Senator Patrick Dodson and Mr Julian Leeser MP Chairs Joint Select Committee on Constitutional Recognition Relating to Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Peoples Parliament House Canberra, ACT, 2600 Submission on the Constitutional Recognition of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Peoples I wish to make comment on the proposal defined in the Uluru Statement for a Makaratta Commission to supervise a process of truth telling about Aboriginal and Torres Strait Island history and agreement making between Government and First Nations. I am Mary Paul neé Docker and I am submitting these comments on behalf of the Paul family. I live in North East Victoria in the Rural City of Wangaratta. Since the 1990s the Yorta Yorta clan has been recognized by the Victorian Government as the Registered Aboriginal Party for our region. I wish to advise in the strongest possible terms that the Yorta Yorta were not traditional owners at the time of European settlement 1837 – 1838. This has been a recent flagrant rewriting of history and alienation of the traditional owners, principal amongst them the people known as the Pangerang/Bangerang. My family, the Dockers were the first family to settle in the district (September 1838) following close on the heels of White, Bowman, Mackay and Faithfulls. The Reids arrived on the Ovens River the same day as the Dockers. Exceptionally good relations existed between the Dockers and the local people in strong contrast to the difficulties that prevailed elsewhere. The Pangerang/Bangerang have long been regarded locally as the traditional owners and recorded as such in local places: Pangerang Lookout, Pangerang House and a memorial to Mary Jane Milawa, Elder of the Pangerang in Merriwa Park, Wangaratta. The Yorta Yorta was a name not much known in this area until they mounted a Native Title Claim for publicly owned lands adjacent to the Murray, Ovens and other streams. For the Wangaratta area to be known as “Yorta Yorta” is an egregious insult to the true traditional owners. The highly regarded late Elder Eddie Kneebone once said “We have had our land “pinched” from us twice – first by the white man and now by the Yorta Yorta. Therefore the Makarrata Commission in the supervision of truth telling about Aboriginal and Torres Strait Island peoples history must consider and review these past decisions. It is important that before any Federal Government determination on the structure and membership of a Voice representing this region further discussions are held between all local Aboriginal community stakeholders. This will be the only way that a truly representative voice may be determined. It is to be hoped that this Federal Government process will influence the Victorian Government to review the application by the Pangerang for status as a Registered Aboriginal Party in our area. .