The name is absent

157

This special project was removed from the Commonwealth Department
concerned with migrant welfare, and the needs of migrants were
recognised as being appropriately placed within the total educational
fabric.
4

By 1975 the Labor government was replaced by the Liberal/
National Party Coalition. Nevertheless the thrust of the Schools
Commission towards the needs of the disadvantaged remained (albeit
with certain trade-offs for the independent school sector).
f

The 1976 Schools Commission Report continued, for migrants, the emphasis on
their special disadvantages. There was also an emphasis on
the importance of school curricula in the maintaining of identity
for ethnic groups.

The Commission, in its 1976 Report, came out against assimilationist
policies for migrants and supported the notion of dual cultural
identity.                      ’

With reference to Aborigines

...the Commission came to the conclusion that one
element, the voice of Aborigines themselves, was
still muffled. To assist it in its consideration
of the problems the Commission formed an Aboriginal
Consultative group, chosen by the Aborigines from
all parts of Australia. The Commission unequivocally
supports their belief that the great need is for
Aborigines to take more responsibility for their
own advancement (Australian Schools Commission,
1976:9.2).

The notion of dual cultural identity was to be applied to
Aborigines as well as migrants. This policy permitted the encouragement
of Aboriginal activity for Aborigines without placing them outside
the frame of reference of Australian society, as other policy
had done.
V
While the Commission thus legitimated the construction of

a specifically Aboriginal identity, it was not within its power
to make real the concept of dual identity, that is identity located

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