First Nations families are feeling a lack of safety and protection from the system. We are seeing laws harden, cultural respect at a national level diminish and First Peoples are feeling this heavily. And this is why this National Reconciliation Week I am as deeply worried as I have ever been.

And while I write this, I want you to know that there continues to be incredible strength, love and joy in communities, not just Children’s Ground but in First Nations homes across the country. This weekend Children’s Ground had 200 families came together on Saturday for a family afternoon in Mparntwe to celebrate children and young people and football.

Last week we focused on preventing diphtheria, ran early years sessions, planned for a new music album of children’s songs, and watched young people and men leading. And this week we have an intensive cultural and learning and wellbeing camp for children and families. At the same time we are planning for the upcoming national First Cultural Educators Forum at the end of June which bring First Nations educators together from across the country as we progress national reform in First nations led education. We continue to push against a system that is bearing down, and we are creating change.

It is an opportunity to reflect on our shared history, the relationship between First Nations and non-First Nations peoples and the future we want to build together.

You may remember that that Australian Government recently undertook an independent evaluation of Children’s Ground and found we are leading practice and recommended full Government funding. This funding commitment remains elusive despite Closing the Gap outcomes that continue to go backwards. First Nations children continue to be removed from their families at devastating rates; First Nations young people, women and men are imprisoned at rates that are outrageous, housing conditions and overcrowding in First Nations communities is appalling and the persistent deaths and disease that are all preventable.

These are lived, daily realities for our families at Children’s Ground. Your support allows us to deliver leading practice. To build an evidence base demonstrating that First Nations led solutions work.

This is a long journey. And together we can, and we must, change the reality of child removal, incarceration, poverty, racism and government systems that continue to deny our children basic opportunities, and instead support the conditions they need to thrive.

Reconciliation week is marked by significant dates. Firstly, National Sorry Day on 26 May, remembering the Stolen Generations and the trauma inflicted when First Nations children were taken from their families, separated from parents, siblings, culture, language and Country. Families were torn apart. Communities carry that trauma to this day. The second is May 27, the anniversary of the 1967 Referendum when over 90% of Australians voted to amend the Constitution to provide for laws for First Peoples and to allow people to be counted in the national census. To be recognised as part of Australia’s population. The last significant day is June 3, Mabo Day, the anniversary of the landmark 1992 High Court of Australia which overturned the legal doctrine of terra nullius (unoccupied land) and legally recognised First Peoples as the First Peoples of this land with ownership, history and rights.

Public debate has increasingly focused on symbolic disputes about First Nations culture and identity. Welcome to Country ceremonies, which are a beautiful gift of inclusion and coming together, have been weaponised. People are being forcibly removed from sacred sites and the respect for First Nations lands and culture is threatened.

Meanwhile, First Nations community leaders continue to lead. With dignity, purpose and generosity. Across Australia, communities continue to raise the same concerns they have been raising for decades. Families continue to call for adequate housing, healthcare, education and economic opportunity. First Nations organisations continue to advocate for prevention, early support and community authority. Inquiries, researchers and experts provide the evidence that stands next to the voices of the people.

Governments know children are more likely to thrive when families have stable housing, access to healthcare, strong educational opportunities and meaningful economic participation. Governments know that culture, language, family and community are protective factors for First Nations children. Governments know that early support is more effective than intervention once families reach crisis.

Sadly, the response to the evidence and to systemic failure is more intervention, more punitive and crisis investment and greater control for government systems; prisons, incarceration, child removal, crisis health. Governments are persisting with inequality not preventing it.

The question is not whether Australia understands the circumstances facing First Nations children but if governments are prepared to act on what they already know. And what it is we can do, or contine to do, to achieve real change.

Every day at Children’s Ground, we see families raising children in culture, Elders exercising leadership and communities creating pathways for their children despite systems that continue to work against them.

As National Reconciliation Week continues, I thank you for your actions, because they matter. They matter to our day-to-day reality on the ground, to every child who walks alongside their family for a better education, for each young person finding a new path, for people accessing health in a meaningful way, for Elders holding the direction and the knowledge, for those who are working for the first time and for those who experience safety and dignity at Children’s Ground. That is the thing that resonates the most for me when I am sitting with families in Alice Springs, Darwin or Marlkawo – they say ‘at Children’s Ground I can be myself’. It is a place that respects culture, language, family, community voice and people feel safe. There are not many places where people feel this, but they do feel it at Children’s Ground. In so many other places people feel under threat, under surveillance and unsafe.

As we come to the end of Reconciliation Week our challenge is to act every day until we achieve justice for First People. To keep listening to First Nations voices. Challenge racism and misinformation. To challenge governments to act. To create space for First Nations perspectives in workplaces, community and everyday conversations. To support First Nations led solutions and remain engaged.

The future First Nations children deserve cannot be created by First Nations communities alone. It requires governments willing to act, institutions willing to change and Australians willing to stand alongside First Nations people in the pursuit of justice, equity and self determination.

Thank you for continuing to walk with Children’s Ground. Thank you for remaining engaged, for listening to First Nations voices and for standing alongside children, families and communities as we continue this long journey together.

You can learn more about our Wear it Yellow campaign here.