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Times they are a'changing for a straight shooter

26 January 2009 - Mick Dodson feared defeat in his long struggle, but he is again a force to be reckoned with, writes Joel Gibson. I'm now 50," Professor Michael Dodson AM told the nation's leaders black and white as they gathered at the Sydney Opera House for Corroboree 2000.

It was a day after a quarter of a million people had walked across the Harbour Bridge to show they agreed with his sorry view of Australia's history.

But still, he said, shock jocks were being taken off air for telling his kind to "get off our lazy black arses".

"Well, I'm happy to announce I'm not going off air," Mr Dodson said.

"I expect to be broadcasting the reconciliation message for some time to come yet."

Mr Dodson's signal, though forthright as ever, was nonetheless dimmed by the Howard era in Australian politics.

As co-author of Bringing Them Home, the report that outlined the full catastrophe of the removal of indigenous children from their families in support of a philosophy of assimilation, Mr Dodson became Mr Sorry in the public eye - the indigenous leader most associated with widespread calls for an apology. When it did not arrive, "the saddest story of them all", as he called the tale of the stolen generations, appeared to haunt him.

"The Howard era did him over a bit," says a friend of 20 years. "He was physically moved by the [stolen generations work], and it really changed him in some ways."

After a seven-year cold war, Mr Dodson tried again to find some common ground with John Howard in 2004, and again in 2006 - to little avail.

As he pointed out in that 2000 speech, the two lawyers' backgrounds could not have been more different.

Born in 1950 in Katherine in the Northern Territory to a father of unknown ancestry and a Yawuru mother, from Broome, he is the younger brother of Patrick, another indigenous luminary.

A year earlier a Broome magistrate had refused their grandmother's application for citizenship, partly because she had not adopted the manner and habits of civilised life. As a young girl she had been taken from her father and placed in a mission in Western Australia. Mr Dodson's mother and two of his sisters all finished up in the same mission.

His father, known as Snowy, was jailed for 18 months for breaching West Australia's Native Administration Act 1905-1941 by "cohabiting" with his Aboriginal wife.

"I will never understand," Mr Dodson said in 2000, "a social, political and legal system that could jail my father for loving my mother."

When he was 10 he found his father dead in suspicious circumstances with a gunshot wound to the head. His mother died soon afterwards, and his aunt and uncle took the children to Darwin and won a protracted battle against the authorities to keep them.

In 1963 he went to boarding school in western Victoria - where he went from a shy boy who liked to fight, to vice-captain and sporting star - and in 1977 he graduated from Monash University law school. Two years later he became Victoria's first Aboriginal barrister. "The thing that spurred me most was my colour," Mr Dodson, then 18, told the Melbourne Herald in 1969. "I felt that the other kids were watching me, and thought I could not make it. I couldn't give a darn what colour I am. People must learn to accept other people for what they are - after all, we have the same coloured blood."

A decade ago, exhausted and jaded, Mr Dodson admitted he felt "largely defeated" and "bloody buggered" by his fight for his people. "You alienate the kids. You lose the love of your partner, and your dog even barks at you when you occasionally return home for some clean clothes, a decent feed and some rest."

But the public Mick Dodson has begun to re-emerge since he took on the chair of Reconciliation Australia last year and heard, finally, a national apology whose absence threatened to shake his faith in the world.

His expanded public profile could affect the balance of power in indigenous politics, which his brother Patrick says is tilted in favour of the welfare reformist Noel Pearson and his supporters, who have disagreed with the Dodsons over home ownership, the intervention in the Northern Territory and the importance of a treaty.

As Australian of the Year he will have the opportunity to explain indigenous Australia to Joe Average and to push again for a treaty, reparations and an end to talk of assimilation.

And Australians may see more of the fanatical Sydney Swans fan, gifted raconteur and knockabout bloke of whom friends speak.

It is difficult to say why this year is more appropriate than another for him to be recognised, except that the political climate seems so perfect for it.

As they once did for his nemesis Mr Howard, the times may now suit Mick Dodson.

Source: The Sydney Morning Herald

Dodson named Australian of the Year

25 January 2009 - Indigenous rights campaigner Mick Dodson says he had to think long and hard before deciding to accept this year's Australian of the Year nomination.

Professor Dodson was nominated for the prestigious award alongside Glenn McGrath, Geoffrey Gurrumul Yunupingu, Ivan Copley, Peter Cundall, Dr Berhan Ahmed, Dr Penny Flett and Bronwyn Sheehan.

Professor Dodson, Australia's first Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander social justice commissioner, is a member of the Yawuru people of the southern Kimberley in Western Australia.

He has spent his career tirelessly campaigning for Indigenous people to improve their lives through reconciliation, understanding and education.

Professor Dodson previously voiced concerns about the date of Australia Day, which commemorates the day the First Fleet arrived in Australia.

But he says accepting the award will help him advocate for human rights in Australia.

"It's a humbling thing, but I too share the concerns of my Indigenous brother and sisters about the date, and I talked long and hard with my family about this and we decided it was in the best interests that I accept the nomination," he said.

"I feel quite embarrassed and humbled in accepting this honour, but i'm enormously proud to receive it and i'm going to do my very best.

Professor Dodson says he hopes to build Australians' understanding of what it means to protect the rights and human dignity of all Australians.

"Upholding human rights is about looking out for each other... sometimes we don't speak up when we should," he said.

"We pretend the problem will go away or ignore it because we think it's too hard, but I have great faith in all fellow Australians, my countrymen.

"What I want to say this year is that we're better than that."

Prime Minister Kevin Rudd thanked Professor Dodson for his commitment to Indigenous people.

"Mick Dodson has been a courageous fighter for reconciliation and for closing the gap between Indigenous and non-Indigenous Australians," Mr Rudd said.

"His efforts truly show that if we work together, we can achieve real progress."

A law graduate from Monash University, Professor Dodson is director of the Australian National University's National Centre for Indigenous Studies, co-chair of Reconciliation Australian and chairman of the Australian Institute of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Studies.

Among his long list of achievements, Professor Dodson was awarded the Medal of the Order of Australia for his work with the Indigenous community and native title rights in 2003.

Professor Dodson is a community representative for the Pacific region at the United Nations Indigenous peoples forum.

Outstanding excellence

Victims support worker Jonty Bush has been named Young Australian of the Year.

After her younger sister was murdered and father killed in an unprovoked attack in two separate incidents, Ms Bush went on to help others deal with their grief by becoming a volunteer with the Queensland Homicide Victim's Support Group.

At the age of 27, she was appointed CEO of the organisation.

Meanwhile professional fisherman Graeme Drew, co-founder of the Bremer Bay SES and Sea Rescue, has been named Australia's Local Hero for 2009.

Mr Drew operates from the small town of Bremer Bay in Western Australia, searching for lost or disabled vessels and retrieving the bodies of those drowned while fishing.

Senior Australian of the Year 2009 is entrepreneur and philanthropist Pat LaManna of Balwyn, Victoria.

Mr LaManna, 76, has been a member of the Lions Club for 40 years and founded the Lions Club of the Melbourne Markets in 1972, which has become the highest fund raising Lions Club in Australia.

Source : ABC

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