Message from the co-chairs
We are pleased to launch Arnold Bloch Leibler's third Annual Progress Report on the firm’s Indigenous Solidarity Statement of Commitment published in 2021 (Statement of Commitment).
The purpose of the Annual Progress Report is to uphold our commitment to reflect on the work and activities we have undertaken this year in solidarity with First Nations Peoples, assess our progress against our annual priorities and publish our priorities for 2025.
We are proud of the progress the Arnold Bloch Leibler Indigenous Solidarity Network (AISN) and the firm have made towards the 2024 priorities. Throughout this report, we also acknowledge instances where we have not made the progress we were hoping to make towards our 2024 priorities, and this report provides us with an important opportunity to reflect on those instances.
It is important to acknowledge the status of the progress towards establishing the Uluru Statement’s tripartite model of Voice, Treaty and Truth. Arnold Bloch Leibler immediately and publicly accepted the invitation contained in the Uluru Statement from the Heart to walk together with Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples in a movement of the Australian people for a better future.
Most of the activities and initiatives the AISN and the firm undertook in 2023 were directed towards trying to achieve a successful outcome at the October 14 2023 Referendum on the Voice to Parliament. Following the deeply disappointing outcome of that referendum many First Nations Peoples in Australia called for a period of reflection and mourning. It is now over twelve months since Australians voted in the Referendum on the Voice and it is more important than ever to continue to stand alongside First Nations Peoples in the movement for a better future. Momentum is building in many Australian states and territories in relation to the other two elements of the Uluru Statement’s tripartite model, Treaty and Truth, but there remains a significant amount of work to be done.
We continue to accept the invitation contained in the Uluru Statement from the Heart to walk together with Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples. We will continue to take our lead from First Nations leaders and organisations over the coming year to help determine how we as a committee and a firm can best support First Nations Peoples in implementing Treaty and Truth in Victoria and across Australia.
We extend our sincere thanks to all the members of the AISN for their ongoing commitment and work throughout the year and, in particular, to Peter Seidel and Bridgid Cowling for their unwavering and invaluable input and support. We also extend our thanks to the partnership of Arnold Bloch Leibler, in particular to Mark Leibler AC, Henry Lanzer AM and Christine Fleer for ongoing support of the AISN and its events and initiatives. We also thank the marketing, events, human resources, IT and catering teams for their assistance and hard work, without which our events, initiatives and publications would not be possible.
In 2025, our activities and initiatives will continue to focus on the ways in which we can best further the firm’s ongoing commitment to Indigenous solidarity. In doing so, we will continue to seek the views of First Nations leaders, organisations, clients and friends to inform the ways in which we pursue that commitment.
Julia Heyward, Max Griffin, Kalinda Scheef, India Taylor
