Queensland says 'Sorry' for history of forced adoptions

Australia's history of forced adoptions has been the subject of recent and ongoing university research, which has led to community acknowledgements, and state government recognitions and as a consequence, has been in the news this week as yesterday, the Queensland Premier, Campbell Newman made an official apology to all those in Queensland who were affected by this policy implemented between the 1950s and 1970s which caused  lifelong pain and suffering to unmarried mothers, and their children who were taken from them.

This follows the official apologies of five other states in Australia and is a very significant step towards healing - through recognition, of the pain and suffering that this policy caused.

What has not been mentioned in the media coverage is the enormous and ongoing impacts of the 'Stolen Generations' policy of removal of children who were not "100% Aboriginal" from their mothers,  many of whom were raped by white men under a brutal policy of assimilation in which it was said that the Aboriginal peoples were a 'dying race' and would be gone in three generations, in 1906 which heralded the beginning of Federation and the start of the White Australia policy which only officially ended in 1967 when an Australian wide referendum resulted in Aboriginal peoples being allowed to vote, for all this time Aboriginal peoples were classified as 'fauna'.

We are still waiting for Reconciliation- and the proper recognition of Aboriginal people - in the Australian constitution.