Every year, somewhere between 150 and 200 babies are born on Cape York Peninsula. Hang on – that’s not right. They’re born into Cape York families – but those babies are born in Cairns. Queensland Health requires pregnant mothers to head to Cairns at around […]
In the 1880s, moves were afoot near the then young settlement of Cairns to establish an Aboriginal mission station on land across Trinity Inlet, at what became known as Mission Bay. The proposal generated some controversy in Cairns, but it did go ahead, under the […]
When Captain Cook landed at the Endeavour River in far north Queensland in 1770, a lot of things changed. Local indigenous people had what was probably their first encounter with Europeans, the outside world became aware of a place that would soon be explored and […]
There’s been a pretty lively debate around far north Queensland in recent times about crocodiles. Well, it’s been going for decades, but has been re-ignited in recent times by croc sightings in close proximity to our large population centres, and especially around popular tourist destinations. […]
We hear lots of debate about our environment and the impact of human activity on our wildlife. In those discussions you’ll hear terms like “endangered”, “threatened”, “vulnerable”, and many other words and phrases. Their exact meaning is not always clear, and given the heat and […]
Back in 2008, the Queensland and Federal Governments, and the Cape York Institute for Policy & Leadership, introduced the Cape York Welfare Reform program in four communities – Aurukun, Coen, Hope Vale and Mossman Gorge. The idea was to find locally informed ways to address social […]
There’s a diversity of views among Cape York indigenous communities on the Australian Government’s recent push for World Heritage listing, and on the prospect of new or expanded mining in the region. The Federal Government has run a long consultation process to muster indigenous support […]
We did our annual Cape York Peninsula road trip a bit early this year, in June instead of October. It was early in the dry season, the roads were in great shape and we travelled to Lakeland, Laura, Lama Lama National Park, Coen, Wenlock River, […]
All over indigenous Australia, there are people who have returned to live on their traditional country, rather than in towns or communities to which they have no real cultural connection. And there are others working towards that goal. In the 1970s, the idea of going […]
Many of Australia’s remote indigenous communities are in towns and centres that began as church missions, or places to which governments re-located indigenous people from their traditional lands. People were encouraged, or forced, to move into those towns, often a long way from the country […]