Moree Baths and Swimming Pool

About

Moree Baths and Swimming Pool is a heritage-listed swimming pool at Anne Street, Moree, New South Wales, Australia. It was the site of one of the successful protests by Aboriginal Australians for their rights during the Freedom Ride in February 1965. The site was added to the Australian National Heritage List on 6 September 2013.

By-laws prohibited Aboriginal people from going to pubs or clubs or the swimming baths in Moree, and they were not allowed to walk on the sidewalk or play football in the local team. The local cinema was segregated - Blacks had to sit in the front rows. Lyall Munro Snr and the Moree Aboriginal Advancement Committee worked hard to change these segregationist policies.

In early 1965 a group of students from the University of Sydney led by Aboriginal student activist Charles Perkins embarked upon a bus trip known as the Freedom Ride through outback NSW and Queensland to highlight racial inequalities in Australia at the time. The trip was based on the " Freedom Rides " that occurred as part of the civil rights movement in the United States in the early 1960s. The bus travelled to number of towns where racial discrimination had been identified with the aim of highlighting the inequalities and raising the profile of this issue amongst the broader Australian community. A number of towns were visited including Walgett and Kempsey but in Moree, where a ban on Aboriginal use of the local pool was in force, the trip gained a national profile in the media and raised the profile of Charles Perkins as an iconic figure for the Indigenous community.

The events at the Moree Swimming Baths in February 1965 constitute a defining moment in the history of race relations in Australia. The activities of the Student Action for Aborigines group at Moree drew the attention of the public to the informal and institutional racial segregation practised at that time in outback towns in New South Wales. The events at Moree also highlighted the failures at both state and federal levels; while both spoke rhetoric of inclusion into the wider Australian society, Aboriginal people in country towns were still being excluded from sharing basic facilities. The publicity that the events at the Moree baths attracted contributed to shaping a climate of opinion resulting in a resounding Yes vote in the 1967 referendum, leading to a change in the Australian Constitution to allow the Australian Government to make laws specifically for Aboriginal people. The constitutional amendment provided the legal basis for subsequent Australian Government involvement in Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander affairs, and also led to increased recognition of the importance of Indigenous rights in Australia.

The Freedom Ride and the events at Moree have their origins in a heightened concern about racial discrimination in Australia after the Second World War. In 1945 the international community, in its attempts to provide peace and security in a world traumatised by the social and economic disruption of total war, agreed to recognise the political aspirations of, and to promote self-government in, colonised countries.

In 1960 the British Prime Minister, Harold MacMillan responded to the Sharpeville massacre in Cape Town by delivering his " Winds of Change " speech to the South African Parliament. The speech recognised the inevitable growth of African national consciousness. The Australian Prime Minister, Robert Menzies, and MacMillan tried to develop a form of words that would keep the Commonwealth intact. However, the final statement released at the end of the 1961 meeting of Commonwealth Prime Ministers expressed concern at the effect that South Africa's racial policies could have on relations between Commonwealth countries that were members of a multi-racial association of people.

Menzies declined to become involved in overt criticism of apartheid, arguing that it was an internal matter for South Africa in which Australia should not interfere. Despite the government's silence, an anti-apartheid movement began to form which included the National Union of Australian University Students.

South Africa was not the only country where there were laws institutionalising segregation and racial discrimination. In the early 1960s, protests by the civil rights movement against racial segregation laws in the United States of America led to brutal response by police in southern states. The police response and subsequent mass jailing received widespread coverage in Australia. In response to the mass protests and arrests in Birmingham, Alabama, the American President, John Kennedy, introduced a Civil Rights Bill to Congress in 1963. His successor, Lyndon Johnson, sought to push the bill through Congress in the early months of 1964. Sydney University students decided to protest outside the United States consulate on 6 May 1964 in support of the Bill, and against the senators from southern states who were attempting through filibuster to prevent its passage. When police began arresting protestors, fellow students tried to free them. The initial scuffle turned into what one newspaper described as "an all-in brawl", leading to extensive media publicity.

International and some local reports of the demonstration included suggestions that demonstrators were hypocritical because they focused on fashionable American civil rights issues but did not consider the treatment of Australia's Indigenous minority, which was also racially discriminatory. In 1965, assimilation rather than segregation had been Australian Government policy for at least a decade, but the Australian Government powers were limited to persuasion since Aboriginal policy was firmly a matter for the state governments at this time. In his statement after the 1961 Native Welfare Conference, the Hon Paul Hasluck, the Australian Government Minister for Territories, described this policy as one that would enable Aboriginal people to:

"... live as members of a single Australian community, enjoying the same responsibilities, observing the same customs and influenced by the same beliefs, hopes and loyalties as other Australians."

Discriminatory legislation was removed by the Australian Government and state governments in the early 1960s. The last two states to grant Aboriginal people voting rights were Western Australia in 1962, and Queensland in 1962 (for Australian elections) and 1965 (for state elections). In New South Wales, Aboriginal policy was managed by the Aborigines Welfare Board (AWB), which sought either to keep people on its managed stations or to exert control over the rest through a network of district welfare officers. Typically, Aboriginal people lived on the fringes of towns, either in unhealthy shanty settlements or in highly regulated stations. They continued to suffer the effects of racial discrimination at a local level, socially, economically, and culturally.

There was, however, a growing movement for Aboriginal rights in the late 1950s and early 1960s, represented most clearly by the organisations brought together by the Federal Council for the Advancement of Aborigines (in 1964 Torres Strait Islanders were added so that the acronym became FCAATSI). Students had not been a significant part of this movement, but after the criticisms of their actions outside the US Embassy in May 1964, and influenced by the arrival the year before of Charles Perkins and Gary Williams as the first two Aboriginal students at the University of Sydney, they began to organise a very successful student-organised demonstration and concert. This took place on National Aborigines Day in Hyde Park in Sydney and was followed by the formation in July 1964 of a more permanent organisation, Student Action for Aborigines (SAFA). This organisation drew people from many of the political, religious and recreational clubs in the University and it had an Aboriginal student, Charles Perkins, as Chairman.

The proposed Freedom Ride with its focus on racial discrimination and segregation resonated with Charles Perkins' life. He was born at The Bungalow in Alice Springs. His Eastern Arrernte mother, recognising there were limited educational opportunities in Alice Springs, took up an offer for him to go to St Francis House, an Anglican home for boys of mixed Aboriginal and other descent in Semaphore South, Adelaide. He had encountered discrimination against Aboriginal people in Alice Springs and this continued when he moved to Adelaide.

One of the suggested activities for the SAFA group, which was inspired by the Freedom Rides in America, was a bus tour of Aboriginal settlements. Unlike the American Freedom Rides, which aimed to challenge segregation on interstate buses and at interstate bus terminals in the south, SAFA planned their bus tour to highlight the plight of Aboriginal people in rural Australia on a range of issues. Their aim was to undertake a social survey into the extent of racial discrimination in country towns, and then to draw discrimination to the attention of the wider Australian public through the press, radio and television. They wanted to point out the discriminatory barriers and inadequacies in health and housing as well as supporting Aboriginal people in challenging the status quo. The group decided to adopt Martin Luther King's approach of non-violent resistance when dealing with opponents.

Preparations for the trip included a number of fundraisers including folk concerts, dances and sales of Christmas cards. SAFA also received donations from the Student Union, and each student participant contributed ten pounds. They heard talks and produced a reading list about the barriers facing Aboriginal people in outback New South Wales to help them prepare themselves for the trip. The group also had several people as sources of information on discrimination and segregation in the towns in northern New South Wales. One was Jack Horner of the Aboriginal Australian Fellowship. He provided information on issues in a number of towns in outback New South Wales including Walgett, Moree and Kempsey. He also advised the SAFA about recent reports and conferences dealing with Aboriginal health and education. Charles Perkins, the President of the group was another source of information for the bus trip. During the summer, he worked for the Foundation for Aboriginal Affairs, where his interaction with job seekers, evicted families and those requiring access to social services enabled him to gain an understanding of the issues faced by Aboriginal people in New South Wales. He gained further insight into racial prejudice and segregation in some of the towns when he was invited to join a light plane tour through New South Wales with a journalist, Craig Williams, and the Reverend Ted Noffs, who had agreed to help the students design their survey.

With all the preparations completed, the Freedom Ride bus left Sydney on 13 February 1965. Its first stop was Wellington where the students conducted surveys and investigations, highlighting social injustices and uncovering evidence of racial discrimination. However, without local Aboriginal contacts and with insufficient firm information to justify a demonstration they moved onto to the next town, Gulargambone. While the conditions under which Aboriginal people lived there were quite shocking, there was not a clear case of racial discrimination on which to demonstrate. The next stop was Walgett, and here the Freedom-riders took action. Walgett had both an existing group of Aboriginal activists and some clear cases of racial discrimination. It proved to be the first real showdown for the Freedom Riders. They spent their first day conducting interviews to obtain information about segregation and racial discrimination and found that the cinema, the Returned Servicemen's League (RSL) club, the town's two hotels and a frock shop were all segregated. The Freedom Riders picketed the Walgett RSL club from noon until sunset holding placards stating "Walgett: Australian's disgrace", "Bar the Colour Bar", "Good enough for Tobruk - why not Walgett RSL?".

Walgett was the first big test for the students. While their protest did little to change the attitudes of the townsfolk, they encouraged the Aboriginal community to push for change. Aboriginal people who participated in pickets were bitter at the ongoing discrimination they experienced in their town and they continued to protest and agitate for desegregation in the establishments that still upheld a colour ban after the protestors left. Initially, there was little media interest in the events in Walgett. However, a report by Bruce Maxwell, a cadet reporter for The Herald, brought the SAFA Freedom Ride into the national spotlight. The Sydney Morning Herald and The Daily Mirror newspapers as well as TV and radio now began to report on the next stage of the Freedom Ride in Moree.

The pattern of racial discrimination and segregation in Moree was similar to that found in Walgett with some firms refusing to employ Aboriginal people, and most hotels refusing to serve them. The students' attention, however, focused on the swimming pool, where a council by-law prevented Aboriginal people's entry. This was an example of discrimination enforceable under local ordinance so it was seen to be similar to officially sanctioned apartheid in South Africa and segregation in the United States. In addition, a local councillor, alderman Bob Brown, had repeatedly tried to get the council to allow Aborigines to use the baths, but to no avail - he could not even get a seconder for his motion.

Initially, the Freedom Riders held a picket at the Moree council chambers to protest against the exclusion of Aboriginal people (except for school children during school hours) from the Moree baths. The next day Bob Brown and the Freedom Riders tried to take Aboriginal children into the pool. The pool manager argued heatedly with the student leaders. The impasse ended when the mayor agreed to allow the children in. That evening, the students held a public meeting to explain why they were in Moree and to present their survey results. Initially the largely white audience reacted angrily and some left, but after discussion the atmosphere changed. The meeting concluded by passing a motion that the by-law segregating the pool should be removed, which the mayor said he would take to the council.

The Freedom Riders left Moree the next day, jubilant that the colour ban had been lifted. While the students travelled to Boggabilla and then to Warwick in southern Queensland, Bob Brown tried to take another group of Aboriginal children to the pool but the pool manager refused them entry and decided to close the pool. Following an emergency council meeting, the mayor arrived and ordered the manager to re-open the pool and enforce the by-law providing for segregation of the baths. The following day Bob Brown called the Freedom Riders to let them know what had happened. Charles Perkins had flown to Sydney to be interviewed for a television programme. The students phoned the Methodist Minister in Moree who confirmed Bob Brown's story and told them that they would not be welcome in Moree. The students decided to turn the bus around and return to Moree.