Children in Crisis

Australia's Children in Crisis | Australia: Fears Over New 'Stolen Generation'

• Report rights infringement
• published: 21 Jul 2013
• views: 5518

The abandonment of thousands of Aborigine children in Australia leads to calls to allow white couples to adopt them. Campaigners are asking for the law to be changed to help rescue thousands of Aboriginal children in Australia from extreme neglect. Alcohol abuse is rife amongst indigenous communities and children are being abandoned while their parents drink. In some rural areas it is common to see toddlers in nappies wandering around unsupervised, even begging for food or warm clothing. Many non-indigenous families are so concerned that they have been taking children off the streets and into their homes without formal permission. They want the law changed to make it easier for white Australians to foster or adopt Aboriginal children. Eight-year-old Cebby, who was born to an alcoholic mother, has been surrounded by alcohol abuse and violence throughout his young life. He told Sky News about the few simple things he thinks adults should provide. "I want them to make me feel safe. Make me feel alright, not scared. Make me feel normal." Becky Healy, who runs a motel in Tennant Creek - a town in the heart of Australia's outback, is distraught at the huge numbers of Aboriginal children wandering the streets unwashed, unfed and unschooled. Her motel has inadvertently become a refuge for neglected children. "It's a crisis. We are now at a point of do or die and we have to do something for these kids. "If it means taking them into our complex and feeding them and training them when we have nothing to do with the social sector, then so be it." Children surrounded by substance abuse are even becoming addicted themselves. Recently three girls, barely in their teens, were caught on CCTV in Tennant Creek breaking into a workshop and sniffing petrol fumes from a tractor engine. Politicians are now considering putting neglected Aboriginal children up for adoption, until now there has been an unwillingness to act because of fears of a new "stolen generation". That was a misguided policy which only ended in the early 1970s where Aboriginal children were taken from their families and placed under foster care with white families or institutions. The law has since stated that Aboriginal children in need must always be placed within their community, wherever possible. Northern Territory Chief Minister Adam Giles, Australia's first indigenous state or territory leader, says it is time to revisit the legislation. "Whatever we do has to be about making parents take responsibility for their kids," he said. "(However) we have to give those kids the best opportunity in life and where we deem it necessary we won't be afraid to make those decisions about the child's future." It is a change Yvonne Mudford and her husband Leigh Swift say can't come soon enough. Their aboriginal neighbours asked them to take their child Mikala for a few hours, then weeks and now permanently. She still sees her natural parents but is thriving in a home free from alcohol abuse and violence. http://news.sky.com/story/1118471/australia-fears-over-new-stolen-generation