor Mick Dodson receives the 2009 Australian of the Year award for his lifetime commitment to improving the lives of Aboriginal people and helping to close the gap between Indigenous and non-Indigenous Australians.