Joel Bayliss

Reconciliation advocate 

Joel Bayliss is a strategic agency representative for Reconciliation SA. Joel is a proud Aboriginal man who has lived on Kaurna land his whole life. He has a keen passion for Social Justice. In response to a Bill Leak cartoon that portrayed a negative stereotype of Aboriginal fathers, Joel posted an image of himself and his two beautiful children Ava and Isaiah to Twitter. This single image became a national movement known as #indigenousdads with thousands of images shared - turning that negative stereotype into a positive one. Joel authored the opinion piece “I consider myself lucky to learn about my culture. Too many Aboriginal people missed out” published in @indigenousX and The Guardian. Joel is on a number of boards including Australia Day Council of South Australia (recently retired from this role) and Reconciliation South Australia. He believes that reconciliation is the process where we as Australians acknowledge the past but move forward together as Aboriginal and nonAboriginal Australians.