16. Aboriginal Customary Laws: Aboriginal Child Custody, Fostering and Adoption

… it is the role and the right of parents everywhere to pass on their beliefs, knowledge, customs, language, law … to their children. In that way the culture of a group lives on and its distinctiveness, too, and consequently, the pride of the people who own it. The role and the rights of parents and families in this can become endangered when other institutions take over aspects of handing on a heritage. ^[1]

^{[1]M Brandl, ‘The Aboriginal Children and Families Heritage Project’ (1980) 5 Australian Child and Family Welfare 20.}