NameReconciliation WeekDescriptionShellharbour City Council celebrates Reconciliation Week from 27 May to 3 June, with an annual Reconciliation Flag Walk.
The event involves hundreds of local school children who take part in the Reconciliation Walk and special flag exchange between students, Aboriginal Elders and civic leaders.
National Reconciliation Week is intended to celebrate Indigenous history and culture in Australia and foster reconciliation discussion and activities.
The process of Reconciliation formally began as a result of the Report of the Royal Commission into Aboriginal Deaths in Custody 1991. The Council for Aboriginal Reconciliation was formed by the government, setting a 10-year timeframe to implement a national process of reconciliation.
National Reconciliation Week began as the Week of Prayer for Reconciliation in 1993. In 1996, the Council for Aboriginal Reconciliation launched Australia's first National Reconciliation Week.
The dates of Reconciliation Week mark two significant events -
1. The 27 May 1967 referendum that saw more than 90% of Australians vote to change the Constitution so that Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples would be counted as part of the population and the Commonwealth would be able to make laws for them.
2. The Australian High Court Mabo decision 3 June 1992; the culmination of Eddi Koiki Mabo's challenge to the legal fiction of 'terra nullius' (land belonging to no one), and leading the legal recognition of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples as the Traditional Owners and Custodians of lands.
Reconciliation Walk 2021.