Tasmianian Frontier Wars memorial taking steps forward as Reconciliation Tasmania looks to talks

Elders hope to meet this weekend to discuss the matter further, including locations, the type of memorial and how the Aboriginal community will be involved in the design.

RSL Tasmania is also assisting in the process, having first raised the matter with Reconciliation Tasmania in December 2019.

Elders have raised the prospect of a memorial near the location of the Hobart Cenotaph, while councils in the North and North-West were also interested in developing sites.

Reconciliation Tasmania chief executive officer Mark Redmond said they were hopeful of making progress in 2021.

"From feedback so far with elders from the December meeting, they'd like to see a commemoration potentially at a major point of remembrance, like the cenotaph in Hobart or other similar places," he said.

"It can't be somewhere that's tucked away down a back street. It has to be visible, accessible, and a place of significance that gives equal standing to the commemorations that we have now for veterans of other conflicts.

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"We're going to look at putting out an expression of interest for the Aboriginal community about what form that may take about what they would like to see. That will be determined by the Aboriginal community."

Reconciliation Tasmania has made contact with the City of Hobart for information regarding the permit process, landlord consent and to assess all options.

During colonisation, an estimated tens of thousands of Aboriginal people were killed through violence or introduced disease.

Mr Redmond said it would also be important to include acknowledgement of other combatants, with convicts making up 87 per cent of non-Aboriginal people in the Tasmanian Frontier Wars, many as indentured labour.

"There are sad stories to be told," he said.

"There's interest out there because there's nothing in the landscape. It's about time there was something."

RSL Tasmania president Robert Dick said the organisation was "working with [Reconciliation Tasmania] as the process moves forward".