Gary Foley

On 26 January 1988, Aboriginal Australia celebrated and gave a great show of solidarity, an expression of our ongoing sovereignty of this country. We've never relinquished the sovereignty of this country. I think it is important that people realise that it's not a question of coming and looking at the poor little old Aborigines and asking what you can do for us. I believe that we are in a position to teach you how to do the sort of things that I think you have come together to talk about at this conference. I believe that Aboriginal Australia politically is in a very healthy position in terms of controlling our own affairs within our own community. We have an ongoing battle trying to get more resources to enable us to do the jobs that we want to do properly. But Aboriginal Australians have proven, especially in the last 20 years, that we are capable of solving our own problems if we've got control over the resources to do so.