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THE campaign for an Indigenous Voice is firing up around Australia with calls to remain focused on the referendum question after controversial comments about colonisation. 

Mass marches have taken place across the nation, with Indigenous leaders calling for those who support a constitutionally enshrined advisory body to cut through disinformation they say is being spread by the No side. 

Indigenous Australians Minister Linda Burney said the show of support had left her speechless. 

“I am almost crying,” she told a Melbourne rally on Sunday. 

“It’s truly overwhelming to look out over this crowd and see you, to know where your hearts are, to know where your spirit lives.” 

Professor Maree Meredith told a Canberra rally that some people had more of an opportunity in society to have their voices heard and the referendum could help tip the scales by ensuring Indigenous voices were listened to. 

“My people share their voices for eight years less than non-Indigenous Australians on average,” she said. 

“It’s a chance to start to close the gap…

TRADITIONAL Gomeroi Owners joined hundreds of protesters who gathered outside NSW Parliament to oppose a major coal seam gas project planned for the state’s west. 

Santos’ Narrabri Gas Project has faced sustained backlash from local farmers, conservationists, Traditional Owners and others, who loudly voiced their position at Sydney’s Macquarie Street last Thursday. 

Protesters say the oil and gas giant’s plan to drill up to 850 wells for the extraction of coal seam gas and run a pipeline through the Liverpool Plains foodbowl will compromise farmland and Indigenous heritage sites. 

They say the wells will pass through the Great Artesian Basin which is vital to the area’s grazing and farming and could be at risk of contamination. 

Independent MP Roy Butler, who represents the Narrabri region, told the protest without access to groundwater, local towns would be forced to empty out. 

“We cannot place groundwater at risk and that is what this project does,” he said. 

Crossbenchers, Greens MLC Cate Faehrmann, Legalise Cannabis…

A FIRST Nations agency dedicated to representing First Nations illustrators took home the top Indigenous Design Award at this year’s Good Design Awards in Naarm (Melbourne) earlier this month.

Solid Lines, developed by Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology (RMIT) researcher Dr Nicola St John and co-researcher Emrhan Tjapanangka Sultan (Western Arrarnta, Luritja and Kokatha), alongside the Jacky Winter Group, consulted closely with many First Nations creatives to ensure culturally safe and supportive representation in the industry. 

“Winning the Indigenous Design Award is a huge honour,” Mr Sultan said. 

“And it recognises the importance of First Nations voices within the design industry and the important work Solid Lines is doing to support First Nations artists to be represented fairly. 

“We want our agency to break down expectations of what First Nations art and design is and let our artists define their work for themselves.” 

Mr Sultan said as proud storytellers, the work of Solid Lines is grounded by Country, community, and cultural identity. 

He said Solid Lines is all about creating solid pathways for emerging First Nations artists to find success, recognition, support and fair representation within the art…

THERE will be no age limit on who will receive funds from a multimillion-dollar payout to an Indigenous group impacted by toxic chemicals on cultural lands, a judge has ruled.

The Commonwealth in May agreed to pay $22 million to people living in Wreck Bay, on the NSW south coast, after firefighting foam containing toxic chemicals leaked into sacred waterways. 

The settlement of the civil action, brought by the Wreck Bay Aboriginal Community Council, was approved by the Federal Court, including an estimated $16.5 million going to Indigenous people whose cultural use of the polluted lands was affected. 

Justice Michael Lee ruled that children from the community would be able to share in the payout after objections were made by some of the 980-member group. 

Justice Lee said minors should be compensated because of the ‘intergenerational impact’ on practising culture. 

He said the settlement did not include any restrictions and he did not believe there should be an age limit on who received the funds. 

Earlier, counsel for the class action, William Edwards SC, said there were several categories of objections from group members about the settlement distribution, including wanting to bar minors. 

The court heard… 

THE Bindal Sharks rugby league organisation in Townsville has appealed to the sports’ governing body for fair and proper financial compensation following fixturing that could leave the community group short-changed in the hundreds of thousands.

The community-owned organisation is in the middle of preparing for the 37th edition of the popular Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Rugby League Carnival at Townsville Sports Reserve from October 13-15. 

The annual rugby league tournament attracts up to 30 men’s and women’s teams from across Queensland’s central and north, from Cape York and the Torres Strait. 

It began almost four decades ago. Planning for the event begins as early as November the preceding year. Each year the carnival is played in the middle of October. 

The influx of visiting teams, their players and fans to Townsville injects many thousands of dollars into the local economy, with accommodation, food, fuel, public transport, local taxis, air travel and other expenses. 

“(The carnival) is of a benefit to the wider community, not just to the Indigenous community,” Pryor said. 

But throwing a massive spanner in the works is the ARL-NRL. Rugby league’s Australian governing body has scheduled a double-header international featuring the Australian men’s and women’s national teams in Townsville head-to-head with the… 

THE Yoorrook Justice Commission recently handed down a damning report on the impacts of Victoria’s child protection and criminal justice system on First Nations peoples. 

The Yoorrook for Justice report contains 46 recommendations, calling on the Victorian government to ‘transform Victoria’s child protection and criminal justice systems to address systemic injustice against First Peoples.’ 

Professor Eleanor Bourke, a Wergaia/Wamba Wamba Elder and Chair of Yoorrook, told the Koori Mail that the commission “is appointed as a Royal Commission, which is the highest level of inquiry and we’ve ever had into Aboriginal matters in this country.” 

She said that the aim of their work is “to achieve truth, understanding and transformation” by investigating the historical and ongoing impacts of colonisation on First Nations peoples in Victoria. 

As such, this is the first time in the nation’s history that a government will be forced to respond to recommendations for major reforms handed down by its own truth-telling commission. 

Yoorrook was established in 2021 as a recommendation from the First Peoples’ Assembly of Victoria, who called for a comprehensive truth and justice process. 

A series of ongoing public…