with a social justice focus.

PO Box 291,  HINDMARSH  South Australia  5007    Email:  suzi.q@three.com.au    ABN:  76 901 154 305

Australia's Apartheid? - The Military Invasion of NT Aboriginal Communities

We are back to where we were 50 years ago.  (Richard Downs, Spokesperson, Four Days in July)

As a non-Indigenous woman, I don't believe it's my place to argue specific solutions to issues facing Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander communities.  However, it is clear that for durable solutions to emerge, community members themselves must be empowered to address these issues ... including being adequately resourced to do this.  The reality is that the intervention has taken resources away from Aboriginal communities, undermined actions that were already being taken by communities themselves to address issues and imposed white rule at a level not seen for decades.  What makes us believe that 'we' are more concerned about abuse of Aboriginal children, than their parents and grandparents?  What makes us believe that 'our' solutions will be more effective than theirs?  Our paternalism certainly hasn't had positive outcomes over the past 200+ years!

The intervention has sofar cost well over $1.5 billion.  As at May 2010 (after almost 3 years), it has resulted in a grand total of 8 houses for Aboriginal people - and this is what people were forced to give up title to their land for?  Aboriginal people are still forced to continue to live in overcrowded, 3rd World conditions.  It is hardly surprising, then, that, according to studies quoted in The Australian on 17 May 2010:

At the same time, many communities have lost practical resources such as phones, vehicles and access to graders (which have been requisitioned by the new Shires).  In some, profitable community stores which funded community improvement activities have been taken over, and pre-existing services such as community-run safe houses for women and children escaping domestic violence have been closed, by intervention authorities.  The demise of CDEP means that thousands of people who were previously gainfully employed providing essential community maintenance services  are now unemployed.  The many communities that were already dry, prior to the intervention, are forced to live with the shame of massive signs at their entrances. 

These practical considerations pale into insignificance against the massive damage to Language, Law and Culture, being imposed on communities.  As noted by Karranjal John Hartley at a public meeting in Adelaide (5 May 2010), depowering of community Elders silences our university lecturers, our lawyers, our doctors ... imagine the prognosis for any society facing loss of all its leaders, thinkers, law managers and holders of knowledge.  Click here for a proposed solution ...  the text of Karranjal's speech on the Aboriginal Cultural Movement, including a powerful poem Innocent Until Colonised.

Some key sites for up to date information about the intervention and anti-intervention activities are:

The Intervention in 2010.  

Sorry means you won’t do it again.  This was the slogan of anti-intervention rallies held throughout Australia on 13 February 2010, to mark the 2nd anniversary of the apology.  In contrast with the apology, the intervention has all the hallmarks of policies that underpinned the Stolen Generations.  All the indications are that the Australian Government seeks to institutionalise the worst of the so-called Emergency Response as permanent arrangements for Aboriginal people in the Northern Territory ... and extend these to more communities.  For an overview of the arguments, see Pilawuk's speech from the South Australian rally.

A fabulous book entitled This is What We Said: Australian Aboriginal people give their views on the Northern Territory Intervention was released at these rallies.  This was produced by a similar group of concerned Australians to the earlier (much more detailed)  Will They Be Heard? report.  The book found that the question Will They Be Heard? has been answered.  And the answer is a resounding NO.  The legislation now before Parliament shows that the feedback from Aboriginal people has been neither heard nor respected.  This is a particularly useful resource for educating non-Aboriginal people who are new to the issue, because many respected Australians (including Malcolm Fraser, former Prime Minister and Alastair Nicholson, former Chief Justice of the Family Court) have endorsed the documents.

Legislation passed through the Parliament in 2010 reinstated the Racial Discrimination Act (RDA).  BUT, it did not  simply reinstate the RDA.  Reinstatement been packaged with some awful measures, which largely legitimise the ongoing abuses of the Intervention ... and extend these to other disadvantaged Australians - in the first instance, in the Northern Territory ... later, potentially more widely.  In other words, this whole process represents significant deterioration in the treatment of both Aboriginal people ... and many other disadvantaged Australians.  In my view, this legislation represents the most significant change in Australian values since the 2^nd World War.

Under the  Act, the Minister can declare ANY geographical area/State/Territory as an income management area.  People on most social security benefits (whether they have children or not) will have 50% of their income quarantined.  Click here for a summary of some of the realities of income management … and what this would mean if the raft of emergency measures were applied to your suburb!  Note that (as at March 2011) there is already an uproar about income management being applied to non-Aboriginal people in the Northern Territory.

And … direct discrimination against Aboriginal people continues.  The HUGE signs at the entrance to prescribed communities, which bring great shame to communities and corrupt children,  have been retained.  Extension of many provisions to almost everyone receiving Centrelink support in the Northern Territory belies the fact that the majority of welfare recipients in the Territory are Aboriginal people. 

Here's some key commentary released during 2010:

The new Act undermines the dignity and human rights of all disadvantaged Australians ... AND a threat to Australia’s fundamental democratic principles.  Applying the horrors of the NT Intervention to a wider group of Australians, doesn't change the fact that the Intervention was, and remains, a fundamentally RACIST activity ... all it does is institute this so-called emergency measure into a LONG TERM structural change in the Australian approach to disadvantaged and disabled Australians.

The Intervention in 2009.  For key documents about The Intervention in 2009 see:

The United Nations has responded to the Intervention with some strong statements.  In particular, see statements by:

The Alyawarr people from the Ampilatwtja community walked off their land in mid 2009 in protest against the impact of the intervention on their Language, Law and Culture.  This community has lost most of the resources they have gradually built up over many years.  Amongst MANY other things, intervention authorities took over their profitable store (which had $700,000 in the bank, earmarked for community improvement activities) and, according to Richard Downs (Public Meeting, 5 May 2010) has sofar spent $65,000 of this community's money on auditors!  For more information about the Alyawarr Walk-Off see:  http://interventionwalkoff.wordpress.com/. This site is a rich source of information, including regular video reports, about the day-to-day realities for one community subject to the intervention. 

The Intervention 1 Year On.  Crikey (www.crikey.com.au) includes some fabulous free articles.  Click on NT Intervention (top left of Crikey homepage) to see commentary from various authors during 2008.  For reflections and analysis of the achievements of the intervention after 12 months, search particularly for: 

And ... here's a fabulous speech by Niwili White Forrest (age 14), given at the 1st Anniversary demonstration (21 June 2008) on the steps of Parliament House, Kaurna Country,  Adelaide.  Niwili is from Peppimenarti, one of the 73 communities subject to the invasion.  His speech compares the military invasion with the Stolen Generation.

On 14 August 2008,  the Central Land Council released details of the first major survey of community members themselves in relation to the intervention.  This media release summarises findings from interviews by Aboriginal researchers with members of 6 Central Australian case study communities earlier this year.  Each community had a different response depending upon the circumstances and history of their particular community.

Background - The Beginnings of the Intervention in 2007.

The rationalisation for the military invasion of remote communities is that it is designed to address abuse of children in these communities.  Is child (sexual) abuse more common in remote Aboriginal communities, than Australian society as a whole?  We simply don't know!!!  Whilst official Commonwealth Government statistics say rates are 5 times higher in the suburbs of mainstream Australian  cities (eg. see 2 ABC briefs: Comparative Child Abuse Statistics - Indigenous and non-Indigenous communities - 6 July 2007), there is strong evidence of extremely high rates of unreported abuse in communities.  For example, The Little Children Are Sacred report found evidence of child sexual abuse in all 45 communities visited.   BUT, this report also argued that child abuse is totally culturally unacceptable according to traditional values ... and that it is likely to result from the extreme stress present in communities and the resulting breakdown in these communities.   It also found that the overwhelming majority of Aboriginal parents and grandparents (just like non-Aboriginal grand(parents)!) want to protect children from abuse.  So ... why an invasion, rather than resourcing the majority of members of Aboriginal communities to address the underlying causes (eg. poor health/education/housing/employment and widespread disempowerment)?

The ABC briefs (link above) put the issue of child abuse in Indigenous communities into perspective.  Academics argue that a genuine concern with reducing child abuse in Australia would at have to include a focus on suburbs in mainstream Australian cities.   Imagine that ... compulsory government acquisition of the title of ALL land in the suburbs and compulsory (potentially intrusive) health checks for all children under 16 ... and title to 'our' land not being returned, even if we don't have children, or those children have not been exposed to abuse!  Would we tolerate that???

Of course, this raises the obvious question - How do the following help address child abuse?:

1. taking control over communities' land,

2. suspending the  Racial Discrimination Act (which allows for "special measures" to be taken in the interests of a particular racial group),

3. taking away the permit system (one strategy communities could use to exclude abusers), and,

4. excluding Indigenous people from any contribution/discussion/information about the campaign?

(Thanks to Senator Linda Kirk for a copy of her speeches of August 13 & 14, which highlight some of these issues.)

SNAICC (the national peak body for Indigenous children) released a paper on 12 July 2007 - Developing a National Response to Child Abuse and Neglect.  Originally written as guidance for a national letter writing campaign, much of the information it contains has ongoing relevance.  In particular, it reaffirms the fundamental principles that should be followed when seeking to address child abuse.

Here are some of the resources I've found most useful in increasing my awareness of the issues:

Another useful source of information is the Australian Medical Association.   The AMA has produced numerous reports on the status of Aboriginal health ... without the need for compulsory, potentially invasive, potentially illegal health checks!!!  For copies of  AMA Report Cards and other policy/research statements see:  http://www.ama.com.au (do an Advanced Search using "Indigenous") .  And ... there's a great little publications about success stories in Indigenous health (including strategies to address the needs of children and overcoming violence) ... 15 very readable case studies from throughout Australia, produced by 2 NGO's.

Another health-related resource is the National Aboriginal Community Controlled Health Organisation.  Together with Oxfam Australia, they wrote a policy briefing paper on achieving comparable health outcomes for Indigenous Australians.  For a copy of the paper see: http://www.oxfam.org.au/media/files/CTG.pdf

Here's a favourite quote from an article by Saprna Dogra entitled Child Abuse in the NT.  (In light of Noel Pearson's most common presentation as an apologist for Commonwealth policies, it is included here with some irony):

Whilst on the subject of Noel Pearson, perhaps you saw the 4 Corners program aired on 16 July 2007, which demonstrated some of the problems experienced by Cape York communities involved in the From Hand Out to Hand Up program (which seems to have been the model for the  Intervention).  Sadly, I felt the 4 Corners program tended to blame the communities, rather than political interference and lack of genuine partnership, for these problems.  For extra comments on the (failed?) Pearson Experiment see Joel Gibson's article in the Sydney Morning Herald: http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2007/07/15/1184438149572.html

BUT ... the last comment has to go to unknown artists/photographer from the Willowra community on Warlpiri country, 250km north-west of Alice Springs.  I received these via email ... and tried to track down the source to get permission to reproduce them ... but wasn't able to find out who created them.  Please contact me if you know!!!  They were just TOO good not to include here ... ENJOY!

For further lists of information and resources see:

For data from international groups see:

We are not alone!!!  There has been some commentary from international sources.  Whilst all the data is not necessarily 100% accurate, and the information is already covered by other sources (above), it is interesting to note that the military invasion of communities in the NT received world-wide attention: