Last night, Thursday 2nd December, I attended the 25th Cabinet Meeting of our Federal Politicians at Clontarf,(near Redcliffe) in Queensland.
Our Prime Minister Julia Gillard, Jenny Macklin, Nicola Roxan and many others Ministers were there.
In the forum, I was lucky enough to be selected by Julia Gillard to whom I asked this question on behalf of our group Adoption, Loss, Adult,Support,
"There were over 250,000 white mothers who had their babies forcibly removed at birth by the same past illegal adoption practices as Aboriginal Mothers.
Do you personally feel that they should also receive an apology?"
In front of aproxamately 500 people our Prime Minister answered my question.
Julia spoke of the apology for the Forgotten Generation and The Stolen Generation and said she agreed that Kevin Rudd had done the right thing.
Then Julia APOLOGISED for herself,
and said she was aware of all the women still out there still needing recognition of the suffering they had endured. Julia then passed my question over to Jenny Macklin, who said that she was also aware many women still lived with the grief of loosing their children to past adoption practices.
Jenny spoke of the Senate Inquiry and hoped we would all send in our stories.
I was able to then add that we had many mothers in their 70's and 80's that thought they may not live long enough to hear rhe results of an inquiry, that an apology was what they wanted to let their children know that they "did not give their children away", that they were loved.
Jenny said that she was aware of these older women.
I have been given a contact card so I can speak some more to her advisor.
I would have to say, I was most impressed with the forum and think my question was well answered.
Margaret Hamilton.
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3 comments:
well done! I'm proud of you mum. Very brave to stand up and face such an intimidating situation head on!
And well done to the Federal Cabinet for allowing the question. It feels like a federal apology may be getting closer. You would never have seen this even considered a few years ago.
Look how far they've come. Well done.
x
Claire
where can we get a transcript of exactly what she said?
Did you know that the ABC originally quoted her on this but has since edited her answer out of their report on the forum?
This was their main quote on the radio, but ABC has now removed it from all reporting of the forum. Also, if you search google for "Gillard adoption apology" the Google listing for the ABC report actually says she was asked but when you go to the article there is no mention of it whatsoever.
Now all you need to do is to prove the Commonwealth is responsible for forced adoption and then you may get your apology, a big job eh
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