Reconciling the Historical Accounts: Trust Funds Reparations & New South Wales Aborigines

Abstract

Past NSW governments did not properly reconcile the trust accounts in which Aboriginal wages and welfare entitlements were paid. Hopefully the NSW Reparations Scheme and others following it will prove a positive and tangible step towards reconciling the historical accounts. The NSW Trust Funds Reparations package needs to be adequately researched and funded. Financial control and consequent disadvantage suffered by NSW Aborigines under the control of government-led Boards are now to be addressed. If the scheme is hinged entirely upon the chance existence of ‘proof’ amongst poorly kept, patchy Records, this historical lottery will introduce a new layer of inequity. The infrastructure, professional expertise and staff resources required to probe into individual financial records will be costly and such expenditure cannot be guaranteed to deliver the just outcomes intended. For many cases, a less rigorous criterion of proof other than specific moneys owed might need to be considered. For example, a payout to all those who can demonstrate that themselves or their ancestors have endured the control of the Aboriginal Protection Board or Aboriginal Welfare Board, would be money better spent than years of research into a poor archive.