Shine Lawyers lodge class action against WA Government over Indigenous stolen wages

A class action has been launched against the West Australian government in the hope of recovering wages stolen from Indigenous workers who laboured in conditions “akin to slavery”.

Shine Lawyers will lodge the class action in the Federal Court on Monday on behalf of workers whose wages were stolen as part of a labour scheme operated by the WA government under the Native Administration Act 1936 and Native Welfare Act 1963.

It is understood the case could result in restitution payments totalling $400 million.

“Under these discriminatory laws, Indigenous Australians were not only separated from their families but forced to work for little or no money, locking them into a vicious cycle of poverty and disadvantage,” head of class actions at Shine Lawyers Jan Saddler said.

“They performed physically demanding jobs in harsh conditions akin to slavery and in some cases were only paid with bread and beef.”

Class action group member Ron Harrington-Smith was four-years-old when he was forcibly taken from his mother to work at the Mount Margaret mission in the north-eastern Goldfields region.

His duties included chopping and carting wood to missionaries in their houses, marshalling livestock and cleaning soiled toilet pans.

“All of this was barefoot and in squalid conditions,” Mr Harrington-Smith said.

“It’s hard to imagine that we endured all this suffering. It is unfair and appalling, and they have to be found guilty of the facts and pay us back the stolen wages which are owed.”

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Anyone subject to the relevant legislation who had their wages stolen is eligible to join the class action, including descendants of deceased workers and their estates.

Last year, the Queensland government settled a class action relating to similar unpaid entitlements for $190 million dollars.