Kidnapped

Episode of Series “Australian mosaic”.
In the late 19th Century thousands of South Sea Islander people were kidnapped and taken to Northern Queensland as “kanakas”, slave labourers, to work on the sugar plantations. This documentary traces the history of the Pacific people in Australia and includes interviews with descendants of the slave-labourers, both in Queensland and the South Pacific. With the advent of the White Australia Policy many thousands of South-Sea Islanders were deported from Australia, but many others fled the authorities and lived in the Queensland bush. Their children and grandchildren now form a strong Islander community in and around the city of Mackay in Queensland.