For the pain, suffering and hurt of these stolen generations, their descendants, and for their families left behind, we say sorry.
It's been eighteen years since Prime Minister Kevin Rudd made a public national apology for the stolen generations.
To the mothers and the fathers, the brothers and the sisters. For the breaking up of families and communities, we say sorry. And for the indignity and degradation thus inflicted on a proud people and a proud culture, we say sorry. We today take this first step by acknowledging the past and laying claim to a future that embraces all Australians, a future where this Parliament resolves that the injustices of the past must never never happen again.
As part of that commitment to right the wrongs of the past, the Government set up the Closing the Gap goals around a range of injustices faced by First Nations peoples. One of those markers was reducing the number of Indigenous children in out of home care. But nearly twenty years into Closing the Gap, that number is not reducing, it's growing, and today the number of Aboriginal Torres Strait Islander children in out of home care is higher than the estimated
number of children removed during the Stolen Generations. I'm Daniel James and you're listening to seven AM today Bungelung woman lawyer and the former act Commissioner for Aboriginal and Tyrest Right Islander Children and Young People, Vanessa Turnbul Roberts on what needs to happen to keep First Nations children at home. It's Thursday, April nine. Venessa, thanks so much for joining us. When Kevin made that apology, there was a great sense
of catharsis around the nation. It was very emotional for many of survivors, people related survivors and those of us who just looked on of the Stolen generations. But there's also a sense of hope that things may change. But in that very same year the Prime Minister made this apology, you were taken away from your family when you were just ten years old. Can you tell us what happened.
I'm almost thirty and being near this age now reflecting on that moment and reflecting on when Kevin Rudd gave that national apology and the crisis that we are in now as a nation when it comes to child removal, when it comes to using punitive responses as opposed to actually how we are holistically supporting families in communities, it
hits a different place. And for me, the night that I was stolen from my father, that is a moment in time where it's set the precedent of so much of my work today, and it set the precedent of actually, Australia historically has a problem in its contemporary element has a problem. And that was one of the most shattering arts of my life and feeling what my father had to go through, what my mother had to go through, and often what we don't talk about in child removal
is actually what siblings have to go through. And when you take away your sibling and you separate that and there is impact. There's impact on children that are left, children that are taken, and the fact that there is this whole system that has a significant amount of funding and money allocated to it not responding in a way that it should.
Tell me more about that experience. What impact does that kind of trauma have on a person?
So I escaped what many call the family policing system, some people call it foster care or out of home care or the statutory care system. Here in Australia, and I escaped that system at the age of eighteen, so as soon as I could leave, I left. Many survivors, including myself, talk about the harm of what's gone on in foster homes, talk about the harm around what's going on in terms of the physical, emotional sexual abuse around children and young people in statutory care systems. We also
see it with our mental health facilities. We just have to gather the data around who's entering these facilities, and we just have to gather the evidence around who's incarcerated, what's their story, what's their background. For me, when I was ten and even prior to being ten, in our community, we grew up with three fundamental spaces that really shaped what our community was. We had a prison next door, We had a high sex offenders housing block, which still
exists today. And then we had one local underfunded community service center. So the community service center was a space where actually men in our community could go on access whether you were if you were struggling, or you needed an extra hand, you needed maybe an electricity voucher or something to support you on your off week. That was
the place to go. That was the place that was going to support you, but we also had a disproportionate impact of the child welfare system visiting our communities, and we also had policing in our communities.
Nonstock.
No one wants to talk about racism and the way structural racism has played one of the biggest fundamental roles in child removal Todayalism in seventeen eighty eight, false idea of protection leaning into the same paternalism twenty twenty six.
Well, let's talk about some of the numbers. Every year the Productivity Commission releases data and Closing the Gap targets. Target twelve aims to reduce the rate of abergin entristraate Island the children and out of home care by forty five percent by twenty thirty one. The reality is nowhere near that, of course, and the situation is getting worse, not better. Can you give us a snapshop of how die the situation is at the moment.
It's critical.
We're in the crisis and the people that are facing that crisis the most is our children and young people. Every time that we respond that the idea of separation and disconnection is the solution, we are adding further risk to that child's long term outcome and interest. So we're then leaning from the outcomes of closing the gap, being from the removal statistic through to where are you pipelining to then you're entering the statistics and closing the gap
around incarceration. Child removal is the undergraduate degree for an honors degree into the youth justice system for a PhD into the adult prison system.
And that's what we're doing with our children and young people.
And the fact that today, in this very moment in twenty twenty six, that we have a higher rate of forcible removal than the sole generations. That should be a huge concern for this.
Nation coming up the pipeline from child protection to prison and how it can be broken. Can I get you just to explain a little bit more about why children are funneled into the prison system, just to help people at home understand how that connection actually works, so.
When children are forcibly removed as a result of that disconnection as a result of insirational trauma being triggered. And Royal Commission to Child Protection was a really powerful reference point that highlighted what's the impact of kids in care and what's the pattern that we're seeing and a lot of kids in care. When you are in that system, the one thing you want to do is you want to run back home. You want to run to someone you know, and you want to leave, and you want
to flee safety. And then what we see is from kids in care and then kids going into the criminal justice system is such severe cultural disconnection, spiritual disconnection, people disconnection, community disconnection, and family connection. And they're five really important pieces of connection that you need as a young person, as a child to really build your sense of regulation
and your sense of self and where you belong. And any young person that is struggling with connection, you will look for connection in some way, even if it's not in the best way.
And so that's when we're seeing a.
Higher rate of policing involved with our children and young people. And it's that first incident or that second incident that results in youth incarceration, and before you know it, because of the higher rate of youth incarceration here in Australia, what we then see is kids forming a connection with each other in the midst of their disconnection, but.
It's then creating an environment.
Where prison becomes their home and their norm, and then that's increasing the recidivism rate of our kids because the place that is consistent to them is the prison system. But it becomes a key crisis point because we don't want our children to die, and we don't want our people to die. And we have a country here where we are now at the highest rate of Aberginal deaths in custody.
Australia has recorded the largest number of Indigenous deaths in custody since nineteen seventy nine. New data shows one hundred and thirteen people died in custody during the past financial year. Thirty three of them were Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people.
As you mentioned, Vanessa, the figures in twenty twenty six exceed the number of children estimated to have been removed during the Stolen generations. How connected is this situation to past practices.
Very connected.
It's because of those past practices that actually we are seeing the detrimental impacts in our communities when we look at the data and the prevalence of how many abajahon Tachu are under children.
Are being removed.
It's our little people, our little people, Daniel, that are making up the jobs and the industry.
And one chapter I write about.
If you get the chance to read my book, is I really bring together the way the industry focuses on privatization. It's turned into a way that there is profit on the back end of poverty. And what I share is the moment that we start punishing poverty, the moment that we start saying to families and in particular mothers that are fleeing domestic and family violence, the worst thing that you can do to any mother is remove their child,
especially in a circumstance of domestic and family violence. The best thing we can do when it comes to system impact violence is actually say we've got a safe space, mum, We're not taking you. We want to make sure you and bubb are safe and together, and actually getting the right people to respond to the urgency where it's happening. So, for example, in my case, when I was forcibly removed, I had fifteen police officers and that police cars stormed
down our housing commissioned street. You would have thought there was a murder that took place. I was just about to close my eyes and go to bed.
I was just.
About to sleep, and my dad walks on the balcony and he says, bub I'm so sorry, they're coming to get you.
He just knew.
And as Blackfellow, as we get intuition, we get strength, we get messaging. And my dad felt something was about to happen, and it happened, and there was no need for policing to be involved in my removal. And on a professional experience, what I often see is policing contact me and say, Vanessa, we know we're not the best respondent for this situation, but the department are putting it on us, and then the police are putting it on.
The department, and we've got two.
Big, big organizations and bodies that are blaming each other around who needs to be the respondent. And in a situation like that, I do acknowledge sometimes there needs to be other different safeguard mechanisms in place, depending on the circumstance. But send someone in who can actually say, hey, Mum, hey Dad, hey Nan, hey Annie, what is it that you need in this moment and before it hits crisis point?
Because we can tell by all the research we're seeing here in the pattern here, let's actually document slowly what needs to happen, and then let's provide the support services that are needed, and that stems from housing sustainability through to our children and young people being connected to our sovereign lands and culture. But I also see it with non Indigenous kids as well, the struggle, the impact of the system, the system actually acting as a perpetrator in
circumstances of removal. Because the crisis is actually against all children, it just disproportionately impacts our kids.
Never before have our children been put into legislation around the protection of their rights, around them having a say in the future of their well being and the systems that surround them.
So part of my.
Role will be to go out and talk to kids and get their voices. We can bring those back. We can do inquiries, make recommendations to Parliament around the systems from the voices of the children Vanessa.
Last week, the Federal government passed a new law that gives the National Commissioner for Aboriginal Tristrateile, the Children and Young People su and Hunter new powers to independently investigate systemic issues within the child protection system. How effective do you think this will be in reducing the over representation of First Nation's children in the child protection system and in prisons.
So Commissioner Hunter is an extraordinary leader and an extraordinary advocate. Her background is within the social workspace, and the difference I think when you have someone from that background versus someone from a direct legal background, is you have someone that's worked directly with children and young people and actually seen the stories of our people and what our people have gone through. And with Commissioner Hunter's new statutory powers,
the one thing that she has is key independence. And I had the privilege of working behind the scenes around advocating for that independence, along with Snake and other organizations and independence and academics that were strongly advocating just how important it is that Commissioner Hunter has that independence, and it means that there can be high level political transparency because here in this country we are really afraid to talk about what's going on with children and young people,
and we are not centering their rights at the front of every single discussion and every single action. And she has the power to intervene hold inquiries, and I have no doubt that there will be times where she may be met with criticism from different states and territories. But as First Nations people, we urgently need someone that is independent at the federal level and able to actually say no, this isn't okay. We had the United Nations denied access
into prisons when they came to visit Australia. That itself is a national disgrace because it's what are you hiding? And now we have a federal commissioner, Commissioner Hunter, who can turn around and say I'm holding an inquiry and there is an onus of responsibility of the minister to publicly table that in Parliament and it's all eyes on
our children, it's all eyes on incarceration. Now. It's a huge job that she has, but I truly believe Commissioner Hunter is going to be a strong stepping stone as long as she's supported and as long as she is backed by the right people lead some public accountability because the country is yet to know about child and rival and the country is yet to know around the pipeline of incarceration. I mean, we look up children with their baby teeth. Still, it's a pretty big disgrace.
Vanessa, thanks so much for the working that you do and thank you so much for coming on seven am.
Thanks so much, Daniel, all the best.
Also in the news, US President Donald Trump has agreed to suspend the bombing of Iran for two weeks in an announcement coming just hours before his deadline for Tehran to reopen the Straits of Hormus or face widespread bombing of its civilian infrastructure. The two countries are now set to enter talks in his Lumbabad. The White House is called the ceasefire a victory for the United States, but Iran did not sign on to Washington's report a fifteen
point plan, which called for an end to uranium enrichment. Instead, negotiations were now received from Iran's own ten point proposal built around a permanent end to the war, sanctions, relief, and reconstruction, while the proposal's exact language on enrichment remains unclear. Under the two weeks cease fire, the Straits of Hormus will reopen on the condition that vessels coordinate with the Iranian armed forces and ben Robert Smith has made his
first court appearance after being charged with war crimes. The proceedings lasted just minutes, with lawyers for the decorated soldier not applying for bail. The matter has been relisted for June four, meaning Robert Smith will remain in custody for at least two months. The forty seven year old is accused of the murder of unarmed civilians while deployed in Afghanistan between two thousand and nine and twenty twelve, as well as failing to stop members of his unit from
killing three others. I'm Daniel James. You've been listening to seven Am. We'll be back tomorrow.