ANTaR's position on the Northern Territory Emergency Response (NTER) has been to:

• agree that government action is required to address the serious problems facing communities in the NT. However, ANTaR believes that many of these problems result from decades of government neglect and failure to support Indigenous people who for many years have wanted and asked for help to tackle these community problems.
• support the considerable increase in funding being provided in the NT for a range of services to Aboriginal communities. However, ANTaR believes that every development should be negotiated with Aboriginal people and driven by Aboriginal priorities. As the NTER Review recognised, strong Aboriginal governance is needed for improvements to be sustained.
• agree that some people need help to manage their lives and their finances for their children’s benefit. However, ANTaR has NOT supported: the suspension of the Racial Discrimination Act; the blanket treatment of all welfare recipients as if they are incapable of managing their lives and their finances; and the loss of dignity and shame that people experience when shopping with their compulsory BasicsCard. ANTaR believes: that a voluntary scheme – such as Centrepay – which was already in operation, should have been extended; that financial literacy education should be boosted; and that the comprehensive services available to non-Indigenous communities to help treat and rehabilitate people who have alcohol and drug problems, should all be provided. ANTaR does not accept that income management as currently practised meets the internationally accepted criterion of "special measure" (read more about what constitutes a “special measure” in the International Convention on the Elimination of Race Discrimination.)
• agree that more housing and related infrastructure and government services are needed in Aboriginal communities. However, ANTaR has not accepted that Aboriginal people should have to offer special long-term leases over their land to the government and forfeit their control over it in order to get basic services provided to their communities.
• agree that more funding and support is required to educate Aboriginal children to meet higher educational standards, including in English literacy. This will merely redress decades of severe under-funding of Aboriginal education in the NT. However, ANTaR does not accept the forcing of children, whose first language is not English, to learn in English from the moment they enter school. Early instruction should be in a child’s first language. International evidence shows this is the best way to develop the building blocks of literacy and engage interest in learning. It is also known to positively support the psychological bonds within families. English should be introduced over time, supported by trained teachers. Currently, very few NT teachers have training in how to teach English as a second language. ANTaR supports long-established evidence that proper bilingual education, which respects and promotes both local language and culture and the English language, is necessary from the earliest years.
• support changes to the NTER that realign the measures with the Acts and International Declarations to which Australia is a signatory. In line with this, we also support the former Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Social Justice Commissioner Tom Calma's Ten Point Plan for modifying the NTER, announced in March 2008.