One Fire is proud to have partnered with local organisations plus engage the Council in the first stage of the Geelong Constitutional Recognition Project.
A grant provided by '
Recognise' to One Fire led to this first stage of the project to inform and engage local people about the plans for a refereundum to change the Australian Constitution, in order to recognise Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander People.
The
Report Summary (short version) is below.
If you would like a full copy of the report, please email: geelongonefire@gmail.com
The purpose of
the Geelong Constitutional Recognition Project has been to raise awareness of
Constitutional Recognition in the Geelong region over a five month period in
early 2013. The tasks undertaken were:
a) Provision of sessiosn to 10 local organisations/groups as stage 1 January-May 2013
b) Evaluate and report on the outrcomes to Reconciliaiton Australia / Recognise
c) Review project and consider next steps
A small Steering
Group was developed, including members of the Geelong One Fire Committee who
were accountable for the Project, plus other interested people. A Co-ordiantor was appointed who worked with the ongoing Planning Group which
became the driving force for the Project.
The decision to engage a
group of people through anticipated interest and with the necessary relationships
and skills to develop and achieve the Project in this short time line was
successful. They became the 10 members of the local Planning Group: five
Aboriginal and 5 non-Aboriginal people, who worked
well together and maintained a commitment to deliver the sessions in a range of
settings to a reasonably wide demographic of the Geelong community.
We received support from
Councillor Eddy Kontelj: Aboriginal Affairs portfolio holder, who we updated as
the project progressed.
We are pleased with the
outcomes, and despite the challenges which went with setting up the sessions
(tight time frame, evaluating the feedback), the approach has proved to be a sound
one.
Sessions were provided to
–
a) Organisations:
·
City of Greater Geelong
Mayor & Councillors at a full briefing
·
Diversitat
(migrant & refugee support service)
·
Geelong Trades
Hall Board members
·
Geelong One Fire members
·
Labour Party MP
and members
·
Liberal Party
·
Narana staff,
Board members and community members
·
Wathaurong Aboriginal
Co-operative community meeting, including Board members
b) Public:
·
Geelong Regional
Library Service (events calendar)
·
Reconciliation in
the Park (focus on younger community members)
We delivered the 10
sessions to over 200 people in Geelong over a 3 month
period: March-May 2013.
55 people now want to help us raise awareness in the Geelong region about Constitutional
Recognition in the Australian Constitution.
The 10 sessions were
generally provided by covering the following three components:
·
Local context –
including the history of Djillong (Geelong)
and acts of local reconciliation since settlement
·
Status of
Constitution Recognition – the sections of the Constitution which the ‘Expert
Panel’ have made recommendations to change
·
Developing a
stronger local link up of groups & activities connected to wider
reconciliatio.
Handouts were available, and links to websites.
These included –
There was unanimous
appreciation of the sessions, and even in the public forums we received no negative
feedback, except understandably some scepticism about the outcomes of this
approach to reducing discrimination against Aboriginal & Torres Strait
Islander People.
We found that the majority
of participants in all of the sessions have not read the Australian
Constitution, and so had no awareness that it still contains sections which are
directly discriminatory towards Aboriginal & Torres Strait Islander People
as well as failing to recognise them as the First Peoples of these lands.
On the other hand, we
found that a significant proportion of local Aboriginal people are unsure whether
the plans to update the Constitution will in fact deliver the level of
recognition and equality they believe is necessary, with particular reference
to achieving sovereignty and putting Treaty in place.
We didn’t reach the younger age group (under 35 years) successfully in
this stage of the project. A number of participants have offered support to
achieve this in the future.
The Planning Group is now discussing
a follow-up stage 2 of the Geelong Constitutional Recognition Project, extending
beyond the Geelong area and developed through a broader partnership approach.
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