ANTaR is concerned that security arrangements in place for the Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting (CHOGM) will impact disproportionately on Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people in Perth and exacerbate the crisis of over-imprisonment.

The bi-annual Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting (CHOGM) officially opens today in Perth. In the lead up to the meeting, 700 additional police have been stationed around the city.

ANTaR has welcomed today’s finding by the Federal Court that journalist and commentator Andrew Bolt breached the Racial Discrimination Act in articles published in 2009.

“The Federal Court’s decision today is an important one for the nation,” ANTaR President, Dr Peter Lewis said today.

A wide range of community organisations have endorsed a Call to Action aimed at dramatically reducing the over-representation of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people in our jails.

The Joint Call to Action was released today to mark 20 years since the final report of the Royal Commission into Aboriginal Deaths in Custody was handed to the Governor General. It is endorsed by a range of Aboriginal and community legal services and human rights organisations.

Ms Jacqueline Phillips, ANTaR National Director, says that it is unacceptable that imprisonment rates have continued to increase in the 20 years since the Royal Commission reported. Since 1989, the imprisonment rate of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people has increased twelve times faster than the rate for the rest of the community.