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Qld Govt urged to back pay underpaid Aboriginal workers

23 November 2006 - The north Queensland arm of the Stolen Wages Working Group says the State Government has no choice but to back-pay hundreds of underpaid Indigenous workers.

The Federal Court has ruled the State Government discriminated against a group of Aboriginal workers during the 1970s and 1980s in far north Queensland, paying them under award wages.

It appears to leave the Government liable for a massive payment.

Lilian Willis Senior says the acknowledgment of past injustices is a real coup for Indigenous Queenslanders.
"Next year Queensland ... celebrates 150 years of statehood and Aboriginal people's and Islander people's wages and their contribution to infrastructure in Queensland should and ought to be recognised and there should be something done in a real way by the State Government to recognise that," she said.

Source ABC

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