Pyne Opens a New Front in the History Wars Federal Education Minister Christopher Pyne is a man of contradictions. On one hand he has sought to portray himself as a staunch supporter of Aboriginal people in their quest to have the head of Aboriginal warrior Pemulwuy repatriated to Australia from the United Kingdom. In June 2013 Mr Pyne made a speech in Parliament whereby he reminded members that “Pemulwuy was an Aboriginal warrior from the Eora people around Sydney who resisted early British settlement in New South Wales. Pemulwuy was eventually caught and executed by the Colony of New South Wales in 1802”. Mr. Pyne told Parliament that Pemulwuy‟s “head was transported back to Britain, where it now lies in storage at the Natural History Museum.” Pyne further stated that Pemulwuy was “regarded as a hero to thousands of modern Indigenous Australians and to many members of the public at large, who see Pemulwuy as a figure of Aboriginal defiance, and his legacy remains an important part of Indigenous culture in Australia”. Mr. Pyne pointed out to Parliament that during 2012 he had made efforts to have Pemulwuy's remains repatriated by making representations to the Director of the Natural History Museum and to the United Kingdom government. Whilst those efforts had been unsuccessful, Mr Pyne said that should the Coalition win government “we will make every endeavour to expedite this matter and return Pemulwuy's remains to the Eora people”. These statements, along with Mr Pyne‟s membership of the Parliamentary Committee on Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Affairs from 1993-97, might lead one to think that he was a strong supporter on Aboriginal issues. But, as I said in my opening paragraph, Mr. Pyne is a man of contradictions. During the early days of the Abbott administration Mr Pyne as Minister for Education has shown himself to be one of the more accident-prone and controversial Ministers in the new Government. His first major setback as Minister occurred very early with what has been described as a “political debacle” and a “combination of policy and political blunders” in relation to the Gonski education reforms. During a series of extraordinary political backflips Mr Pyne managed to alienate his State Liberal counterparts in NSW, Victoria and Tasmania and as Crikey.com said, “single-handedly turn an ordinary start for the Abbott government into a complete stuff-up” But the biggest contradiction in terms of Pyne‟s earlier attempts to portray himself as a supporter of Aboriginal rights is his latest announcement of a review of the National Curriculum. In early January Mr. Pyne announced that he had appointed commentator Dr. Kevin Donnelly and University of Queensland Professor Ken Wiltshire, to conduct a short review of the national education curriculum. Like Mr Pyne‟s attempt to fiddle with the Gonski reforms, this announcement seemed to be an ideologically driven attempt to undo six years of consultation, submissions and contributions from a huge number of people by the body responsible for developing the new system, the Australian Curriculum, Assessment and Reporting Authority (ACARA). . ACARA, which had been chaired by one of my old history lecturers at University of Melbourne, Professor Stuart Macintyre, had received more than 20,000 submissions and surveys in relation to English, maths, science and history. In response to Mr Pyne‟s