Senate Finance and Public Administration Legislation Committee, , 7:08:52 to 7:18:00
The Tiwi Land Council outlines strategic planning for homelands and the emotional process of repatriating ancestral remains from the South Australian Museum.
Topics: First Nations, Land management
Speakers: Brenton Toy, Austin Wonaeamirri, Senator Karen Grogan, Unknown Speaker
>> Thank you very much. Um Ty Lang Council, Mr. Toy.
>> Yep. Uh so Brenton Toy uh chief executive officer Tiwi Land Council. I'll just introduce u other members and staff that we've got here. So we've got Mr. Austin Monuri uh chairman of the Tiwi Land Council, Miss Karina Kums who's the uh trustee for the Monipe land owning clan group on Tiwi, Anna Garcia who's our governance and risk officer and Suzanne Manar another Tiwi person who's working in our closing the gap policy officer space. Okay. >> Um, and so we'll we'll bounce a little bit, but I'll hand over to the chair to to start to do his bit of the opening statement and I'll finish off.
>> Yep. Chair senators, my name is Austin Moni, chair of the T land council. Firstly, would like to acknowledge the Nanowal and Emry people, traditional owners of this land, we meet on. Thank you for the opportunity to appear today on behalf of the TV land council. In this opening statement, we'd like to share two examples of the critical work our land council is doing to keep our TI culture strong. Firstly, we have been doing strategic planning for Tiwi homelands. Homelands are foundation of our identity, culture, and well-being. We are talking about this now because between over the next few months the Australian and anti-governs will be making decisions about future investments in homelands. Homelands have been neglected by government for a very long time. It was really good to see the Australian government start putting money back into since 2022. This money runs out in the middle of Kiwi people have plans for their homelands. They are places for restbite and There are places to pass on knowledge and keep culture strong. There are also places where we can share our culture with visitors through tourism and create jobs for two people while staying connected to The aspirations that two people have identified are practical and achievable TV people are already working on ways to generate our own income to support homelands living. For example, some homelands businesses are already established like the Mamontes cross-cultural camps at Petra on Melbourne Island. And there are other plans for more including the Moplari prawn farm at Rancu on Bethus Island and the ecourism at Tarakami on Melville Island. What we also need is support from the government to fund the basic infrastructure that keeps homelands The homelands movement hasn't gone away. two people are living and returning to homelands. We have seen how the recent homelands housing and infrastructure program HHIP investment has enabled families to return at places like Tarakami and Condor Point. We encourage the federal government to see opportunity that comes from investments in homelands as places of cultural important physical and spiritual health and economic I will now hand over to CEO Brenton toy to discuss some of our operations. >> Thank you.
>> Thank you chair. Um so this is just one example. The Tiwi land council recognizes uh the critical important importance of investing and maintaining strong cultural land rights system. To support this work, the land council has formally established the tour cultural committee as a formal subcommittee of the land council. [clears throat] We've done this because we know that cultural maintenance and revitalization is not just a nice thing to do for the land council. It's it's central to effective land governance. Uh because effective land governance relies on cultural uh just sharing a an experience that our uh culture committee uh had recently um stories about truthtelling, healing and cultural authority. So in September uh they went for a visit down to the South Australia Museum and a week out from attending the museum, they were advised that there uh 23 ancestral remains still held at the museum. uh which was a bit of a shock to Tiwi people to know that that was still um you there were bones you know sitting in places and um that we didn't even know about. Um and so our committee had the opportunity to go and view these remains have the conversation with the SA museum and as you can imagine this was a profoundly moving experience uh for for our members. Following on from the museum visit, uh the next month our culture committee had just spent going back to community talking about the experience, letting them know about the remains and um I've never seen our clan group so engaged in a conversation when it was talking and to get a sense of the importance of you know the ancestors and our connection to our history. So during October, our culture committee went out and sharing the experience um of their visit with the SA Museum and connecting with our um clans, talking about our ancestors. Um and it's clear that Tiwi people want our ancestors to be brought home. Um for the Tiwi land council and Tiwi people, repatriation is not simply the return of ancestral remains. It is the return of Tiwi authority uh over those remains and responsibility for what happens to them in the future. It is healing. It is recognizing and making peace with our It's history and knowledge that we can carry forward and current throughout current and to future generations. This is important work of the Tiwi Land Council's culture committee and it's something that we want to continue uh to take forward. Thank you.
>> Thank you very much. Really appreciate can I just we will go to Senator Shish but can I first ask with that repatriation what what is the process that is open to you at this point in
>> Yeah so most places have been very good ISIS the museums and we're having that conversation to say that we really need a central authority to decide what happens to that and and we're agreeing that the land council is that group. There are a few things involved in it. we can bring um we can repatriate remains but we need an appropriate storage place for them and so that's the first thing and so I guess what we're doing is getting out and finding out where these things are and then agreeing that the authority for where they sit sits with the land council and then we have conversations around what things can we return digital collections no worries we can do that but the hard artifacts um some of them you know you know hundreds of years old and very brittle and need to be kept in climate controlled envirment environment. So, uh, for us first it's establishing the authority that the Tiwe Land Council decides what happened to them. And so, if we say we want it to stay in the SA museum, well, then that's what it does. And so, establishment of cultural authority, working out what things we want to bring back, and then this is the whole point of talking to our clan groups is some families and and some of the remains aren't identifiable. So, getting DNA testing to try and find, you know, descendants of an or ancestors of those remains, I think, is a step as well. Um but then the conversation around what do we do with them? Do we keep them in storage and you know or there are some families that go no no part of our ceremony way is to have a funeral and ceremony and send them off properly so that it that spirit of that person can leave this world. So to step that out establishing the cultural authority getting identification around the descendants through DNA testing and then working out what the appropriate storage um mechanism might be. Uh and then I guess aside to that is the work that we're doing with the different groups um to try and find an appropriate uh storage facility which might mean combining uh and talking about um cyclone preparedness but like a a um a cyclone shelter that doubles as a you know a cultural holding place for us as