By the turn of the new century, Australia was waking up to the full extent of the suffering of the stolen generations.
The Bringing Them Home report was released in 1997; the following year the first National Sorry Day was held; and in 2000 a quarter of a million Australians walked across Sydney Harbour Bridge in support of meaningful reconciliation. Even the conservative prime minister John Howard was forced to acknowledge that the systematic seizure of First Nations children – a practice that continues in a different name to this day – represents “the most blemished chapter in the history of this country”.
