Upper Hunter Readings 4: Working with Indigenous Australians

Community worker

An Aboriginal community member speaks about services

What are the services you feel most comfortable going to?

Aboriginal services, Aboriginal family support services, Aboriginal legal aid.

What makes those services comfortable or friendly?

Their our own people and they understand our situation. They have had their own family in similar circumstances, they are not judgmental.

What services do you feel least comfortable accessing?

The police

Why don’t you feel comfortable going to the police?

Because they are more corrupt than us. They don’t look past our eyes. They just assume that because we are Aboriginal, we are in a lesser grade, scum. If we have been in activities before, it’s a cycle Aboriginals have been brought up in, and its harder for us to break it and as we tend to, and as we move towards it they make it harder for us. It’s hard to approach them, and just recently when my house was broken into, they took an hour to get to me, they jump up and down and turn the tables on us. They don’t realize its harder and were about to break that cycle, with Domestic Violence and the way we use to live with drugs and alcohol. They just think that’s all we do.

Are there any other services?

DoCS, similar with the police. They assume we can’t look after our kids, or that we are thieves. They are not approachable and you feel that you can not ask for help or tell them the truth how things are in fear that they will take your kids away. And also with DoCS and police I remember one incident where the police came to my house to serve an AVO on my daughter and it took half an hour for me to put some trust in them, just for my daughter to come out from behind the door and when she did they grabbed her and the way they treated her, they dragged her out of the yard into the bull wagon as if she was a dog and I knew she was only going to the police station……stolen generation their kids were taken away and they never knew where they were going or if they were going to see them again and it just rips you apart, how they treated us and how they still treat us. We have to come up against society, white society let alone other societies that are there to have authority to use against us because they choose too.

What do you think that they can do to change there attitudes?

I think they need to get out into the community more. Meet the community people. There is good and bad in all the races. They need more programs to understand our culture. Where we come from, why we are resentful and why we retaliate. Its like they don’t want to listen to us. When John Howard would not give us an apology, it was not so much the apology it was we wanted them to recognize what they have done to us in the past. They want to take our money away that we have been fignting for all these years. There always trying to find a way to take it away from us, like Abstudy for our children. We do struggle. More and more Aboriginal people are getting employment now, but I am a single mother and It’s hard for me to put shoes on 5 children.

What experience have you had with a non Aboriginal organization where the service was appropriate?

Just recently I came into contact with a Drug and Alcohol service which I approached off my own bat to get some help and I have been lucky not to be involved in drugs and alcohol like a lot of people. It’s just another cycle. As a single parent and an Aboriginal one, it comes down to us as an Aboriginal to break the cycle for our children. Like two generations ago, parents and our grandparent fought harder for it to be easier for us now that’s why we need to continue it for our kids.

What service did they provide to make it comfortable for you?

Basically listening. Its been different since I moved to this community, people from the Aboriginal community has blown me away with their help and support which is good because usually when you go into another town being black they are usually harder on you. I have found this town so welcoming, and they just want to help, they want to help our people. Sometime we can be our own worst critics. They listen and they understand. Personally I am always talking about my colour and our culture, how blacks deal with things, how we think, how we feel and they try to be understanding about that.

So why do you think the workers are different in this community that other communities?

Maybe it’s a smaller community.

A smaller Aboriginal Community?

Yes. They have paved the way good here from what I have seen. I believe there has been a lot of trouble for years, for it to have become this way now. From what I’ve been hearing from the community and shown we can get back up onto our feet and that we do help each other. There is going to be racism everywhere, its still going to be at school and we are going to get it for the rest of our lives but I find it just a little bit easier and it makes it a little bit easier.

How can you stop racism in schools?

I don’t think you can. You can be Chinese, you can be red haired, you can wear glasses, kids are very cruel. We had a parent teacher meeting for Aboriginal families last week and they were asking the same thing and we were asked to write it down. We need programs in the school to show them our way, and what they have tried to take away from us, like being out in the bush, women’s talk and men's business and all that stuff. They need to be aware where were coming from, not just being black and we sit around drinking. We’ve come far from that now.

What services don’t you like to access.

The Police. the police, the police, Doc’s, Probation and Parole, In a lot of these organizations, white man needs to assess who they put into these jobs, and what attitude they have towards blacks. It’s a bit bazaar, with whats been happening with the Lebanese at the moment. Their getting a taste from the white community what were been going through. They look at one and they brand the rest with the same brush. It has sort of taken the focus away from us blacks. I find it bazarre, a bit amusing. It like now the white Australians, like a few years ago, with our Art, the Japenese and the Americans loved it and they wanted us to be recognized, because they were bringing in money. We were bringing in money off our Art. They wanted to be proud of us then. They we’nt proud of us they were proud of the money we were bringing in. They’re still doing it. And then they turn around and get the white fella’s to do all the copies for the olympics. Half of that was white peoples work.

What success stories have you got about non-Aboriginal staff or organizations improving the way they provide services for Aboriginal people or communities.

I can honestly say none. None successful. To me personally its been the drug and alcohol service. They have been good to me and that has been over the last couple of months.

Do you access non-Aboriginal health services?

No, I would rather stick to the Aboriginal services if they are available. They know what were all about and we then to stick together. Referring, if there is other services I do need, or if they think that it is good for my children or my self they are there to help more.

With the Aboriginal Family Worker what do they do that other workers don’t do?

They find a way with helping us to deal with things or find services that keep us on track. Just putting their hand out to help, its like your not alone. There has been a few things that have happened to me lately and the black community have gathered and kept me strong.

Where I’ve been, what I have done, and where I’m going and what I intend to be, my children are going to recognise. I’m proud to be black and I say, stay strong and stay black. We have to keep that, being black. I am going to pave the way for my children and their children as well and we don’t have to live this way. White man say’s we have to, don’t mean to say we got to.

CEO of an Aboriginal Organisation speaks about services

As the Chief Executive Officer of an Aboriginal organisation do you feel that non-Aboriginal orgainisations/services provide appropriate services to Aboriginal people.

Some do and some don’t. Some organization don’t understand the needs of Aboriginal people, and all the cultural awareness in the world is not going to change that, because they have their minds set in government departments on how Aboriginal people are supposed to be.

What are the problems you face when dealing with government services?

Across the counter dealings with Aboriginal people on individual basis, the complaints that I get through this office is counter staff actually talking down to them, and when handed forms if they do not understand them they are looked at as if they are stupid. Staff are not aware that all Aboriginal people can not read and write. Instead of asking for help and support from staff they are dealing with, they bring the forms here or to other Aboriginal organisations and that is actually belittling in its self and I find that is where cultural awareness comes in, not just for management but for counter staff that are dealing with our people and I think attitudes have to change where, I’m employed and your not and you have to do what I say, or if you are looking for a house, here are the forms, fill them in, don’t bother me, get someone else to do it and the rubbish of take them away and bring them back make an appointment for a fortnight. A lot of it is rubbish and can be dealt it with there and then and that how our people get to know these people. If they are helpful and do the right thing our people will walk away and think they were good people to deal with and when they go back they will actually ask for them.

How can management change the attitudes of staff towards Aboriginal people?

Its up to management to make that change.. They have to do Cultural awareness, they have to ensure that the staff working under them are fulfilling what their directions are. At the end of the day, if you have a person across the counter looking down their nose or trying to belittle you in any way, the response from me is, I don’t deal with those people, I go straight to the manager and I would expect the manager to deal with his staff.

Besides cultural awareness what else should management put into place?

It should be part of any policy that all staff that have an Aboriginal community undertake cultural awareness training and even those in a low population or no population should undertake it, especially The Department of Housing, Centrelink.

Some Aboriginal people won’t access non-Aboriginal orgainsation/services, what would be some of the reasons for that?

Some services are limited with the service they provide. We have a good rapport with the department of housing but if we have to deal with Centrelink on behalf a client we deal with the Aboriginal Liaison Officer and where organization have Aboriginal Liaison Officers we gravitate towards them for the sole reason they are aware of the wants and needs of the Aboriginal community and there is no cultural barrier.

What successful programs have you managed from this Aboriginal Organisation.

The cell and watch program. That’s a law and justice program, that supports indigenous people in custody, and in the legal system and we work in association with the police. Juvenile Justice, Probation and Parole, court support is offered and we have legal aid that attends here on a needs basic. We have Awabakal Medical Service that come up here twice a month and that has been very successful. We have Centrelink that does outreach up here on a fortnightly basis through the Aboriginal Liaison Officer. Ungooroo is actually a registered Land Care Group and basically what we do is offer any service that anyone needs when they come through the door if its within our capability. We are here to support them and advocate on their behalf, If it beyond us, we put them in contact with services that service the needs they require. We have undertaken CDEP, Community Development Employment Program over the last six months and have reached all our goals in that. In saying that it is not compulsory but we have our clients sign up with a job network provider and we found this difficult in the fact the we encourage our people to go to these because they have training dollars that exceed ours, and to this point we are only aware of about one or two of the job providers that have actually put some of our clients, who are also their clients into training and this is a matter that is gong to be dealt with, probably where we have to call a meeting and find out how many of our people have gone into training and if not, why not, because basically that ‘s what they are their for to train them up for employment and support them exactally what they are their for.

What outcome do you expect from this meeting?

I am hoping that they take into account exactly what they are saying and what I am saying without saying it is “ you start training some of our people or we will advise them to walk away from your network and sign up with a another job network and is working towards the benefit of our people.

What service do you expect from Job network providers.

I expect an equal playing field, I’m not saying were not getting that, maybe more training remembering that a lot of our clients left school early and have worked in the workforce as labourers, and minimal jobs and now you have to computer literate to do these thing. They need to be put into training for welding and apprenticeships or associated training to get apprenticeships which are out there, its costly and Ungooroo are willing to come to the party if we are able to get these people trained up so they are able to go into employment. Ultimately that’s the goal of CDEP to get these people full time employment and it is supposedly the goal of job network providers.

How important is it for Aboriginal people to gain access to full-time employment?

It is one of the most important things that’s on the agenda, because its breaks that Centrelink cycle. Their Aunt or Uncle gets their pay this week and everyone lives high because Mum an Dad get it the following week and their seen as surviving and not knowing that they are just surviving and basically that is just part of life. To have just a couple of young people to just go out and get a job and able to go out on the weekend of buy a car and other Aboriginals kids can say “if I get a job I can have this stuff” instead of living from day to day and week to week, so it really is crucial that with our younger people especially breaks that cycle so that their children don’t get into that cycle of unemployment.

Glen Morris: Burnt Bridge, The Welfare Board, Doctors

My name is Glen Morris

My name is Glen Morris. I was born in 1951 in Kempsey on the Mid-North Coast of NSW. Me family lived on a Reserve there called Burnt Bridge. There was four of us in the family, me elder sister, meself, younger sister and younger brother. My father worked at the Golf Links as Green Keeper at Kempsey.

My mother passed away

I remember that when I was about 6 me mother had passed away. I remember vaguely she was pegging clothes on the line and it was raining and she died of a pneumonia. The Welfare Board in those days didn’t allow one parent to look after the family so we tried to negotiate with the Welfare Board to have one of the Aunty’s look after us while our father worked as a green keeper.

They didn’t allow this to happen they wanted to take us away and to adopt us out. So me Uncle decided that it was time to move. He had an old T Model Ford truck and he put us in the back of it, covered a tarp over us and transported us then from Kempsey to Armidale.

Glen - Burnt Bridge
46 sec

The Welfare Board came and wanted to take us...We were terrified of the police and we didn’t want to deal with the government departments

When we were in Armidale the Welfare Board came out to me old Aunty’s and again wanted to take us but the old Aunties and the Granny hid us out the back of the mission every time the police would come out to take us. We used to hide in the manholes in the ceiling. This happened for about at least two years before the Government accepted that we were better off with our own people and that one of me old Aunty’s could adopt me. It made us shy away from dealing with the government, the government people. We were terrified of the police and we didn’t want to deal with the government departments or the police themselves.

Glen - The Welfare Board
46 sec

Painted white...I avoided doctors

I remember when we were living on the Armidale reserve there was old Doctor Ken Chews, she was a short little lady that comes. She had these big glasses on and she’d come out and she’d examine all the children and give them these like big horse tablets, like worming tablets, and they’d strip all of us, girls and boys, in the main street of the Reserve and then they would paint us with this white paint.

We thought it was paint, but it was a lotion that stopped people from getting scabies and of course we didn’t have scabies. But it burnt the hell out of you. We would of make out we could stand the lotion they put on us and then no sooner than the government doctor, Dr Ken Chews went, than we would run inside and wash it all off and dry ourselves.

Then years later I finally realised why I didn’t go to the doctors all the time. I avoided doctors because of the experience I had when I was a kid, being painted for something you didn’t have wrong. I avoided doctors right up until I was about 44 before I went to the doctors. I always maintained I was healthy, nothing wrong with me and I didn’t go to them. It has only been in the latter years now that I have started to trust the doctors and go back to have check ups to find out what is wrong with me. It’s an experience a lot of people went through.

Glen Morris: Discrimination - swimming, movies, education and jobs

We weren’t allowed to swim with the other girls and boys in the main pool there was a separate pool

I remember in Armidale when we were teenagers we used to go to the swimming pools and the picture theatre and of course we would go down to the pool and were weren’t allowed to swim with the other girls and boys in the main pool there was a separate pool, it was segregated from the rest of the community.

When I used to go to the picture theatre I was put right down the front

When I used to go to the picture theatre I was put right down the front of the picture theatre and of course being right down the front and section chained off you couldn’t see the picture property it was all blurry and loud noise.

Glen - Swimming and movies
46 sec

School - another form of discrimination that I look at was they put us up the back

When we was at school another form of discrimination that I look at was they put us up the back of the classroom not down the front so when the school teachers were asking us do we hear about what they said or could we do the sums, we couldn’t hear because they didn’t speak loud enough and we were right at the back of the class, we got in trouble for not fully understanding what they said.

Again it makes you think that we were less educated in those days because we didn’t fully hear what they said. We had peers of our own like our own people saying that when we do get ahead “What are you trying to be white?” and so you would come back into line to have the same sort of education that they had.

Education and jobs - even when I obtained the equivalent to the school certificate and I had better marks than the non-aboriginal people, when I went for an apprenticeship I was knocked back

When I did move away from Armidale I moved down to Newcastle and there was only two aboriginal people in the whole of the high school and so I had to learn to compete because there was no other Aboriginal kids pulling me back so I had to learn to compete to further me education. I got up to intermediate in those days, it was called the intermediate certificate and I had to end up leaving school very early to get out and work because I had me younger brother and sister coming through.

It was very difficult in those days, even when I obtained the equivalent to the school certificate and I had better marks than the non-aboriginal people, when I went for an apprenticeship I was knocked back, I went of a job I was knocked back. It didn’t stop me from trying but when you get knocked back a lot of times you tend to sort of give in. I remember going for a job at the Retravision store at Armidale and one of the first questions they asked me was we don’t allow stealing here and I said “Ha Ha, well it looks I haven’t got the job” and I said “I don’t steal”. I went back out into the waiting room, the next applicant came in and he came back out and I asked him “Did they ask you about stealing” and he said “No” so again, another form of discrimination.

Glen Morris: Living on the Reserve in Armidale 1950s/60s

Armidale. We moved there when I was about 6. Me younger brother was only a baby. I left there when I was roughly about 12.

The Reserve was out of town like all of the Aboriginal Reserves.

It was not far from the town dump, the town tip cause I remember we used to get all the building materials to build our own tin huts. We used to get the old tin and iron, we used to get to build our own huts. There was a big fire place, the chimney and then sort of like two separate rooms. One was sort of like a lounge and the other one was then partitioned off with either some old cloths. The main bedroom where my old Aunty and Uncle slept, and where we slept five of us.

There were five of us in one room. Dirt floors, we had a dirt floor. We used to sweep it with the old tea trees, cut the tee trees, bind it up into a broom and sweep it, water it down so there was no dust. There was one tap in the middle of the Reserve.

The hHouses had no water, there was no electricity we had the old fat lights. Filled a tin up with fat, cut the top of it, put a wick in and then paint the wick with the fat itself so that it burns. The one tap, like we had those big old 44 gallon kerosene tins and we used to make those into buckets and go down and fill them up, two or three, and we would have a big 44 gallon drum outside and fill the 44 gallon drum up, put a lid on it and then get the water out as you want it.

We had one big tub everyone shared and we took it in turns in the tub.

The toilets were out the back. Toilets were built but bit like a pit toilet and the hole went down as far as we could dig it. When it got filled up we sort of like it was covered over and moved it to a new location. Usually well away from the house but.

On the weekends after school we would go spud picking or pea picking and you get those big hessian bags so my aunt used to get them and cut them down to squares, then she would sew all those bags together and then get the old material from the tip, old shirts, old trousers any sort of old cloth boil it all up in a big boiler and cut that up into squares and sew together into a big “wagga”, like a quilt. It was quite a warm one.

We used to get rations from the police station, first it was the police station, me Aunt used to go down and they’d hand out the rations at the police station or coupons they’d give them. Then it changed from the police station to the post office and they used to then hand out the coupons.

The local store, they took the coupons, they’d give you so much worth of sugar, milk, tea all the basic stuff.

This was about the late 1950’s/1960’s. Meat was sort of a rarity. You would have mince as basic meat but I think we we would have rabbits.

We used to go out as kids and hunt rabbits and dig them out of burrows. We used to get about sometimes six or eight rabbits in a weekend.

We used to shoot a kangaroo and cut up into steaks and take it home. No nothing sort of like fancy really. We used to go pea picking I think we used to eat more peas than we put into the bloody buckets. The times on the mission it was like good times because as compared to today because there was no stress, no worries about rents, didn’t have to pay any rent.

Everyone looked after each other, the caring and sharing part of it. If you got into trouble your old Aunty would give you a hit with the strap or stick and we when you got home the other Aunty would belt you. It was doing things that we used to do we shouldn’t have been doing. But it was them looking after each other.

Me father came to Armidale with us but he had very little to do with us because he had various labouring jobs in Armidale in the building and construction and Newcastle working on the railway.

My Aunty basically looked after us and my Uncle. But he was a war veteran. He was a war veteran he was on the pension so he didn’t really have a lot of money that was coming into the family. This then forced me to get out when I left high school to work, to look after the younger sister and younger brother coming through.

Glen Morris: Traditional knowledge

The at National Parks was basically to record Aboriginal sites which had Traditional Knowledge

The at National Parks was basically to record Aboriginal sites which had Traditional Knowledge throughout NSW. It was put on a grant at first, a five year Grant by then the Institute of Aboriginal Studies in Canberra. The anthropologist and the linguist and archeologist said there were no sites that are still left that had traditions on them because we recorded them all. The history has been recorded the known sites were recorded and so we didn’t have sites which had traditional knowledge which were still remembered by Aboriginal people today.

In 1973 to 1980 we recorded 600 sites that had traditional knowledge from Elders stories, Ceremonial Burials, Art. It was when we did the sites that Initiated Elders at, the knowledge they had, they wanted to pass onto people that were interested in recording their history or past knowledge that they had. Once we finished the project we then became permanent in the National Parks into the mainstream because we were not only dealing with protection management but we were also dealing with development consent. It changed in 1979 when the Environmental Protection Act came out to protect Social Cultural Significance which we referred to as sites, places in the landscape.

So our role changed then from recording traditional knowledge sites to keep up with developments for development consent. There was only sort of like 13 of us covering the state of NSW from 1979 up until about 1985. So the role changed then from recording, keeping up with developments.

In those days we were pioneers, even to get the Government to look at the protection management of cultural heritage in NSW. It was very difficult, the communities weren’t willing to deal with people that come in, took the information, went away, didn’t do nothing in terms of protection management or even writing reports up saying this is your information and bring back to them. So we turned it around and said well we are here to protect and manage and we will get back to you and we will write these reports in plain English and get back to you. Once we done that then we were more acceptable in the communities because different languages from the north coast to Byron Bay out to west and southern, we are dealing with all the different language groups that still exist.

What is being taken, what have we lost now, is that losing our culture, you lose your land, you lose your law, you lose a lot of things and what I am finding is that Aboriginal people have lost their self respect, they have lost their dignity.

It’s been hard when you look at in a Traditional sense when you have a lore that’s been in place for 60,000 years. The control of a community even when I was young on the reserve, the kind of control the Elders had over the younger ones. When you have a breakdown in our Culture, in our Language, our Lore, there is no control of the young ones. There is no order and through the Initiations they had order. They had lores that dealt with punishment, severe punishment in terms of what people had done. What is being taken, what have we lost now, is that losing our culture, you lose your land, you lose your lore, you lose a lot of things and what I am finding is that Aboriginal people have lost their self respect, they have lost their dignity.

Glen - What we have lost
46 sec

If some form of initiation was allowed to continue and communities were then allowed to deal with the way that young people have no respect to control them, then it would be a lot better system because what we found is that once that law was broken down and that culture was lost then you have chaos. There’s no respect, there’s no beliefs in the cultural side of how we lived, how we operated. What we find today is that the only thing in a lot of communities where you have that caring and sharing that is still there but fathers respect the Elders then to look at what you can do and you can’t do. The white laws we have today are too lenient and if they are too lenient how can they expect our people to respect those laws. Because they are too lenient they don’t deal with the issues properly. That’s the trouble we are finding now, if they don’t deal with the issues severely then you have chaos.

There was passing on of cultural knowledge

There was passing on of cultural knowledge you see I was brought up by my Aunty but spent a lot of time with my Grandmother and Grandfather. He was a non-Aboriginal but he was put through a high degree of initiation in the Anawan Tribal Group. He wanted to marry me Grandmother and they used to sing like, cause he was Irish or English, he’d sing a lot of the old Irish songs but then he’d sing the aboriginal songs. Those songs are still around. I still remember the songs today. A lot of the kids up home do.

He would tell of places we weren’t allowed to go to. Things like at night you can’t draw in the ground, if you put a mark in the ground at night it allows the spirits to come out at night to play so you couldn’t do that. When I was on the Reserve, when someone died, you’d get all their belongings, you’d burn them and then they would smoke the house right through. The burning of the belongings is that if you keep someone’s belongings they come back, smoking is to purify the house to get rid of the spirits, for them to move on and if you didn’t, cause I remember the old 4 gallon buckets the middle of the house and smoke coming out of them when someone died in the house, it used to go on for 2 days or 3 days cause the family would live with someone else then after the smoking then they would come back in.

We were spud picking up in Guyra and the old Grandfather said “Whatever you do don’t go up on the hill up there” there were two hills. He said “Don’t go up on there it’s a battle ground, don’t go up there”. One of the older blokes went out with his 22 to shoot some rabbits or kangaroo and went up on the wrong hill, he came back and he went crazy at night, he was singing out and going on. Me Grandfather come along and said “I told you boys not to go up to that hill” and so he spent the night with him because he’s very clever, he done things to the young bloke and he was right… We never went back up there again. It’s something you don’t do.