The recommendations of the Northern Territory Emergency Response (NTER) review report provide an opportunity to refocus the Federal Government’s efforts from an emergency to community development approach in improving the lives of Northern Territory Aboriginal children.

Central to this should be the restoration of protections afforded by the Racial Discrimination Act, including changes to racially-based, compulsory income management arrangements.

However, ANTaR accepts the Review Panel’s view that such changes “may require an intermediate period to transition from the present scheme”. Such a transition must be responsive to the specific and varying needs of different communities.

ANTaR believes that the process by which the changes recommended by the review are implemented will be crucial to the success of the Intervention.

Unless the Government restores respect to and constructively engages with Aboriginal people in the NT, the community ownership so essential for enabling functional, resilient communities will not be achieved.

As the Report points out:

No matter how good the framework, no matter how much money is available, you cannot drive change into a community and unload it off the back of a truck. That is the lesson of the Intervention.

Deep seated change—safe healthy families—must be grown up within the community. That is the challenge for Aboriginal people.

Careful and thorough consultations with all sections of the affected communities will be essential. This process must be inclusive of both women and men and the free, prior and informed consent of community members, particularly those most vulnerable, should guide changes to the Intervention.

Ensuring the safety of community members, particularly women and children should be of paramount concern. This is particularly the case given the fears by women in some communities that immediate lifting of compulsory income management could lead to violence and intimidation associated with the practice known as humbugging.

Since the release of the Review report, much public comment has centred around the measures concerning compulsory income management. However, this is at best a stop gap measure and no substitute for the sustained, long term action needed to make these communities safe for women and children.

Of greater importance is the need to change the skewed priorities and wasted expenditure of the NTER so that resources are directed to areas of most need. For example, as at July 2008 there were safe houses in only 10 out of 73 target communities (none of which were operational), night patrols in only 14 out of 43 target communities, extra police in only 17 out of 73 target communities, child special services in only 12 out of 83 target communities, and only 20 additional alcohol and other drug (AOD) workers for the entire NT. Proposed new housing is well below the level of need and will not address overcrowding in the majority of ‘prescribed’ communities.

The 10 Point Plan developed by Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Social Justice Commissioner, Tom Calma, provides a mechanism that can assist the Minister in making the transition from emergency intervention to community development.

Action 9 of Commissioner Calma’s 10 Point Plan involves using ministerial discretion to remove communities from the prescribed list following the development of Community Partnership Agreements. This could enable a staged and incentive-based approach to removing compulsory income management and other measures once the Minister is satisfied that a particular community has sufficiently dealt with the issues of violence and abuse.

It is important that there is proper consideration of alternative mechanisms to enable communities to transition to new arrangements according to their specific circumstances and needs, and to ensure that transition occurs within reasonable time-frames.

This could enable, for example, some communities to be removed from the prescribed list or from compulsory measures immediately. Others could remain prescribed or subject to compulsory measures until such time as community safety issues are addressed through Community Safety Plans (as recommended by the Review Panel) or where Community Partnership Agreements are initiated.

Independent advice should be provided to the Minister to guide decision-making. For example, a specially constituted panel could be established to make recommendations to the Minister over whether a community should be removed from the prescribed list or from compulsory measures drawing on the results of community consultations as well as advice from the Department, police, the National Crime Commission, Government Business Managers and other bodies.

Consideration also needs to be given to criteria for deeming prescribed communities to be ‘safer’. This would include, in addition to community views, such things as availability of police (including Aboriginal community police officers), safe houses, night patrol/community policing, access to child protection workers, and community education and awareness around ‘safe living/environment’. It is also important to ensure that there are not significant numbers in communities, particularly of young men, left without any income support through breaching or suspension of payments or other factors, and thereby increasing pressure on women with children and old people.

ANTaR urges the Minister to set deadlines and targets for when the transition from the emergency to community development phase of the intervention is to be completed.

This process would allow a transition from the current model to the one outlined by the NTER Review Panel, in a way that does not compromise the safety of vulnerable community members. It would enable the Government to respond to the specific circumstances of individual communities, rather than maintaining blanket measures on the basis of race. It allows for communities to decide on the most appropriate measures to meet their particular needs.