Australian Prime Minister apologises to "stolen generation": rhetoric versus reality

The theme of Rudd’s speech, watched by a big crowd outside Parliament House and on large screens in venues across the country, was that it was necessary to confront and acknowledge the wrongs committed in the past in order to “move on”.

For many people watching, this would have been the first time that the shocking practices associated with the forced removals of indigenous children had come to their attention in such detail. And no doubt members of Aboriginal communities, the “stolen generations” and their descendants, drew strength from the acknowledgement in parliament of the brutalities they had endured as a result of public policy.

But nowhere in the prime minister’s speech was there any explanation of why, as the resolution stated, “the laws and policies of successive parliaments and governments” had “inflicted profound grief, suffering and loss on these our fellow Australians”.