Robbie WilliamsPrint Page

The plaque commemorates Robbie Williams (1962 - 2007) who was the first Indigenous Australian to serve on the Brisbane City Council.

The plaque is located at the site of the former indigenous Echidna Magic Cafe which ceased operation in 2015. The cafe had been run by Aboriginal group First Contact since 2010. First Contact wanted to operate the cafe to give young indigenous people solid experience in the retail and hospitality industry. That was the dream of Brisbane's first indigenous councillor, Robbie Williams, who set up First Contact Development Corporation, which eventually won a $437,000 loan from Indigenous Business Australia to build the cafe.

Robbie Williams was the first Indigenous Australian councillor to sit on the Brisbane City Council. He had held the role only since October 2007, but had been tipped to win a seat in the council elections in March 2008. Williams had previously served three terms as a regional councillor with the Aboriginal & Torres Strait Islander Commission (ATSIC) and was later the ATSIC commissioner for Brisbane and southeast Queensland. He was widely known for his community work, and was the founder and chair of First Contact Aboriginal Corporation for Youth, an organisation dedicated to improving the lives of indigenous youth, in 1992.

Williams was the son of Hazel, an First Nations person with connections to the Yugambeh language group, and his father was Bob Williams, a butcher. He trained and worked as a butcher for several years before gaining a diploma in Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander welfare and joining the Australian Public Service, working in the Department of Social Security. marries with four children, he died of a heart attack at the age of 45 on 20 December 2007.

Note: The Echidna Magic Cafe was so-named because Mount Gravatt was known by Jagera and Turrbul aboriginal people as "Kagarr Mabul"

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