This year Tweddle will be observing and celebrating NAIDOC Week (2nd to 9th July 2023 ). The NAIDOC 2023 theme is For Our Elders. Across every generation, Aboriginal Elders have played, and continue to play, an important role and hold a prominent place in Australian communities and families.
They are cultural knowledge holders, trailblazers, nurturers, advocates, teachers, survivors, leaders, hard workers and loved ones.
Tweddle commences NAIDOC week with the announcement of our first Aboriginal Chairperson. Annette Vickery is a proud Gunditjmara woman with extensive experience across public, private and community sectors.
Annette is a signatory to the Aboriginal Justice Agreement Phase 4, an ambassador for the Ngaga-dji (Hear Me) report and chairperson of the Western Metropolitan Regional Aboriginal Justice Advisory Committee. She has an active interest in social justice and human rights and is a lecturer at Victoria University on the social determinants of Aboriginal Health.
Tweddle is committed to providing accessible, inclusive practices and programs in the best interests of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander children and families for a safe, thriving and strong start to life. We believe that indigenous babies and toddlers’ lives are better when they are connected to family, community and Elders.
During NAIDOC Week, we are reminded that Tweddle deliver services on stolen land. Intergenerational ill-health has impacted generations of Aboriginal families who continue to experience trauma linked to colonisation, stolen generations, discrimination and healthcare delivered through a western lens.
Tweddle has the privilege to work alongside Aboriginal health workers, mums, dads, babies and toddlers as part of our early parenting support programs. Tweddle believes in the rights of Aboriginal People to have opportunities for self-determination.
We respect Aboriginal people by supporting them to stay connected to Country, to family, to language and to land.
NAIDOC Origins
NAIDOC stands for National Aborigines and Islanders Day Observance Committee. Its origins can be traced to the emergence of Aboriginal groups in the 1920′s which sought to increase awareness in the wider community of the status and treatment of Indigenous Australians.
Tweddle Reconciliation Journey
Tweddle is now embarking on our RAP Innovate. Tweddle believes in working in partnership with Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander communities in order to develop an understanding of transgenerational trauma impacts. This is important to us because we believe in delivering inclusive practice and programs in the best interest of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander babies, children, and families.
As part of Tweddle’s RAP journey, we commissioned Dixon Patten, proud Yorta Yorta and Gunnai man and Director/Graphic Artist at Bayila Creative to illustrate our Tweddle RAP Reflect. The artwork tells the story of Tweddle’s commitment to Reconciliation with the Aboriginal community.
Tweddle’s Reconciliation Action Plan (RAP) program provides a framework that will enable us to support the national reconciliation movement. Tweddle’s vision for reconciliation is that all Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander babies and children in Victoria grow up in a secure environment, supported by strong families with a cultural connection to community. As a health service, we want to play our part in Healing Country.
We acknowledge that Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people are proud, and as a proud community, they teach us the power of standing up for the rights of their children, rights to their land and their rights to access services.
You can read more about NAIDOC Week and get involved here.
This Indigenous artwork was created by Dixon Patten, proud Yorta Yorta and Gunnai man and Director/Graphic Artist at Bayila Creative. The artwork tells the story of Tweddle’s commitment to Reconciliation with the Aboriginal community.
- The ‘U’ shape symbols in the middle depict key people forming the RAP committee and coming together to listen, share and support.
- The ripple patterns represent the positive effect on the broader community that the RAP actions will have.
- The 2 outreached hands represent the ancestors guiding Tweddle’s RAP journey.
- The gum leaves represent being ‘Welcomed to Country’.
- The figures holding hands represent children and families supporting, nurturing and protecting each other.
- The footprints depict Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal people walking together in reconciliation.
- The emu and kangaroo tracks are on Australia’s Coat of Arms; chosen because they can’t walk backwards. They are also very paternal and nurture their young.
- The pathways lead to different directions and the circles represent the diverse smaller communities that come together to form our big community.
- The Boomerangs depict returning to cultural values and principles to inform how we learn and teach each other in the spirit of reconciliation.
2023 NAIDOC Poster
2023 National NAIDOC Week Poster
