2010

1. 1 April

   During a visit to Australia, Prince William takes up a request to return Aboriginal warrior Pemulwuy's remains to Redfern (Sydney), making front page news.

   

2. 19 April

   New Zealand signs the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, leaving only the USA and Canada rejecting it.

3. May

   Aboriginal academic Megan Davis becomes the first Aboriginal person appointed to a UN body when the Australian government nominates her for the UN Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues.

4. May

   Following discussions between Stolen Generations peak organisations and government agencies, the Stolen Generations Working Partnership is launched to track the outstanding recommendations of the Bringing Them Home Report.

5. 28 May

   Michael Leslie wins the $50,000 Red Ochre Award for lifetime achievement in Indigenous dance.

6. June

   

   19-year-old Aboriginal model Samantha Harris makes it to the cover of Vogue Australia’s June issue. Harris got her first break into modelling after entering a competition in the Australian teenage magazine Girlfriend in 2003, aged just 13.

7. 9 June

   The Resale Royalty Right for Visual Artists Act is introduced, entitling all artists to a 5% royalty whenever their work is re-sold. Thousands of Aboriginal artists can benefit from the scheme. ⇒ Aboriginal art profits

8. 12 June

   Timana Tahu, an Aboriginal player of the Sydney-based Parramatta Eels Rugby League club, walks out of the NSW Origin team camp in response to racist comments by the team’s assistant coach Andrew Johns, sparking a media debate about racism against Aboriginal players and people.

9. 21 June

   The government passes legislation to re-instate the Racial Discrimination Act by extending compulsory income management nationwide. The administration is estimated to cost taxpayers $350 to $400 million dollars over the next four years, or about $4,000 a person a year. Reports indicate that people under income management feel "severely demoralised". ^[2]

   Re-instating the [Racial Discrimination Act] restores dignity and helps Indigenous Australians to take ownership of their lives and to drive change in the NT. — Jenny Macklin, Federal Indigenous Affairs Minister ^[2]

10. 24 June

    Julia Gillard, previously Deputy Prime Minister, becomes the first female Prime Minister of Australia after Kevin Rudd lost the confidence of his party. Rudd served the shortest period of any Prime Minister so far.

11. 27 June

    French-born tourist Alizee Sery, 25, outrages Aboriginal and non-Indigenous people by walking to the top of Uluru (formerly Ayers Rock) and performing a strip show which she sees as a ‘tribute’ to Aboriginal people. ⇒ Threats to Aboriginal land

12. July

    The National Museum of Natural History, Washington DC, USA returns Aboriginal remains taken from their burial places during the 1948 American-Australian Scientific Expedition to Arnhem Land (Northern Territory) ^[3].

13. 29 July

    The West Australian government approves $3.2 million, one of the largest ex-gratia (voluntary) payments ever made in Australia to the family of an Aboriginal Elder who died of heatstroke in the back of a prison van in 2008. ⇒ Aboriginal deaths in custody

14. 27 August

    The UN Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination releases its Concluding Observations following a review of Australia’s compliance with the International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination. Among other things the committee recommends that the government "consider the negotiation of a treaty agreement to build a constructive and sustained relationship with Indigenous peoples". ^[4]

15. 28 August

    The UN Committee on the Eliminiation of Racial Discrimination (CERD) delivers a damning report on Australia’s failure to meet international commitments on eliminating discrimination.

16. 8 September

    NSW becames the third Australian state, after Victoria and Queensland, to recognise Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people in their Constitutional preambles. The Aboriginal flag is also permanently hung in the NSW Parliament.

    We are enshrining today fundamental truths, the truth that Aboriginal people are the first peoples of NSW, the truth of the spiritual, economic and cultural ties that bind Aboriginal people to the land. — Kristina Keneally, Premier of NSW ^[5]

17. 30 September

    The National Gallery of Australia opens 11 new Indigenous galleries and art spaces that will house the majority of the gallery’s huge collection of Indigenous art, reportedly the largest collection of its kind in the world. ⇒ Aboriginal arts

18. October

    The ancestral remains of an Erup (Darnley Island) child return, 161 years after they were taken to the UK. The remains were first acquired by Captain Owen Stanley in 1849 during a visit to Darnley Island, then passed on to an antiquarian who gave them to the Norwich Castle Museum in 1854. Finally, the World Museum Liverpool received the remains in 1956. ^[6]

19. 9 October

    The opera Pecan Summer premieres telling the story of the Cummeragunja Aboriginal walk-off of 1939. It is the first opera to be partly sung in Yorta Yorta language.

20. 15 October

    The Indigenous Land Corporation (ILC) announces it had purchased the Ayers Rock Resort at Yulara, near Uluru (Ayers Rock). The deal covers all resort hotels, accommodation and infrastructure. The ILC is an independent statutory authority of the Australian government, established to assist Aboriginal people to acquire and manage land to achieve economic, environmental, social and cultural benefits.

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References