treaties with the natives formalising the takeover of land by Europeans. The government had always termed the land of Australia terra nullius , that is belonging to nobody. JUDITH WRIGHT ( - ), an Australian writer, was a champion of the rights of the Australian aborigines. She wrote many moving poems about the loss created by keeping the white people and the natives apart.
D ISPLACING I NDIGENOUS P EOPLES T HEMES IN W ORLD H ISTORY There was also a long and agonising history of children of mixed blood (native European) being forcibly captured and separated from their native relatives. Agitation around these questions led to enquiries and to two important decisions: one, to recognise that the natives had strong historic bonds with the land which was ‘sacred’ to them, and which should be respected; two, that while past acts could not be undone, there should be a public apology for the injustice done to children in an attempt to keep ‘white’ and ‘coloured’ people apart. ‘White Australia’ policy ends, Asian immigrants allowed entry The Australian High Court (in the Mabo case) declares that terra nullius was legally invalid, and recognised native claims to land from before The National Enquiry into the Separation of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Children from their Families ( th May) ‘A National Sorry Day’ as apology for the children ‘lost’ from the 1820s to the 1970s