Sorry Day and Reconciliation Week 2026

Sorry Day

Each year the nation is asked to pause, reflect and acknowledge the Stolen Generations. This year, National Sorry Day, or the Day of Healing, commemorates 29 years since the release of Bringing them home: report of the National Inquiry into the Separation of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Children from Their Families – better known as the Bringing Them Home report.

The road to the release of the Bringing them home report was a long one. For decades, Aboriginal organisations had called for a national inquiry into the forced removal of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander children, and the impacts of this on individuals, families and communities. In 1992, the Secretariat of National Aboriginal and Islander Child Care (SNAICC), demanded a national inquiry. Two years later, in 1994, the Aboriginal Legal Service of Western Australia began documenting the experiences of Mob who had been removed, or who had children removed from them. In 1995, the inquiry formally began.

The inquiry was the first to document the experiences Stolen Generations survivors, with more than 770 testimonies recorded.

The report made 83 recommendations, aiming to support survivors and their families, and also presented a number of key findings. The inquiry and subsequent report found that between 1 in 3 and 1 in 10 Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander children had been forcibly removed from their families, between 1910 and 1970. The inquiry also found that these practices of removal were a gross violation of human rights.

Crucially, the Bringing them home inquiry and report found that the forced removal of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander children was an act of genocide.

On Sorry Day, we remember those who were taken, and what that meant for them, their families, and their communities. My own Grandfather was taken, and there are no words to adequately describe the profound impact that this had on his life.

However, we must ask ourselves – what is the point of saying sorry if the behaviour doesn’t change?

As of 2025, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander children are 11 times more likely to be removed than non-Indigenous children. In NSW, almost half of all children in out-of-home-care are Aboriginal children, despite making up only about 7% of the youth population of NSW. Aboriginal children also comprise 60% of the young people in youth detention in NSW. There are deep concerns that Australia is creating another Stolen Generation.

Despite the landmark inquiry and report, governments across Australia continue to drag their feet, failing to meaningfully implement the recommendations of the report. Until there is meaningful action, and until Aboriginal-led and -controlled organisations are empowered to support families and promote healing, nothing will change. Another generation will be forced to try to survive the ongoing genocide of our people.

So, while we encourage you to reflect and to remember, this isn’t enough anymore – we must all take action to prevent another generation being subjected to this colonial violence. Listen and learn from Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Peoples. This might take the form of regularly reading Indigenous X or the National Indigenous Times, or engaging with Aboriginal artists and truth-tellers. It might be paying the rent, supporting Mob who do the work to create better outcomes. However you choose to commemorate Sorry Day, just remember – Sorry means nothing if you do it again.

Lindsay McCabe and Brie Roy
SUPRA Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Officers

*This is a distressing subject for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Peoples. If you are mob, and this article has caused any distress, please call 13YARN. It’s important to Know Your Rights and remember that help is available.

Reconciliation Week – All In

National Reconciliation Week is held each year from 27 May to 3 June. These dates are important – 27 May commemorates the successful 1967 Referendum, when the nation decided that Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander People would be counted as part of the Australian population. 3 June is Mabo Day – the date that the High Court of Australia handed down its decision in Mabo v Queensland (No. 2).

These are momentous dates in the contemporary history of Australia.

The Referendum

The Australian Constitution, established in 1901, gave the Commonwealth power to make laws for all Australians, except for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Peoples. The Constitution also stated that in counting the population of the nation, ‘[A]boriginal natives shall not be counted’. Because of these stipulations, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Peoples were not recognised as part of the population. It also meant that states and territories could pass discriminatory and harmful policies that impacted every aspect of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Peoples’ lives, including policies that resulted in the removal of children and the destruction of families and communities.

The 1967 Referendum was the result of decades of activism by Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Peoples. From the Yirrkala Bark Petitions in 1963, to the Freedom Ride in 1965, and the Wave Hill Walk Off that began in 1966, First Peoples had been demanding to be heard. There were also a number of organisations that were led by Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Peoples, such as the Federal Council for the Advancement of Aborigines and Torres Strait Islanders (FCAATSI), the Australian Aborigines’ League, the Aboriginal-Australian Fellowship (AAF), and the Australian Aboriginal Progressive Association (AAPA), who were instrumental in leadings calls for a referendum.

The referendum asked Australians:

Do you approve the proposed law for the alteration of the Constitution entitled—
“An Act to alter the Constitution so as to omit certain words relating to the People of the Aboriginal Race in any State and so that Aboriginals are to be counted in reckoning the Population”?

On the 27 May 1967, 90.77% of Australians voted YES, repealing section 127 of the Constitution, and amended section 51(xxvi), allowing direct Commonwealth involvement in the making of laws for First Peoples.

Mabo Day

On the 20 May 1982, legal proceedings in what would become known as the Mabo Case began, when Meriam people from the Mer Islands brought a claim to the High Court of Australia seeking recognition of their traditional land ownership. Four Meriam men, Eddie Koiki Mabo, Reverend David Passi, Sam Passi, James Rice and one Meriam woman, Celuia Mapo Sale, led the case, directly challenging the doctrine of terra nullius. Terra nullius is the false assumption that Australia was ‘land belonging to no one’ before British colonisation in 1788, and the idea that sovereignty gave the Crown absolute ownership of all land. After complex legal delays and an unsuccessful attempt by Queensland to extinguish these rights through legislation, the High Court allowed the case to proceed, with evidence heard both on Mer and the mainland.

On 3 June 1992, the High Court delivered a landmark decision in Mabo v Queensland (No. 2), recognising that the Meriam people held native title under their own laws and customs. The ruling overturned terra nullius and confirmed that Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Peoples have long-standing, legal relationships to land that survived colonisation. This decision fundamentally reshaped Australian land law and led to the passage of the Native Title Act 1993 (Cth), enabling Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Peoples across Australia to pursue recognition of land rights and compensation for dispossession.

Tragically, Eddie Koiki Mabo died on 21 January 1992, just 5 months before this landmark decision would be handed down. He was only 55 years old. His legacy lives on, and so far there have been 534 consent determinations granting native title.

What does this mean now?

National Reconciliation Week began in 1993, and seeks to remind all Australians that reconciliation and the advancement of the rights of First Peoples is everyone’s responsibility. This is of course a worthwhile goal. There are however some serious criticisms of Reconciliation Week that must be heard. Some have argued that the focus on ‘reconciliation’ means very little without serious structural change. The failed ‘Voice to Parliament’ referendum showcased the vitriol and hatred toward Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Peoples that many in our communities still feel is acceptable. Interpersonal and institutional racism are still experienced by Mob on a daily basis, with the Call it Out report identifying hugely distressing levels of racist violence. More than 17,000 Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander adults and children are incarcerated, comprising more than a third of all detainees.

This year was the 35th anniversary of the Royal Commission into Aboriginal Deaths in Custody, one of the most significant inquiries in the nation’s history, and yet its recommendations are still ignored. More than 634 Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander men, women, and children have died in custody (prison, police custody and youth detention) since the recommendations were handed down.

Our children are over 10 times more likely to be removed than non-Aboriginal children, with Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander children making up more than 44% of all children in out-of-home ‘care’. Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Peoples are 55 times more likely to die from rheumatic heart disease than any other Australian.

Reconciliation Week, for all its good intentions, is not enough to change these stories. Without structural change, we will continue to face forms of violence, and indeed genocide, throughout our lives as First Peoples. It’s not good enough. As morning teas are held around the country for Reconciliation Week, the words of Luke Pearson will be on my mind – after all, ‘you can’t tame the white supremacist power structure with cheese!’