Australia: The South West Aboriginal Women's Collective (SWAWC) welcomed over 100 Aboriginal women from across Bunbury, Manjimup, Collie, Busselton and surrounding towns to gather for the second Roundtable held in September. Photo: Aimee Han/Oxfam.
Self determination program
Indigenous Rights Program
The ability of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people to freely determine their own political, economic, social and cultural development is a fundamental first step towards securing a better future.
We’re committed to helping Indigenous Australians realise their right to self-determination. In a practical sense, it’s about ensuring that Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people are able make decisions about policies and programs that directly affect their lives, and respecting and supporting these decisions.
This is why Oxfam was a signatory to the Redfern Statement during the 2016 Federal election. The Statement came about because of the growing frustration amongst Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander leaders in a range of sectors that governments of all persuasions were not listening to Indigenous people.
We have worked with the Kimberley Land Council to highlight the ongoing fight to secure land rights for Aboriginal people in the Kimberley and speak out against the discriminatory practices of the Western Australia Government in relation to proposals to forcibly close remote Aboriginal communities in the Kimberley; changes to the Cultural Heritage Act which would weaken Aboriginal peoples ability to protect their cultural heritage; and the creation of new conservation areas on Aboriginal land that would require people to give up their native title rights.
Strengthening Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Peoples’ influence
We are working with Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people and organisations to ensure their voices are heard by Australia’s politicians and others in positions of power. And if there isn’t a forum for this to happen, we help to create it. A decade ago Oxfam joined with several Indigenous, not-for-profit and health organisations to form the Close the Gap coalition. This initiative put the stark health inequality of First Australians on the national agenda. In April 2015 we joined with similar groups to launch the Change the Record campaign to reduce the soaring number of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people in the criminal justice system and incarcerated.
And each year we continue to organise regional or and national Straight Talk summits which links bring Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander women from around the nation together with female Ministers and parliamentarians to explore ways to advance reconciliation, justice and equality for Indigenous Australians. In 2016 we held our first ever Straight Talk event with the Victorian Local Government Association (VLGA) which brought together Aboriginal women in Victoria interested in local government. We also hosted a National Summit in Canberra.