More than 100 Stolen Generations survivors have gathered in Canberra for the apology anniversary. The government is pledging new money to help them heal.
Uncle Sonny Morey has spent a lifetime searching for his mother after he was taken from her at the age of seven. He was playing among the ghostly gumtrees in Alice Springs when the welfare car pulled up, grabbed him and drove away.
“I still remember so clearly the look on my cousin’s face of sheer terror almost 80 years later, that’s how bad it is,” the Arrernte man said.But this year on the eve of the 18th anniversary of the National Apology to the Stolen Generations, at a gathering surrounded by fellow survivors, Uncle Sonny received a phone call with some unexpected news.For Uncle Sonny it’s been a decades-long journey towards healing. He was well into adulthood when he learned his mum had passed away in 1992, but had never been able to locate her final resting place. Now he plans to travel back to Napperby station on his mother’s country, north-west of Alice Springs, to mark her gravesite.After being forcibly removed from his family under government policies of the time, young Sonny was taken to live at St Mary’s Hostel outside Alice Springs. His last name was changed, and it was not until years later that he learned his mother had been searching for him.In the years to follow he was moved again to another children’s home in Adelaide, St Francis House run by the missionary body of the Church of England. Here, Sonny grew into a teenager alongside now renowned Aboriginal rights activist Charlie Perkins, designer of the Aboriginal flag Harold Thomas and artist and soccer player John Moriarty.It was then Sonny began to make a name for himself as a talented Australian Rules football player. “We were natural at it. We were quick and smart footballers. It was a very important time as you’re growing up, to be part of a community,” he said. “Sports was the greatest equaliser because when you’re in a team, there’s no ‘I’ or ‘we’. It’s a team, and that’s what Australian football taught me.”Playing for the Central District Bulldogs, he was the first player to reach 200 games for the club and would later be inducted into the SANFL Hall of Fame.”At the time, Australia was very racist, in the sense of how they looked after us and how they treated us. But if you were part of the footy team, you were different.”After retiring from football, Sonny went on to work in a range of jobs including as a fitter and turner, a storeman and a community police officer.This week, more than 130 Stolen Generations survivors from the far corners of Australia gathered in Canberra for a breakfast to mark the anniversary of the formal Apology to Australia’s Indigenous Peoples from then-prime minister Kevin Rudd. The annual event began in 2009 and is organised each year by Stolen Generations survivor Michael McLeod to acknowledge the significance of that apology, and the ongoing challenges that survivors face. It is Uncle Sonny’s first time attending the breakfast, travelling from his home in the Barossa Valley in South Australia. In an emotional scene, he was reunited with four of his ‘sisters’ that lived alongside him at St Mary’s Hostel over six decades ago. “We were snotty-nosed kids when you were there,” said Nora Kempster as she embraced Sonny with a hug. Sonny Morey was reunited with survivors from St Mary’s Hostel Nora Kempster, Mary Shadford and Audrey Melaney .”It took a lot of courage … and all sorts of internal fortitudes for someone to stand up and apologise for something that should have been done a long ago,” Sonny said. “We’ve still got so many politicians that don’t look at that as a positive, they blame Aboriginal people for a lot of their faults … it’s time for people to grow up. “We won’t be united unless we do something about it and that comes back to politicians because they’re our leaders,” he said. With renewed calls for truth-telling around the country, Uncle Sonny said that formal recognition of the hurt caused by past government policies is critical.Funding to support survivors Peak body for the Stolen Generations, the Healing Foundation, has spent years calling on the government to take “urgent action” on recommendations made almost 30 years ago by the Australian Human Rights Commission. The commission’s 1997 Bringing Them Home Report brought to light the lived experience of forcible removal from family and community.Today Minister for Indigenous Australians Malarndirri McCarthy announced $87 million over four years to support survivors, including with family tracing and reunification; advocating for trauma-informed health and aged care services; access to survivors’ records and access to redress. “Past government policies caused immeasurable harm to Stolen Generations survivors and their families,” Minister McCarthy said in a statement. “Sadly, for many of our people, the distress and hurt continues today. This is why understanding and supporting the needs of the Stolen Generations is so important.” Queensland remains the only jurisdiction in the country without a redress scheme for survivors of the Stolen Generations. “We really need to ensure that survivors can see the justice and the healing that they deserve,” said Healing Foundation CEO Shannan Dodson. “Truth-telling is incredibly important, particularly for these old people, to feel that their stories were not in vain, they’re not forgotten.”Political Leadership
Apology National Anniversary Kevin Rudd Prime Minister Survivors Truth-Telling Redress Aged Care Healing Cherbourg
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