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Addressing the Gap Within the Gap

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Addressing the Gap Within the Gap Published by Te Rau Ora, 2020 Addressing the gap within the gap Volume 5 | Issue 1 need for increased and specific healing-centred services across areas of Australia where the Article 6, May 2020 Stolen Generations and their descendants live. Steve Larkin Keywords: trauma, intergenerational trauma, The Healing Foundation healing, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander disadvantage, Closing the Gap, health and Abstract wellbeing, Stolen Generations. A new report from the Australian Institute of Health and Welfare has provided vital He Mihi – Acknowledgements: The Healing information about the numbers, demographic Foundation1 recognises the invaluable characteristics, and health and welfare status of contribution of its Stolen Generations Reference the Stolen Generations and their descendants, Committee, which has helped to shape this which will influence future policy and service research initiative and continues to assist in development. It has also measured the ongoing designing an Action Plan for Healing. impact of past policies which led to the forced removal of tens of thousands of children from Introduction their families, by documenting high levels of disproportionate disadvantage across most of 38 For more than two decades, the Stolen critical health and welfare factors analysed. Generations have been telling Australians about the challenges they face in their every-day life, as By showing that the Stolen Generations and their a result of their painful childhood experiences families experience greater levels of adversity and the unresolved trauma they continue to carry. than other Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander They have also documented their fears about a people (who are already at a disadvantage in legacy of trauma, and associated disadvantage Australia), we can see a direct link between unknowingly passed on to their families (Healing traumatic childhood experiences, inter- Foundation, 2017). The Human Rights and generational trauma, and many of the social and Equal Opportunity Commission (1997) Bringing health issues in Aboriginal and Torres Strait Them Home report, which augmented widespread Islander communities today. public discussion around these issues, uncovered individual stories of loss, isolation, abuse, sexual The Healing Foundation is using this data to help assault, and neglect when children were taken build an Action Plan for Healing and promote the from their homes to be institutionalised and 1 http://healingfoundation.org.au 72 Volume 5 | Issue 1 | Article 6 – Larkin trained for domestic servitude, farm work, or outcomes between these groups and similar fostered with non-Indigenous families. It was aged non-Indigenous people (AIHW, also the first report to describe the extent of harm 2018a). and ongoing burden created as a result of forcibly removing tens of thousands of Aboriginal and The report identified numerous gaps in trying to Torres Strait Islander children from their quantify the contemporary size, characteristics, families, under government legislation to achieve and needs of the Stolen Generations and the assimilation. However, the report’s specific effects of forced removal practices on recommendations designed to address trauma critical health, wellbeing, and economic factors. It were never properly implemented. As a result of is also the first time The Healing Foundation has its analysis of anecdotal reports and limited had comprehensive data to illustrate the direct research holdings, the Healing Foundation link between the forced removal of tens of suspected that trauma-related issues in Aboriginal thousands of children from their families and the and Torres Strait Islander communities had real-life experiences of intergenerational trauma significantly escalated (Healing Foundation, across families and communities. 2017). On the back of the Bringing Them Home report’s Methods 20th anniversary, The Healing Foundation The AIHW (2018a) analysis is based on data from received federal government funding to five surveys conducted by the Australian Bureau undertake a demographic analysis and needs of Statistics (ABS) between 2002 and 2015. This assessment to quantify the contemporary size, includes the National Aboriginal and Torres characteristics, and needs of the Stolen Strait Islander Social Survey (NATSISS; ABS, Generations, using both quantitative and 2004, 2009, 2016) and the National Aboriginal qualitative data sources (Healing Foundation, and Torres Strait Islander Health Survey (ABS, 2017). As part of that broader Action Plan for 2006, 2013). These are large, nationally the Healing project, the Australian Institute of representative surveys, containing a consistent set Health and Welfare (AIHW, 2018a) was of information and detailed data on a wide range commissioned to develop Australia’s first of topics, including removal from family. detailed demographic and policy impact study of Making use of the time series nature of the ABS the Stolen Generations and their descendants. surveys, the AIHW (2018a) report has been able This report has four main components: to make comparisons between outcomes for the Stolen Generations and those for Aboriginal and • Estimates of the numbers, demographic Torres Strait Islanders in the same age cohort characteristics, and geographic location of who were not removed from their families. This the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander approach provides a more reliable perspective on population born before 1972 who were the differences between the Stolen Generations removed from their families, as a proxy for and other Aboriginal and Torres Strait lslander the surviving members of the Stolen Generations. people and therefore, the specific impact of forced removal practices. • Estimates of the numbers, demographic characteristics, and location of the Aboriginal Limited use has also been made of the ABS 2014 and Torres Strait Islander population aged 18 General Social Survey (ABS, 2014), and of and over whose elder relatives were removed administrative data from an AIHW Online in the past. Services Report on the total Indigenous and • Comparisons of differences in selected Stolen Generations clients who access social and health, welfare, socioeconomic, and cultural emotional wellbeing support and Link-Up outcomes between these two groups and Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people services (Australian Government, 2020). of the same age group who did not have Where outcomes are measured in a similar way, experience with removal. non-Indigenous data was sourced from the 2014 • Comparisons of differences in some selected General Social Survey (ABS, 2014) and compared health, welfare, and socioeconomic with the Indigenous data from the 2014–15 73 Published by Te Rau Ora, 2020 NATSISS (ABS, 2016) to measure disadvantage In terms of determining the impact of past for the Stolen Generations compared to non- removal practices, the report paints a disturbing Indigenous Australians. picture of health issues, disability, and poor economic security factors for the Stolen The statistics relating to the numbers of Stolen Generations. For example, Generations and their descendants are estimates, • 67% live with a disability or restrictive long- based on data from people born before 1972 term condition; when it is generally accepted that forced removal • 70% rely on government payments as their practices came to an end (AIHW, 2018a). Due to main source of income; the way data was collected for the ABS surveys, • 39%, aged over 50, report poor mental the numbers could include people who were health; removed during the period of active Stolen • 62%, of working age, are not employed; and Generations policies but outside the context of • 91% never completed Year 12 of schooling. those policies. In addition, many Stolen Generations members have chosen to keep their The AIHW (2018a) data shows that even story secret over many decades, and the ABS compared to Aboriginal and Torres Strait surveys relied on self-reporting of removal. Also, Islanders in the same age group, who are already the surveys only targeted people who live in at a significant disadvantage in Australia; the private dwellings, so anyone who was homeless Stolen Generations are suffering more financially, or living in an institution would not be included. socially, and in areas of health and wellbeing. In fact, they experience higher levels of adversity in Results relation to most of the 38 key health and welfare outcomes analysed in the AIHW (2018a) report. The Stolen Generations This disproportionate level of disadvantage Before this project, we did not know how many demonstrates the negative impact of past actions Stolen Generations members were still alive and that forcibly removed children from their had very limited information about where and families. how they live making it difficult to confidently identify needs or determine priorities for healing Compared to Aboriginal and Torres Strait strategies. The AIHW (2018a) report has Islanders in the same age group, the Stolen estimated that 17,150 members of the Stolen Generations are Generations are living across Australia today. • 3.3 times as likely to have been incarcerated Among all Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander in the last five years, people born before 1972 (when forced removal • 2.2 times as likely to have ever been formally policies were abandoned), around 1 in 10 (11%) charged by police, report being removed. In Western Australia, • 1.8 times as likely to rely on government almost a quarter (24%) of all Aboriginal and
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