Evidence Library

Rumbalara Football Netball Club (Rumbalara FNC) is an Aboriginal community run sporting club located in Shepparton, Victoria.

This submission is a Final Report into the Rumbalara Wellbeing and Resilience Project by Algabonyah Research and Impact Centre at the Kaiela Institute.

In recent years, the exposure of young members to racial vilification has compelled Rumbalara FNC to seek this evaluation of how well the club is supporting the wellbeing of its members, with a view to seek additional ways to promote wellbeing and resilience and decrease exposure to racism.

Codey is a Lama Lama man from Queensland. This submission details Codey’s experiences of growing up in foster care, challenges at school, mental health and addiction challenges. Codey describes his negative experiences of psychiatric in-patient facilities, and spending time in prisons and how this has impacted on his social and emotional wellbeing particularly the inability to connect with Country. Codey reflects on his healing journey, which has been supported by re-connecting with culture and community, and the desire to be a role model and advocate for others through music.

Paul Dodemaide is a descendant of settler colonials living on Wadawurrung country. In this submission, he reflects on his own and his family’s history, his privilege, and the systemic racism he has witnessed. He acknowledges his past ignorance and commits to learning as much as he can about his family’s settler colonial history.

This submission reflects the voices of Your Community Health staff and their commitment to equity and truth-telling. It describes the impacts of colonisation as profound and ongoing, along with the resilience of First Nations peoples. Your Community Health believes it is essential that Victoria addresses gaps in education, promotes cultural understanding, strengthens anti-racism efforts and takes meaningful action toward truth-telling and Treaty. It remains committed to amplifying First Nations voices, supporting self-determination and standing alongside communities in their pursuit of equity and justice.

This submission describes the author’s family’s challenging past, including their Nan’s experience of intersectional racism, intergenerational and transgenerational trauma, and the difficulty of connecting to their culture due to mental health struggles and family dynamics. They feel the disconnection is intense and isolating.

This submission discusses the unfair treatment by police, hospitals and courts of a mother whose children are no longer under her care.

Loddon Mallee Health Network’s ‘Blak Butterfly’ – First Nations Emergency Care Best Practice Framework research project sought to reveal solutions for First Peoples access to emergency care at all triage categories, their experience of cultural safety during treatment and discharge planning. It researches and recommends actions for areas including First Nations care governance, culturally safe building design, triage, transport home, mental health, cultural care and anti-racism education.

Michelle Gurry contributes her account of what might be called everyday racial microaggressions – injustices caused by the judgements, assumptions, biases, and ignorance of non-Indigenous Australians. This includes the injustice of unintentional harm, the injustice of a deficit mindset and not understanding self-determination, the injustice of non-Indigenous Australians failing to learn the truth, and the injustice of First Nations knowledge systems not informing/shaping mainstream Australia in the way they rightfully should.

This submission reflects the Indigenous Hospitality House (IHH) from its beginnings through until the end of 2022. It also primarily reflects the views and experience of the original group of people who initiated and lived at the project during these years. The IHH is a community project in Naarm / Melbourne that uses a property on stolen land to provide a place for First Nations people to stay while visiting family members in hospital.