Bringing-Them-Home-Report-Web

When I go and visit him he tells me that he is very sorry for what he has done to me. He justcannot seem to help himself. He just cannot help getting into trouble with the cops.‘Sean has been in and out of jail for a number of offences. He does not really know what hewants in life. It is very hard for him and for me … I have to look after five other childrenwho are all younger than Sean …Things have not changed that much from when I was taken away from parents and placedin a mission at Norseman. By the time I got out, my mum had died and I could not find myfather. I think he had gone somewhere over east and from what I heard he hit the bottlepretty badly.Sean’s father had also been taken away from his parents. He had gone to MogumberMission. He left me when Sean was only two years of age … Sean’s dad could not cope withhis childhood. He was subjected to sexual abuse and made to work really hard.No wonder Sean is the way he is. I and Sean’s dad have had our own problems and Isuppose they have rubbed off on Sean.Quoted by ALSWA submission 127 on pages 335-6.There is clearly a direct association between removal and the likelihood ofcriminalisation and further instances of removal. The compounding effects of separationand criminalisation were shown dramatically in the Royal Commission into AboriginalDeaths in Custody investigations. Forty-three of the 99 Indigenous people who died incustody had been removed from their families as children; 43 had been charged with anoffence at 15 years of age or younger (National Report 1991 Volume 1 pages 5-6).Discussion and recommendationAddressing the underlying issues identified in this chapter is necessary to remedyboth the effects of past removal and the causes of contemporary removals.This tragic experience [of removal], across several generations has resulted in incalculabletrauma, depression and major mental health problems for Aboriginal people. Careful historytaking during the assessment of most individuals and families identifies separation by one meansor another - initially the systematic forced removal of children and now the continuing removalby Community Services or the magistracy for detention of children, rather than the provision ofconstructive support to families and healing initiatives generated from within their owncommunities. The process has been tantamount to a continuing cultural and spiritual genocideboth as an individual and a community experience (submission 650 pages 4-5).A recent review of the South Australia juvenile justice system noted,