Central Land Council

 

 

CLC support for child abuse report

“The difficulty is that because of the language and cultural barriers many people never get an opportunity to express their knowledge or their ideas. The impression is given to them that they are idiots and that people outside of their community are more qualified to deal with their problems. As a result of this general attitude people become apathetic and take no interest in dealing with the problems.”

Alyawerre Elder, Report of the Northern Territory Board of Inquiry into the Protection of Aboriginal Children from Sexual Abuse, page 53

The Central Land Council says it fully supports the findings and recommendations of the Report of the Northern Territory Board of Inquiry into the Protection of Aboriginal Children from Sexual Abuse.

“Aboriginal people are profoundly saddened and deeply distressed at this ongoing and escalating tragedy and the Central Land Council will assist in any way it can,” CLC Director David Ross said.

Mr Ross urged both the Northern Territory and Australian Governments to commit to implementing the recommendations as soon as possible .

“The Northern Territory and Australian Governments must work together to provide a comprehensive and costed strategy that can be monitored by a new Commissioner for Children and Young People as proposed in Recommendation 9,” CLC Director David Ross said.

“In addition, we hope that both governments take a long term bipartisan approach, without blame, point scoring or election cycle spin.

“In particular, I was struck by the Report's principles for engagement with Aboriginal people which recommended ‘closing the gap' between Aboriginal people and non Aboriginal people,” he said.

“That is, improving government service provision to Aboriginal people, taking Aboriginal language and cultural “world views” seriously and recognising that only community-owned and community-based initiatives are going to be successful. I think that is a critical and fundamental tenet of community development and anything else is doomed to failure.

“There is an increasing tendency, born from both frustration and short term views in government, to do exactly the opposite and more and more solutions are top down and forced onto communities.

“While we generally agreed with all of the recommendations, we strongly supported its strong and comprehensive recommendations in relation to alcohol, education and community engagement,” Mr Ross said.

“We know its hard and change takes a long time with many seemingly intractable difficulties but if things are done properly and take into account the principles set out in the report, success is much more likely.

“I was also pleased to see the Report debunk the myths about Aboriginal culture and Aboriginal men. A large number of Aboriginal men participated in the inquiry and some said it was the best meeting they had ever had and, in many cases, the first time that they had ever talked about it,” he said.

“This is a problem of mind boggling magnitude and none of us can afford to point the finger. In these times of economic prosperity we call on both Governments to allocate the funding and resources to implement the findings.

“We have an opportunity to save young lives. Let's not let this report sit on the shelves like all the others, or allow platitudes to take the place of action,” Mr Ross said.