Hearings and sessions
Every one of us is a part of Queensland's story. Our information, records, history and experiences define us as Queenslanders
About hearings and sessions
The Inquiry will hold truth‑telling sessions and hearings around the State to hear from all Queenslanders.
A truth‑telling session is a less formal way to share your experience with the Inquiry. A session could just be one of the Inquiry Members, you, a support person, and someone from the Inquiry’s legal team. A session could also be a meeting, a site visit, or a yarning circle.
Truth-telling hearings
A truth‑telling hearing is a more formal event held by the Inquiry. It will allow more members of the public to attend and may be available for people to watch online. Hearings are an opportunity for the Inquiry to hear evidence from participants and to ask questions. Hearings may also involve other parties who may be impacted by the Inquiry’s work.
The Path to Treaty Act 2023 requires the Inquiry to adopt a trauma-informed approach based on the principles of free, prior and informed consent. This means the Inquiry will assess if live streaming is appropriate on a case by case basis. The Inquiry may make recordings of hearings available on this website at a later date.
Truth-telling sessions
A truth-telling session is a less formal way for the Inquiry to hear your story than a hearing. It is a meeting with one or more members of the Inquiry, which provides an opportunity for participants to share their stories and provide evidence. Sessions can be done in any venue in any format (group sessions, family sessions, a meeting or roundtable, a site visit, or a yarning circle etc) and can be public or private.
A public session is conducted in public and recorded. Anyone is able to attend and watch. A transcript (a written record of what was said) of the session will be published.
A private session is conducted with only the participant and Member/s present, and may be recorded with your consent. If recorded, the recording and transcript of the session may be published with your consent.
You can review information for participants here.
The Inquiry is unable to receive expressions of interest at this time.
Legal support
Free legal advice will be available for participants to share their experience and evidence safely at a truth-telling hearing or truth-telling session. The Inquiry will publish more details about this service soon.
Support services
Truth-telling is a way to heal. But to do this, it needs to be safe and accessible.
The Inquiry will provide free and confidential social and emotional wellbeing and legal support to you before, during, and after you share your experience.
The Inquiry can arrange an interpreter if you want to share your experience in your own language. Interpreters can be provided for Aboriginal languages, Torres Strait Islander languages, Auslan, and international languages.
The Inquiry will publish more details about these services on its website soon.
Unfortunately, the Inquiry is not able to provide financial support to you to participate in the Inquiry.
Community engagement
The Inquiry will empower Aboriginal peoples and Torres Strait Islander peoples to share their stories in a trauma-aware, healing informed and culturally safe way. One of the first priorities of the Inquiry will be to capture, preserve and share the experiences of Elders.
The community participation support team leads engagement with communities and supports Aboriginal peoples and Torres Strait Islander peoples.
If you would like to contact one of the team, please email [email protected] and a team member will be in touch soon.
Activities will be shared here, as they become available.
You can also visit the events page to see our upcoming activities.