Breaking the Cycle

When you sit and talk with Alison Liddy, it’s clear that she is a kind, generous woman with strong connections to her family, and country. “Family is very important to me. I enjoy having my nieces, nephews and grannies pass through the house,” she says. Her clan, the Lama Lama people, are the Traditional Owners of the Lama Lama National Park in the Port Stewart area.

Alison is in her twelfth year working with the Lama Lama Rangers, an organisation rehabilitating the land that was home to Alison’s ancestors. She works at the Coen office and lives in town with her sister, nephews and nieces. When she’s not working, she’s enjoying family time at home or out fishing on country. “A big thing for the young ones is to know where they come from. Know their clan and the history of their land,” she said. Alison treats her nieces and nephews like they are her own children. When asked if she has a full house Alison responds with a chuckle, “Yeah. Even when my sister isn’t home, I’ve always got kids to care for.” To keep her fridge stocked up with food for the family to share, she uses Mayi Market in conjunction with her regular grocery shop to keep her and her family fed with fresh fruit, vegetables and meat. When educational costs, such as new uniforms, school fees and stationery arise, Student Education Trust (SET) accounts are accessed to pay for them. Alison says SET is a major help to kids and parents in communities. “With SET now, the kids have it easy. Some of the families that had kids going away to high schools, they were just on Centrelink. Now, it’s pretty easy with SET,” she says. As a child, during school term in Coen, Alison grew up in a tin house with her six brothers and sisters. When the owner of the house passed, Alison’s uncle, the siblings of the Liddy and Bassani families came together to help pay it off but soon ran into problems meeting the mortgage repayments. The family consulted Homelands, an Opportunity Product from the local O-Hub that helps families take shared financial responsibility of the costs of land ownership. “Prior to Homelands, we used to do it by ourselves, through our own bank accounts,” she said. “You know, we had good times and we had bad times. We had to catch up with payments. So we sat down with the staff at the O-Hub and set up Homelands, which made everything easier. That just eased our hardship,” she said. After three years of shared financial contributions to their Homelands account, the Liddy and Bassani families have sufficient savings to comfortably meet mortgage repayments, complete maintenance and make upgrades on the property as they see fit. The Liddys and Bassanis are currently considering building a new fence. Alison hopes that the next generations feel a sense of pride in what the family have accomplished. “They can feel proud that their aunts and uncles paid the mortgage off for them. The burden is not on them if something were to happen to us.” Alison looks forward to many more weekends with her family knowing that she is leading the way for the generations to come. She hopes to see the next generation educated, respecting Elders and knowing their roots.