Chief amongst those powers was the control over access to grog.

Brough told the House of Representatives that:

“The authors of the Little Children are Sacred report described alcohol abuse as the ‘gravest and fastest growing threat to the safety of Aboriginal children‘.

…

To dry up the lethal rivers of grog, this bill will enable the government to introduce a general ban on people having, selling, transporting and drinking alcohol in prescribed areas. At the same time, our measures apply tougher penalties on people who are benefiting from supplying or selling grog to these communities.”

The primary anti-grog measure introduced by Brough was contained in section 12 of the NTNER Act – which replaced the previous regime in section 75 of the NT’s Liquor Act of offenses and penalties relating to “restricted areas” with a regime relating to “prescribed areas“.

Brough’s “prescribed areas” expanded the area subject to the alcohol bans by several orders of magnitude to include all Aboriginal freehold land in the NT – about 42% of the Territory landmass.

And, as I explained in Crikey back in 2007 in relation to another contentious part of the NTNER legislation, the Devil would always be in the detail.

And Vince Kelly, now President of the Police Federation of Australia and in 2007, as he remains, also President of the NT Police Association, told the SBS program Living Black just prior to the introduction of Brough’s “tough on grog-runners” legislation:

VO: But only days away from the ban coming into effect, Northern Territory Police may not be ready to tackle this latest Government plan.

VINCE KELLY: I do envisage difficulties with prosecutions because of the way legislation is drafted. There has been limited training or no training provided to the NT Police on the practical implications of the legislative changes that are coming about because of federal legislation. So all these difficulties will flow through, ultimately, to prosecution.

In March this year the NT News reported that one particularly useless part of the NTNER legislation would be scrapped:

Under a rule introduced by the previous federal government, anyone who spends more than $100 on takeaway alcohol must have their ID recorded and say where they plan to drink it. NT Licensing Minister Kon Vatskalis yesterday said the law was “a waste of time, a waste of paper and a waste of ink”. He said he had discussed it with Federal Indigenous Affairs Minister Jenny Macklin and he expected the laws to be removed “soon”. “The Minister agreed with me that it was not the brightest idea of the intervention,” he said. The scheme was said to be an attempt to stop grog-runners but it doesn’t stop anyone buying booze – or taking it to alcohol-free communities.

Almost two years after the introduction of the NTNER scheme current Indigenous Affairs Minister Jenny Macklin was asked about the effectiveness of the NTNER legislation in stopping the “rivers of grog”.

As Macklin told journalists at a press conference in Melbourne on the 5th of August 2009:

“…certainly all the evidence shows that that particular measure has not been effective. That said, I just want to reiterate how critical it is that we have strong alcohol controls on the supply of alcohol…one of the things that we have to do to control and reduce that violence is to see stronger alcohol controls.”

And, as the Fairfax Press reported last Friday, the rivers of grog are apparently flowing faster and wider than before:

“In the communities targeted by the intervention…there was a 34 per cent increase in alcohol-related crime, the report, titled Closing the Gap in the Northern Territory, said.

The last spike could be due to the criminalisation of alcohol possession in some remote communities. The Minister for Indigenous Affairs, Jenny Macklin, attributes the increases to higher police numbers.”

“An increased police presence in remote Northern Territory communities, particularly in places that previously had limited or no police, has resulted in more reporting in a number of offences, including violence, alcohol and child abuse,” a spokeswoman said.

For some time The Northern Myth has been aware that several NT Magistrates have been less than pleased that their sentencing options with regard to grog-running – particularly for serious and repeat offenders – have been seriously compromised by the supposedly tougher regime instituted by Brough and maintained by Macklin.

The Northern Myth also understands that many police – particularly those in remote areas that have to deal with grog-runners face-to-face on a daily basis – are particularly pissed off at this situation – they know that if they get a repeat offender “bang to rights” that they will only face a fine at most when the matter is dealt with by the Courts..

Before September 2007 a prison sentence was available as a sentencing option for a Magistrate dealing with a person convicted of a basic “restricted area” offence under the Liquor Act – an option increasingly attractive in respect of repeat or particularly serious offenders.

Since then, under the “prescribed area” provisions of the NTNER-modified Liquor Act, the maximum penalty available is a fine.

A prison sentence can now only be imposed for an aggravated version of the basic offence that relates to “transporting” more than 1,350 millilitres of pure alcohol with the intention to supply.

The pre-existing regime under the NT Liquor Act, at section 124A, always allowed (and still does) for Police officers to state or “aver” that seized grog was alcohol.

But there is no equivalent averment provision in the NTNER Act in respect of the 1,350 millilitres of pure alcohol situation.

The consequence of this is that if Police seize enough grog to trigger an aggravated offence and charge accordingly they will have to chemically analyse each item if the defendant opts to go to hearing.

The Northern Myth understands that the NT Police Forensic Lab in Darwin is not geared up to conduct such testing, and would have to send the seized alcohol interstate for testing.

The practical result of this snafu is that the vast majority of charges – including those that would clearly be classed as aggravated “grog-running” offences – are now processed by the Courts as basic “prescribed area” offences, and the only sentencing option is a fine.

Three weeks ago Marie Nudjulu stood before Court at the troubled community of Wadeye charged with a number of “prescribed area” offences.

The Northern Myth has seen the Court Transcript of Proceedings against Ms Nudjulu.

The Prosecutor read the following facts – admitted by Ms Nudjulu’s Defence counsel – into the public record:

Your Honour, the facts are that approximately 5:55 am on Thursday, 10 September 2009, Marie Nudjulu, the defendant, was the rear passenger in a green Holden Vectra sedan, registration: 536 888, driving to Wadeye from Darwin.

The defendant was travelling with Sebastian Cumpuda(?) and Terrence Parmbuck both rear passengers and Matthew Cumpuda driving. At that the defendant’s vehicle was stopped by police in the vicinity of Woodyculdiya Outstation turn off from Port Keats Road. The search of the vehicle apprehended nine bottles of spirits and 29 unopened 375 ml of cans of Victoria Beer on the floor at the defendant’s feet.

When asked who owned the unopened 29 cans of 375 ml of beer the defendant replied, ‘The VB is mine, I bought it for myself’, the two unopened 700 ml bottles of Bundaberg rum were located at the feet of the defendant were claimed by the co-offender Terrence Parmbuck. The remaining bottle of spirits was claimed by the co-defendant Sebastian Cumpuda.

The vehicle was seized and conveyed to Daly River Police Station. Both the defendant and co-offender, Parmbuck, were conveyed to the residence of Wadeye in a marked police vehicle. The defendant was advised she will receive a summons in relation to the matter.

At the time of the offences the whole of the Daly River land trust area is a prescribed area under the Liquor Act as amended by the Northern Territory National Emergency Response Act. The defendant was not the holder of a liquor permit in order to provide a lawful excuse for the liquor in question.

According to the transcript Ms Nudjulu had previous convictions for possession of alcohol contrary to the Liquor Act – and was currently subject to a suspended sentence. This meant that, in ordinary circumstances under the previous regime, she would be a prime candidate for a custodial sentence.

But, as Stipendiary Magistrate Melanie Little told the Court:

“Her Honour: Well she…I mean this just demonstrates how this legislation is not completely – look at this lady’s record, it’s inevitable she would have gone to gaol for this offence, absolutely inevitable, $2200 maximum penalty now. I wonder – I don’t understand Canberra, it just totally bewilders me.

…

Her Honour: Look at the record, look at it. How many, look, one, two – this is now her fourth bring liquor and she was on a suspended sentence. I wonder – it just – it seems to have accelerated and the message is out, isn’t it, there’s absolutely no deterrence anymore.”

And in sentencing Ms Nudjulu, Magistrate Little made her views on the practical effects of the NTER Act modifications to the NT Liquor Act clear as possible:

Her Honour: Ms Nudjulu, on 10 September you were in a car at 6 o’clock and the police stopped the car and there was other people there and quite a lot of alcohol was found. You said that 29 of those cans were beer, 29 375 ml cans of beer were yours, and you pleaded to guilty to bringing liquor into the community. The liquor and the vehicle was seized. You had no permit to have alcohol here. You said you bought it for yourself and you were in the – what’s called a prescribed area.

We used to call them restricted areas and the penalties were very significant, Ms Nudjulu, and as I mentioned had they been – under the old penalties and old regime you would be looking at a period of imprisonment today. The maximum penalty today is $2200 and I take that into account.

I take into account that you were told to keep out of trouble. This offence is not punishable by imprisonment so it’s not a breaching offence. I take into account that this now the fourth bring liquor, plus you’ve got other offences on your record. So it’s clear to me that you’re not taking any notice whatsoever of the rules, Ms Nudjulu.

I accept you have been trouble for some time since I put you on that suspended sentence, and I take that into account. You pleaded guilty the very first time in court so I take that into account as well. It’s not a small amount of alcohol, having said that it’s certainly not at the – completely at the upper end, but I take that maximum penalty to – to mean that – well I know that it covers all offences, control liquor, possess liquor, bring liquor, and I regard bringing liquor is at the upper end of the types of offences that are covered by the maximum penalty.

You’re convicted and fined $400, $40 levy, 28 days to pay. You’ll get a piece of paper explaining how to pay that money and – and how to get more to pay if you need that extra time. (emphasis added)

Canberra – weak as piss on grog and grog runners in the NT.

In April this year, Kevin Rudd, maintaining the fine Australian political tradition of vilifying people you’ve not met and never will, told the world that:

“People smugglers are engaged in the world’s most evil trade and they should all rot in jail because they represent the absolute scum of the earth. We see this lowest form of human life at work in what we saw on the high seas yesterday.”

Rudd was talking about the tragic events arising from an explosion on board the boat, known as SIEV 36, carrying a group of Afghani asylum seekers en route to Australian waters from Indonesia.

SIEV 36

Last week two of Kevin Rudd’s “scum of the earth” made guilty pleas before Justice Dean Mildren in the Supreme Court of the Northern Territory in the matter of The Queen v Mohamad Tahir and Beny.

Justice Mildren, here speaking in his Sentencing Remarks directly to Mohamed Tahir & Beny, summed up the background to the trip from Indonesia:

On 15 April 2009 a Type IV Indonesian fishing vessel, about 15 metres in length of wooden construction with an inboard engine, was intercepted by HMAS Albany approximately two and a half nautical miles south-east of Ashmore Reef inside the Territory of Ashmore and Cartier Islands. The vessel has been given the name SIEV 36 by Australian authorities. At the time of interception you were both inside the wheelhouse at the helm of the SIEV 36. The vessel also carried 47 unlawful non-citizens, 46 from Afghanistan and one from Iran. The SIEV 36 had been at sea for about five days and nights after leaving Indonesia. The vessel carried sufficient food and water and it was equipped with a compass but it only had one life jacket. The passengers each paid up to $6000 to reach Australia.

And, rather than being the “lowest form of human life”, the two men charged with bringing the boat into Australian waters – Mohamed Tahir & a man known only as Beny – were really just young innocents abroad on a folly – not members of some evil conspiracy.

Beny is one of twelve children and attended school in South Sulawesi till he was about seven years old and has mostly worked as a subsistence fisherman and labourer .

As Justice Mildren told the court on his Sentencing Remarks:

“…approximately 12-18 months ago, you left South Sulawesi to go to Java in order to find work. You obtained some employment but about a month before you became involved in this matter, you left Java to go to Lombok in order to find work there. You were approached in Lombok by an older man who offered you employment on this trip. You were to be paid five million rupiah (about $AU560) which to you is a very large sum of money. You were lured into the task by the money. You expected to be caught. You were told that you would be returned home after a short time.”

Mohamed Tahir was one of seven children had a similar work history as Beny and was:

“…born in a village called Muncar near Banyuwangi in East Java. You also had been employed as a fisherman. You were approached by two older men at the wharves near your village and were offered five million rupiah to undertake this job. You had not been in work for some months and to you this was a very substantial sum of money. You left your village with the men and you were taken to Lombok. There the vessel was loaded with the passengers on a beach. At the time of departure, a captain was also on board.

Beny and Tahir were both severely injured in the explosion.

As Justice Mildren told them in Court:

“Beny you received burns to your left leg, left arm, left foot and the left side of your back. You were also thrown into the water for about 25-30 minutes before you were rescued. You were hospitalised for about 20-30 days.  Following your discharge from hospital you…were arrested and detained at the Brisbane Immigration Transit Accommodation at Pinkenba in Brisbane. You falsely told officers of the Department of Immigration and Citizenship that you were 17 years of age. A bilateral wrist X-ray taken for the purpose of age determination subsequently revealed that you d the skeletal maturity of a male of at least 19 years of age. I accept your counsel’s submission that the question of your age is one of some difficulty. You do not know your date of birth and there were conflicting reports about how old you were. It is accepted now that you are over 18 and that you are probably about 19, although you may be 20. This information has been confirmed by your solicitors through speaking to your family.”

…

“Tahir, also received burns to right arm and left leg. You have permanent significant scarring. You are still wearing bandages and will need to wear the bandages for the next two years. You still have pain.”

…

You, Tahir, were arrested following your discharge from hospital and detained at the DIAC juvenile facilities at Redcliffe in Perth. You had falsely told officers at the DIAC that you were 13 years of age. A bilateral wrist X-ray taken for the purpose of age determination subsequently revealed that you had the skeletal maturity of a male of at least 19 years of age. You do not know your exact age but you accept that you are older than 18.

The question of Beny and Tahir’s age is relevant because of the operation of subsection 233C(1) of the Migration Act 1958 (the Act) which provides that a mandatory minimum sentence does not apply to persons under the age of 18 years.

Beny & Tahir entered guilty pleas to offences under section 232A of the Act for which the maximum penalty is imprisonment for 20 years or a fine of $220,000 or both.

The true evil for Beny, Tahir and for Justice Mildren, is the requirement that anyone found guilty under section 232A of the Act is liable to a mandatory minimum sentence of five years with a mandatory minimum non-parole period of at least three years as required by section 233C of the  Act.

These provisions were introduced as amendments to the Act in 1999.

Introducing the Bill to the House of Representatives, Peter Slipper said that:

“The bill…introduces a more severe penalty of 20 years imprisonment or 2,000 penalty units, or both, for the trafficking of groups of five or more people. This penalty recognises that organised crime groups are involved in people trafficking, and the penalty reflects the seriousness of the offence.”

Labor’s Con Sciacca responded:

“Overall in 1997-98 some 157 illegal immigrants arrived by sea on our shores. In 1998-99 this figure increased eightfold to 859, and more are coming every day. This increase in people smuggling, in the operation of the so-called `snakeheads’, signifies that Australia’s penalties for these offences do not go far enough to deter those who assist these criminal warlords on our shores.”

In Beny & Tahir’s case all in Justice Mildren’s Court knew that they were not members of one of Slipper’s “organised crime groups”, nor were they Sciacca’s “snakeheads” or Rudd’s “scum of the earth” deserving of the condign punishment required by the provisions of the Act.

In any other circumstances Beny and Tahir would be prime candidates for the exercise of long-standing judicial discretions and the application of the ordinary judicial Sentencing Principles that provide clarity and transparency in sentencing.

But in Beny & Tahir’s case Justice Mildren’s hands were tied.

In words that reveal his barely restrained judicial frustration, he told Beny and Mohamed that:

“But for the mandatory minimum sentences which I am required to impose, I would have imposed a much lesser sentence than I am now required by law to do. There are dangers when the Courts are required to impose mandatory minimum sentences. In cases such as this, the ordinary sentencing principles play no function.

…

The other dangers of mandatory minimum sentencing, apart from the fact that the Court is required to impose a sentence which is greater than the justice of the case would otherwise require include the fact that principles of parity between offenders has little or no role to play. All offenders that fall within the class will be treated equally no matter what their level of criminality may be.

However this is not the occasion to debate the merits of mandatory minimum sentencing.”

Beny and Tahir were both sentenced to five years “on the top” and a non-parole period of three years.

Justice Mildren recommended that Beny and Tahir be released after twelve months.

Maybe now is the time to debate the merits of mandatory minimum sentencing under the provisions of the Migration Act?

Perhaps McDermott could have looked at the NT, where more traditional policing methods – like the use of the “three point hold” also known as “‘ground stabilisation’ or ‘take-down’ – has been implicated in a number of recent deaths.

Yesterday ABC Darwin reported that NT Police officer Acting Sergeant Bradley Fox had been charged with aggravated assault in relation to an incident at the Royal Darwin Hospital in December 2007 that ended with the death of the well-regarded film-maker Bob Plasto.

Bob Plasto

The ABC’s Obituary to Bob Plasto records that:

After leaving the ABC in 1980, Bob founded his own film production company and went on to become an internationally renowned film-maker, making more than 75 films in 35 years. His work included films about Islamic fundamentalism, Pine Gap, the Coniston killings and Aboriginal land rights. Bob was the first independent film producer to enter post-revolution Iran. His exclusive story from this visit, In the Name of God won the United States’ highest award for an independent documentary, the Alfred I Dupont Award in 1986. Iran – Behind the Veil won Best Documentary at the New York Film Festival, the film lauded for capturing a myriad of telling scenes, despite the tight Government control which followed the crew at every turn…Bob was also a poet who wrote more than 500 poems. He retired from film-making in August.

His funeral was held at Darwin’s Uniting Church on December 31. He is survived by three daughters, Jacqueline, Georgina and Rune Al-ith and one son, Tyge.

NT Coroner Greg Cavanagh recently conducted a joint inquiry into two deaths – including Plasto’s – because:

The circumstances of the deaths were investigated at the one inquest because of common factors and an overlap of issues. Both deaths were at least contributed to by injuries sustained after the police used force involving restraining the men in a prone position. Both men were large men who suffered from pre-existing heart conditions. An issue arises in both cases as to whether the deaths were caused by ‘positional asphyxia’,

According to his report into Plasto’s death NT Coroner Greg Cavanagh, on 22 December 2007, NT Police attended at Knuckey Street in central Darwin, where they found Plasto, who was:

“…shaking and sweating and speaking incoherently [and that they] believed…needed urgent medical assistance due to his mental state.”

Plasto was taken to the Royal Darwin Hospital emergency department, where he was examined by a doctor shortly after 4pm, who, according to the Coroner, reported that:

“…he was “pleasant and cooperative.” He was sweaty. She recorded “no insight into current state but does say he will do whatever I think he needs to get better.”

Plasto was then “sectioned” by a Dr Cromarty. At that point, responsibility for, and custody of, Plasto transferred from the NT Police to the Royal Darwin Hospital as an involuntary patient.

Dr Cromarty told Nurse Rebecca Weir that the Deceased was “acutely psychotic and he needed psych reg [psychiatric registrar] assessment”. Dr Cromarty said she spoke to a police officer (Fox) shortly after 4.30pm and told him that she had sectioned the Deceased. She also told him that she was concerned that the Deceased was psychotic.

Plasto remained at the emergency department – as did several NT Police officers including Acting Sergeant Bradley Fox – waiting for the psychiatric registrar to assess him.

During that time:

“The Deceased often talked to himself. The people who heard him speak could not make sense of what the Deceased was saying. He was highly agitated. He was standing up, sitting down and walking in and out of the Oleander room.”

…

“The Deceased, who was a chain smoker, repeatedly asked…for a smoke…The longer the Deceased was waiting at the hospital, the more agitated he became.”

Shortly before 6pm Plasto moved towards the external doors of the emergency ward, repeatedly stating that he wanted to have a smoke and “I want to go and get some air”, “I want to have fresh air.”, “I want to go outside. I want to go outside.”

Some Police officers tried to convince Plasto to stay inside, Acting Sergeant Bradley Fox was more abrupt, telling him to “Get back in the room”, “You’re not free to go just yet. You’re going to have to wait a little bit longer”.

The situation then escalated rapidly with Acting Sergeant Bradley Fox effecting what is known in police parlance as a “takedown”.

“Very shortly, six or seven men including all four police officers became involved in the restraint of the Deceased. Whilst on the ground, Fox and ACPO Eric Morrison applied significant weight to the Deceased’s upper torso. At one point, Fox was using his pectoral area to lie forward on the Deceased’s left shoulder. At some stage, Fox’s right knee was also used to push down the Deceased’s left scapula trying to effect a ‘3 point hold’. The Deceased was resisting and pushing up with his right hand. Acting Sergeant Fox says that he was using all his physical strength and weight. He described the intensity of the struggle as a ten out of ten. He said it was possibly the hardest apprehension in that manner he had ever undertaken. ACPO Morrison was putting his left knee on the Deceased’s right pectoral. Fox also held the Deceased’s head down with his left knee.”

Dr Cromarty attended the scene:

She saw the Deceased restrained face down on the floor with several police members lying across him and others restraining his arms and legs…Dr Cromarty says that as she tried to approach the Deceased, Fox put his knee on the Deceased’s head, and she heard the head smack onto the floor. She and Dr Lai Heng Foong leant down and clustered around the Deceased’s head and told the Deceased to relax, and that she would try to get the police off him. Dr Cromarty was concerned as the Deceased appeared to struggle less and his face was becoming quite red.

Dr Lai Heng Foong, the lead registrar in charge of the emergency ward:

“…heard screaming from the flight deck and came running to the ambulance bay. Dr Foong shouted at the police in a very loud voice to back off a bit and “ease off the pressure”, “let us talk to him”. She remembers very clearly seeing Fox place what appeared to be his whole weight on the Deceased’s head so his face was completely crushed into the floor. Dr Foong saw the Deceased trying to move his body and lift his head, she believed, in order to breathe and talk. She observed that Fox’s knee was on top of his head whilst the Deceased was turning red and later blue.”

“And do you remember now seeing blood come from the Deceased’s nose while he was on the ground?—I’ll never forget it, yes, I do. And why will you never forget it?—Because this is a patient that was scheduled and supposed to be protected by the hospital and he was being restrained with excessive force, compromising his ability to breathe and, despite my pleas, there was no easing of the pressure put on his face.”

Dr Clarissa Oh said that she saw Fox apply a knee to the Deceased’s head when it was about 15 cm above the ground. Dr Oh saw that when Fox put his knee on the Deceased’s head, it hit the ground, and she heard a significant thud.

…

“Dr Cromarty, Dr Foong and Dr Oh all saw the Deceased begin to turn blue, and that shortly after that he stopped struggling. Dr Cromarty and Dr Foong shouted at the police that he was turning blue and that they had to get off him. Dr Foong said nothing happened and she again had to say: “Guys let go of him. He’s getting blue”.

Therese De Groot said she saw a police officer (Fox) with his knee on the Deceased’s head and heard a thump at least once. Nurse Natasha Roberts heard the Deceased say quite loudly words to the effect of: “Can I get up? Sorry, let me get up”.

Plasto was transferred into the Intensive Care Unit but never recovered consciousness and died 6 days later.

NT Coroner Greg Cavanagh was scathing of the conduct of the NT Police officers:

“In my view the conduct of the police in this matter involved a litany of serious errors and misjudgements that led to the tragic and unnecessary death of the Deceased.

The Police Custody Manual and the Police General Order relating to Transport of Persons in Custody require a police officer apprehending a person apparently suffering from a mental illness to notify a hospital Emergency Department that they are attending with the person. This was not done.

More seriously, the Deceased was not taken directly to Royal Darwin hospital. Instead, he was taken to the police station where he was kept in the back of a caged vehicle for 16 minutes. That conduct is unacceptable. The Deceased was not a prisoner. He was not a suspect. He was not, as Fox described the Deceased during his interviews to investigating police a “person of interest”. He was a person who was a potential patient. The only power the police had under section 163 was to apprehend him and take him to a medical practitioner or an authorised psychiatrist for the purposes of an assessment under s 33.

…

In my view the decision to use force against the Deceased was not necessary and the police did not apply the minimum use of force.

I accept that the Deceased said on more than one occasion in a loud voice that he wanted to go outside to get some fresh air or he wanted to have a smoke…All four police officers were in close proximity to the Deceased at that time he said those words. I do not accept that not a single police officer heard the Deceased say those words or words to that effect. It is telling that none of the police asked the Deceased why he wanted to go outside. That is either because the Deceased had told them why he wanted to go outside or it did not occur to the police to engage in any dialogue with him.

There is no cogent evidence that the Deceased was intending to flee or escape or attempt to hurt himself.

…

I also find that if force was required to be used against the Deceased, the force actually used on the Deceased was unnecessary and excessive…I accept the evidence of the civilian witnesses that Fox applied his knee to the Deceased’s head when it was lifted about 15 cm above the ground causing the Deceased’s head to hit the floor. Fox’s conduct was not in accordance with the training provided by the NT police.

…

In making the decision to use force, the police members failed to take into account that the Deceased was mentally ill, that he was in a distressed condition and was in an agitated and anxious state after an unnecessarily prolonged wait at the hospital.”

Coroner Cavanagh also blasted the training provided to NT Police in dealing with the mentally ill:

“The training received by operational police about dealing with the mentally ill was clearly inadequate. Sergeant Hansen…acknowledged that the NT police were not given any specific training on negotiation or ‘tactical disengagement’ or communications with mentally ill people.

Bronwyn Hendry, the Director of Mental Health in the NT, gave evidence of the training received by NT police and security guards in relation to mentally ill people. She regarded that training as inadequate.”

Acting Sergeant Brad Fox remains on duty.

He has been summonsed to appear in the Darwin Magistrates Court on 9 November.

Coroner Cavanagh made the following recommendations:

1 – The NT Police Custody Manual be amended to provide that members must take any apparently mentally ill or disturbed person apprehended under s 163 of the Mental Health and Related Services Act by the most direct practical route and as quickly as possible for the an assessment.

2 – The NT Police Custody Manual, the Police General Orders and the Memorandum of Understanding dated June 2002 offer no clear guidance to operational police in relation to the handover of patients by police to hospital and should be revised.

3 – That Northern Territory Police ensure operational police are trained and retrained using reality based training techniques in relation to: “to the use of the prone restraint; risk factors; warning signs of a rapid onset of serious injury or death which can potentially occur in connection with certain restraint positions when subjects are in the prone position; prevention strategies; the monitoring of a subject person’s health if practical during and certainly immediately after the subjects are in the restraint positions.

4 – The Northern Territory Police should ensure that all members are trained and re-trained in strategies to deal with mentally ill persons.

5 – The Northern Territory Police should amend the General Order on Transport of Persons in Custody, and Part 6 of the Custody Manual – Mentally Ill Persons to include step-by-step instructions for police members on exercising the power of immediate apprehension for the purposes of a mental health assessment.

6 – The Northern Territory Police should amend clause 6.1.2 of the Police Custody Manual…so that Clause reflect that where legal advice is sought by a member and it is not possible to obtain that advice before the end of the member’s shift, the member should be interviewed as soon as reasonably practicable thereafter.

7 – That the legislature consider amending section 34 of the Mental Health and Related Services Act to clarify police powers and responsibilities after a section 34 recommendation has been made.

I’ve written about the NT Ombudsman’s annual reports and the small glimpses that they provide into the various instances of misconduct by the NT Police before here – noting that her annual reports to the NT Parliament only document those matters that come to her by way of formal complaint.

The point that I made then – that Carolyn Richards’ reports into NT Police misconduct present convincing support for the need for an independent authority to investigate allegations of misconduct by NT Police and public officials – are only bolstered by the instances of appalling conduct of NT Police revealed in her latest report.

You can see all of the NT Ombudsman’s annual reports here.

The chapters on NT Police misconduct make for fascinating reading, and there is little to suggest that NT Police conduct, and the quality, supervision and investigation of that conduct, has improved over time.

As Carolyn Richards told the local ABC in Darwin, past NT Police recruiting and training policies may be making no small contribution to these issues:

“…a lack of senior officers in the police force could be a reason why there have been some serious breaches of police duty of care for people in custody. “Because of the influx of new recruitments into the police and because there was a five year delay prior to 2001 where [there] were no police recruitments, we are now in the situation where we’ve got all these young officers out on the beat with six months training.”

The Northern Territory’s Acting Police Commissioner, Bruce Wernham, said: “All new police recruits undergo thorough and intensive training prior to operating under full supervision as probationary constables. “I note the ombudsman’s comments with regards to increased recruiting causing more complaints against less experienced police. “However, I am not aware of any evidence to specifically support this.”

The material in this post comes from just one of the case notes of complaints against NT police documented in the 2008-2009 annual report to the local Parliament of the NT Ombudsman, Carolyn Richards.

Some of the comments made by the unnamed Police Officer in the unidentified NT watchhouse to a prisoner being processed included:

“shut your face.”

“dumb f**k”,

“f**king loser”

“d**khead over there”

“… no brain”

“f**king retard.”

The case note, headed “No brains” detailed the treatment meted out by NT Police to a complainant who was arrested:

“…for breaking and entering. This person had fallen asleep outside the premises, due to being highly intoxicated, and was arrested at the scene. A complaint was subsequently lodged relating to his treatment whilst at the watch-house.”

Even before he made it to the cells he was getting the full benefit of the cop’s limited vocabulary:

“The complainant could be heard mumbling something whilst he was seated on the bench, although it was not discernable as to what was said. One of the attending officers responded with “shut your face.” Further comments made to or about the complainant within the next 30 minutes included, “dumb f**k”, “f**king loser”, “d**khead over there”, “… no brain”, “he’s from CSI, one of our smart criminals who breaks and enters and then collapses outside the scene” and “f**king retard.” There were several officers present during the comments, not one of them suggesting they were wrong or inappropriate.”

And it just doesn’t get any better – for the poor guy in the cell or the cop with the potty mouth.

Further examination of the audio and footage from the watchhouse cameras revealed this tasty little incident:

“…the duty officer was eating a piece of toast. He was pointing to the toast and then himself and later pointed to another breakfast behind the counter. In the officer’s statement he claimed he was indicating to the complainant that his breakfast was behind the counter. However on viewing the video it appeared the duty officer ate the complainant’s toast that was sitting with the complainant’s weetbix. He then went to a box sitting on the bin containing breakfast rubbish and took out a white bag with toast and a carton of milk. The duty officer then poured the milk on the weetbix and brought this, along with the toast in the white bag, to the complainant. It was concerning that the duty officer provided the complainant with toast and milk which appeared to have been taken from rubbish sitting on the bin.”

And thanks to the watchhouse cameras we now know that:

In addition to the inappropriate comments identified above the duty officer was heard and observed making the following statements to or about the complainant:

• “stupid f**king idiot”

• “make things quite clear, …, if you wanna f**kin’ play up I’ll make things hard for you”

• “god, he f**king stinks”

• “didn’t bang head for too long coz it hurt” one officer apparently mocking the complainant to another officer

• Two officers were joking about the complainant hitting his head against the cell door because he

wasn’t given a blanket. One officer stating that the complainant had said he would jump in the air

and land on his head killing himself. The officer then stating “go ahead, do it.” The other officer

stating “make sure you do it in front of the cameras”

• “piece of s**t that he is”

• After the officer established that the complainant was dialling his wife whom he had a domestic

violence order against, the officer said “get back in your f**king cell you spastic”; “you’ve got a

domestic violence order that says you are not allowed to contact her, you f**king wanker. You’re

not allowed to approach her, you’re not allowed to contact her directly or indirectly you f**king

wanker”

• “how about you shut the f**k up”

• “spastic c**t” whispered by officer

And what was the sanction meted out to the officer?

Here again from the NT Ombudsman’s annual report:

It was determined that some of the conduct was highly inappropriate for police officers and in breach of the NT Police Code of Conduct and Ethics and General Orders. The JRC recommended that the officers receive managerial guidance in relation to appropriate conduct when dealing with detainees. The JRC noted that it had already been recommended that the officers receive formal counselling.

The investigation also revealed that appropriate entries were not made into the watch-house log or offender journal.

Great – “counselling” and “managerial guidance” – no mention of the slap on the wrist, an apology to the complainant or any action against those other officers who, by their silent acquiescence, condoned their brother officer’s conduct.

As Glen Dooley of the North Australian Aboriginal Justice Agency (NAAJA) , which provides legal services and representation across the Top End of the NT, told the local ABC:

“…there should be tougher sanctions and more transparency.

“If we had a field officer and that field officer started calling that client a dumb whatever, a whatever loser and a whatever retard and then served them some food out of one of our garbage bins, that person would be sacked on the spot,” he said.

“The report here recommends the officers receive managerial guidance in relation to food hygiene and appropriate conduct when dealing with detainees. That’s limp to me.”

For the benefit of those members of the NT Police reading this who may have forgotten what it says – and for the rest of us who have most likely never seen it before – here is the NT Police Statement of Ethics:

STATEMENT OF ETHICS

Each member of the Police Force is to act in a manner which:

- upholds the rule of law;

- preserves the individual’s rights and freedoms;

- places integrity above all;

- seeks to improve quality of life throughout the community through involvement with the community;

- strives to attain maximum citizen confidence and satisfaction;

- strives at all times for professional excellence;

- strives to maximise the effectiveness of available human and other resources; and

- tempers authority with common sense, discretion and sensitivity

Any bids on how many of those points have been contravened here – all of them? – or none?

Have any thoughts about the effectiveness of the current investigative process for complaints against NT Police?

Your thoughts please!

Wadeye township

I’ve written here recently about the fantastic (in the original sense of that word) approach that The Australian and its dwindling number of northern correspondents take to just about anything to do with Aboriginal affairs here in the NT.

This past weekend The Weekend Australian continued this dubious tradition when it ran this piece from its northern correspondent, Nicolas Rothwell.

Rothwell examines apparently new economic and governance developments at the troubled remote township of Wadeye, in the west of the NT’s Top End.

And Rothwell, after many years in the NT, has apparently finally realised what anyone with any experience in remote Australia would have found out a long time ago – that Wadeye, like most small townships in the NT, and elsewhere – is a town that is “mostly ordered and peaceful”.

If you take the assertions in Rothwells piece at face value you would think that the good citizens of Wadeye had turned their backs on all forms of Australian mainstream governance and were boldly charting a course of their own, free from the controls imposed by Australian governments at all levels.

As Rothwell says:

“…what bureaucracy gives, it can also take away. Not only did the federal intervention of mid-2007 sweep through Wadeye; the Thamarrurr local council was wound up as the Northern Territory unveiled its new regional shires. The council, though, gave birth to a new Thamarrurr Development Corporation, which was bolstered by strong support from the Rudd government. The upshot of this administrative upheaval was a deepened desire among the Wadeye leadership group to pursue their own path.
…
“The idea aims to assert control over their own region and in time to supplant the long-established Northern Land Council, which is widely seen as a moribund arm of the Territory Labor Party. “We will set up our own council,” Nganbe says bluntly. TDC’s Berto says: “There’s a lot of people here not happy with the NLC and its complete lack of service, and its standing in the way of progress. We want to set the political agenda from the ground.”

And notwithstanding the brief reference to “strong support” from the Rudd government, Rothwell reckons that the people of Wadeye:

“…don’t like the deal on offer from mainstream Australia’s authorities. They want to keep their own culture, they want economic development and they want it on their own terms, under their control.”

What Rothwell is of course talking about here is localised Aboriginal self-determination, an aspiration that he has frequently, and as recently as six weeks ago, condemned to the dustbin of Australian political history:

“For some time it has been clear Aboriginal self-determination has had its day.”

Due credit should be given to the good citizens of Wadeye for getting their act together in what are incredibly difficult circumstances. By all accounts they have established a range of business enterprises that will provide real jobs and offer economic opportunities to locals.

Rothwell implies that the people of Wadeye have achieved these successes in spite of the bureaucratic and administrative barriers set up by governments at every turn. But it may be that a few inconvenient facts – for Rothwell’s thesis at least – might explain a somewhat different basis for some of Wadeye’s recent successes.

The bureaucracies that Rothwell says have taken so much from the people of Wadeye with one hand have been very busy giving bucketloads of money to the recently-established Thamarrurr Development Corporation Ltd (the TDC) with the other.

The TDC is a non-profit commercial operation limited by guarantee with no shareholders – just members that represent the 20 clan groups of the Wadeye region.

In the 2008/2009 round of funding for the Indigenous Heritage Program announced on 7 July 2008, the TDC was given two grants to a total of $62,704 for “the investigation and management of cultural heritage” of the Thamarrurr region.

On 8 October 2008 Federal Indigenous Affairs Minister Jenny Macklin announced that TDC would receive $500,000 as “an establishment grant to deliver a range of business services” to the Wadeye region.

At it’s meeting of 10 February 2009, the Victoria Daly Shire Council (the Council), the local government body that replaced Thamarrurr’s predessor, the Thamarrurr Regional Council, passed the following Motion:

“That Council agrees to lease for one dollar ($1.00) to Thamarrurr Development Corporation for the period from the 10th of February 2009 to the 7th of December 2009 all non – fixed assets.”

At the following meeting on 7 April 2009, the Council, in the course of the Confirmation of the Minutes of the previous meeting, amended that Motion:

“The minutes of the ordinary meeting, item (8) TDC were amended with a further dot point
added, saying that if all the above conditions were met the vehicles would then be sold to the TDC for the sum of $1.00. The minutes were  then taken as read and accepted as a true record of the Meeting.”

The value of the assets leased to the TDC for $1, according to the Report provided to Council, was $760,073.

According to the same report, the insured value of the vehicles to be sold to Tharmarrurr upon it meeting Council’s conditions was $482,273.

You can read the Minutes of Council meetings and the Report from Council staff for yourself here.

On 4 March 2009, by joint press release Minister Macklin and Member for Lingiari, Warren Snowdon announced that TDC would receive a total of $650,000 to provide painting services and the purchase of civil construction machinery.

On 11 June 2009, in another joint press release, Snowdon and Macklin announced that TDC would receive a total of $1.422 million to purchase a mobile concrete batching plant and to provide accommodation for “key staff” at Wadeye.

As the ABC reported last month, the Thamarrurr Association, (also based at Wadeye but a separate entity to the TDC) following representations from then NT Indigenous Policy Minister Alison Anderson, received a $250,000 grant from the NT government in circumstances yet to be fully explained:

“Ms Anderson secured $250,000 of taxpayer funds for a corporation run by the powerful Yunupingu family in Arnhem Land, including Galarrwuy Yunupingu. The only other organisation to get $250,000 for community consultation is the Thamarrur Association at Wadeye, which has never declared an income before. The Government has not announced the payments and is yet to explain how the companies were selected. It says the money will pay for consultation on the Working Futures policy to help the Government get its service delivery right.”

I’ve not yet been able establish any direct connection between the TDC and the Thamarrurr Association – other than that they both do the same kind of business in the same small town.

On my back-of the-envelope reckoning the TDC has received control over $760,000 worth of assets for the bargain basement price of a single dollar from their local Council and, including the grant to the Thamarrurr Association, close enough to $3.5 million from the NT and Federal governments.

Not bad for a group that Rothwell says, “…don’t like the deal on offer from mainstream Australia.”

And what of the assertions in Rothwell’s article by TDC’s John Berto of the Northern Land Council’s “…complete lack of service, and its standing in the way of progress” at Wadeye?

John Berto should know all about the NLC and service delivery at Wadeye. After all, he had been a long-term employee of the NLC and for a period up to late 2006 he was the NLC’s Deputy CEO.

But Rothwell and Berto would also be aware of the benefits to the Traditional Owners of the Wadeye region (and beyond) resulting from the NLC’s negotiations on their behalf over the Blacktip gas plant and pipeline.

The deal negotiated by the NLC has given, and will provide into the future, significant economic and social benefits to the traditional owners and residents of the Wadeye region.

Indeed, there is every appearance that Rothwell consciously excluded these well-known and readily available facts from his piece because they did not support his oft-repeated spurious claims about the NLC. I found all of the material noted above after about ten minutes of searching on the web and a bit of scurrying about in the backblocks of various websites.

Rothwell ends his piece with a dubious comparison between Longreach in far-western Queensland and Wadeye, implying that Wadeye should be accorded the same services, government support and facilities as Longreach.

Longreach is a service centre in a region with a long history of extensive & highly productive mining, pastoral and agricultural activity. It is also has roads that lead from somewhere to somewhere else.

Wadeye services only itself and a few small homelands. It is at the wrong end of a long and rough road in a region with no history of pastoral, agricultural or any other significant development – apart from the above-mentioned Blacktip gas project.

Pity about those annoying facts getting in the way of a fantastic story.

Declaration: Bob Gosford has worked for the Northern Land Council as a legal advisor, most recently in 2008. He had no involvement in matters at Wadeye apart from a single meeting with an early version of the Thamarrurr council in about 2000.

Image from Getup

This a guest post from John Greatorex who worked as a teacher at Galiwin’ku on Elcho island off the coast of Arnhem Land for 27 years. He now is a part-time teacher of the Yolngu studies at a Darwin University.

He has now resigned from teaching to work with his Yolngu families on projects of importance to them – including the wonderful Arnhem Weavers group – you can find out more about the Arnhem Weavers and the food co-operative project they have recently started at their website.

Recently I was profoundly moved when I heard Richard Downs, an Alwayarra elder, seek refugee status for his people whose homelands are in the central east of the Northern Territory, Australia.

The Alyawarra were refusing to accept the impositions of the Federal Government through the Northern Territory Emergency Response (NTER), and as part of their action they have requested the United Nations (UN) register their people under the international refugee convention as internally displaced persons.

The ABC reported (26 August 2009):

“Mr Downs says people of the Alyawarra Nation have been left with no choice because the federal intervention in the Northern Territory has taken away their rights.” “We’ve got no say at all,” he said. “We feel like an outcast in our community, refugees in our own country.”

This was followed the next by another report on the ABC where Richard Downs said:

“We no longer have any rights to exist as humans in our own country and are outcasts in our own community”

On the 3rd September Richard Downs wrote:

“Your government’s so-called measures under the intervention go far beyond this [protecting women] to take away our dignity, our self esteem, and land control, disempowerment, human and indigenous rights.“… Your system is about creating divisions, hate and racism and control over people who are already struggling under oppression.”

When I read these statements I thought: “These people are making a stand in a climate of constant and negative stereotyping by governments and media; a difficult step for anyone.”

The Alyawarra, by refusing to be redefined, are taking active steps to take control of their lives.

Don’t we all want to be in control of our lives?

I would like to tell two stories which I hope will provide insight into why homelands are of crucial and critical importance to their traditional custodians.

The following stories attempt to represent what I have heard and learnt from Aboriginal mentors in east Arnhemland over several decades.

Not only does it make common sense, but it has been clearly demonstrated that the happiest and healthiest people in any society are those who are able to control the most important aspects of their lives.

Control over our lives is proportional to how we feel about ourselves, how society sees us, and our status within society.

In the Northern Territory the people with the least control over their lives are the First Nations peoples.

Disturbingly, recent Australian and NT Government policies, including the NTER, have further stripped away at Aboriginal people’s rights to control their lives in the Northern Territory. Traditional (nation) estates on which ‘prescribed’ communities are located have been compulsorily acquired by governments without negotiation.

Every Black Territorian living on ‘Aboriginal’ land receiving Centrelink or other welfare payments is compulsorily ‘Income-Managed’ (including old-age pensioners).

Black Territorians are negatively stereotyped as child abusers and alcoholics, poor school attendees and perpetrators of domestic violence.

Recently-announced policies now envisage forcing families off their custodial estates (away from their homes) into ‘growth towns’ for the convenience of government bureaucracies.

Public statements that redefine all Black Territorians in a negative way can only have a negative and debilitating impact. While governments, supported by the media, continue to negatively stereotype all Black Territorians, the health and well-being of these peoples will continue to decline.

In east Arnhemland where the Yolngu peoples live, and where I have spent much of the past 30 years, I can say for a fact:

“…there are homelands where school attendance is higher than anywhere else in Australia; where children are safer than in white towns and centres and where substance abuse and youth suicide are non-existent.”

So what is it that is so important and special about homelands for their traditional custodians and that underpins such successful outcomes?

The following two stories may provide some insight into these questions.

Story One.

Recently the Yolngu Studies lecturer, Yingiya Guyula, delivered the last class for the semester. He spoke about the first contact between his families and White settlers.

He told how fear of Whiteman first entered the lives of his families after his grandfather was shot by cattlemen. Before this incident his families had heard reports from further south that White men were scalping Black men; just like his families were skinning crocodiles.

Now they had to be ever vigilant and wary. They could no longer live peacefully, safely travel and hunt on their custodial estates; lands they had inhabited since the beginning of time.

Towards the end of the class a student added to Yingiya’s story.

She explained that when the Elcho Island missionaries called the twenty or so Yolngu nations to ‘the Light’, they didn’t understand. These missionaries failed to recognise the existence of strong and complex governance structures, where nation boundaries, established alliances and political structures were understood and respected.

By calling these diverse peoples into the Elcho Island mission, and onto the land of one nation, the missionaries were disempowering all the non-landowners.

She explained it like this.

“We Yolngu people are connected to our ancestral estates like a tree is rooted deeply into the soil. When the roots of a tree and the soil recognise each other, the roots will grow ever deeper and stronger, and the tree grows strong and bears good fruit.”

“The missionaries pulled us up by the roots and placed us in the mission and onto soil that was foreign. Our roots could not grow into the mission soil, that soil does not recognise us, and our roots do not recognise that soil. Our roots would only stay in the surface soil. A tree may stay alive on unfamiliar and alien soil, but it will not find nourishment, it will be stunted and will not bear good fruit. We can be only strong and independent on our homelands; not in the mission; not in the “town”.

Story Two.

In 1984, with the best of intentions, the Northern Territory Government developed a constitution for the community council on Elcho Island. The new constitution made provision for members to represent the 20 or so nations who lived on the mission (in 2009 residents still use the term mission).

An old man and I were talking one day. He had been elected chairman of the council. He described how he felt in conflict, he did not feel comfortable talking about the land where the mission stood, it wasn’t his land. He understood why some council members didn’t attend council meetings. He explained that it was disrespectful for non-landowners to discuss the mission land. So how could the council work?

I could see what he was saying. I grew up on a family owned farm. We would have been very upset if the government had decided that our neighbours had the right to make decisions about our farm.

I noticed that although he attended council meetings, he didn’t make public council announcements, he always deferred to the land owners for such matters.

When a Yolngu man or woman speaks of the critical importance of land, I now know they are not talking about land in general. They are referring to their very own homeland.

If you are motivated to do so, please have a look at the online homelands petition, and consider supporting this cause.

http://www.getup.org.au/campaign/Homelands

John Greatorex

7th September 2009

Note: The quotes in these stories are used with permission.

Memorial for Ron Marks north of Coober Pedy

I’ve written about Australian roadside memorial markers recently here. There is an almost infinite variety of these memorials – some are just a cross with no name, date or details. Other sites are more elaborate, with all the appurtenances of a regular grave-site – the plastic flowers, cans and bottles of beer of spirits and a scatter of items of significance to the deceased or those that remain to remember. Some are carefully and regularly tended, others look like they’ve not been visited since they were established.

You can read more about roadside memorials and follow links to a wonderful body of research by Dr Jenny Clark and Professor Majella Franzmann from the University of New England, Armidale, NSW at the ABC’s Religion & Ethics website.

I came across this memorial to Ron Marks about 90 kilometres or so north of Coober Pedy in South Australia’s north when I passed through there early in July.

What struck me was that this was the first of the many hundreds of roadside memorials that I’ve seen over the years – and particularly over the past few months while I’ve been spinning my wheels down backroads across the country doing research for my book on  Aboriginal bird knowledge – that concerned a death by misadventure other than a motor-vehicle accident.

This sign reached out and grabbed me as I drove past – there was something about it that demanded my further attention – its size, the distance from the road – I don’t know. The force of the few words on this sign remain a shock – “Murdered at this spot – 16-9-93.” I stopped and wandered around the area for a few minutes but it was more than a little spooky and I soon hit the road southward for the Coober after taking a few photos and looking around at the rather desolate landscape.

That night I sat in a mouldering caravan in Coober Pedy and looked on the web to find a bit more about what happened to Ron Marks on that lonely stretch of road. Eventually I found two reports from the Courts of Appeal in South Australia and after a little more digging and a few week’s wait I got a reply from the staff at the Criminal Registry of the Supreme Court of South Australia that answered – at least in part – a few of my questions.

Most murders are pretty straightforward to solve – family members kill their own, drug dealers kill other drug dealers – and are solved within the first 48 hours.  And so it was with the unlawful killing of Ron Marks.

On the day that he was killed, Ron Marks was driving a Commodore station wagon northwards to Alice Springs from Clare in South Australia where he had been on holiday. Unknown to him, travelling on the road ahead of him were Dale Francis Harris and his girlfriend, Alison Spendlove.

About 96 km north of Coober Pedy Harris had fallen asleep and run off the road – wrecking his car in the process. Harris had taken a number of tablets the hynotic benzodiazepine Rohypnol that day and previously and had smoked ganja after his accident. Alison Spendlove caught a lift back to Coober Pedy soon after that accident.

Later that night Harris turned up in Coober Pedy. He was driving Ron Marks’ Commodore, wearing his jumper and shoes and was covered in blood from a wound to the back of his neck. Staff at the roadhouse where Harris stopped soon alerted police and two general duties officers attended.

What happened between the time that Ronnie Marks pulled up on the side of the road outside Coober Pedy and when Harris turned up back in Coober Pedy later that night can only be reconstructed from Harris’ confused tales to the police and the evidence on the side of the road. Apparently Ronnie Marks and Harris had some sort of altercation that ended up with Ronnie Mark’s body dumped in a culvert on the side of the Stuart Highway.

Harris was found guilty of the murder of Ron Marks on 25 November 1994 and appealed that decision two weeks later. That appeal was allowed in March 1995 and a re-trial was ordered. Harris was re-arraigned, pleading not-guilty early the next month, and a second trial was held over ten days in late September 1995. At that trial Harris was acquitted of murder he was found guilty of the lesser charge of manslaughter by majority verdict of the jury.

Harris again appealed that verdict. At sentencing Harris was given a non-parole sentence of 8 years and 6 months, with a ‘head’ sentence of 11 years and 2 months. His second appeal was dismissed in June 1996 and the sentence stood.

I haven’t been able to locate any sentencing remarks from the judge in either of Harris’ trials and when next I’m in Adelaide I’ll wander along to the Supreme Court Registry and see if I can get copies of them from the Court archives.

What follows is from the decision of Justice Millhouse in Harris’ first appeal to the 3 member Court of Criminal Appeal of the South Australian Supreme Court in February and March 1995.

On 16 September 1993 he [Harris] and his girlfriend, Alison Spendlove, were driving from Kimba up to Alice Springs. When they were 97 kilometres north of Coober Pedy the appellant, having dozed off, allowed the vehicle to go to the right off the road. The vehicle was so badly damaged as to be undriveable.

Miss Spendlove got a lift back to Coober Pedy. The appellant stayed near the wreck. During the afternoon he was seen by several passers by. He seemed alright: they noticed no injuries on him.

The deceased Mr Ronald Lawrence Marks, was also driving to Alice Springs on that day. He was going home from Clare.

Just what happened when he stopped to speak to the appellant is not known for sure. The appellant gave evidence at trial that when he offered Mr Marks cannabis, Mr Marks became abusive, a row turned into a fight in which the appellant stabbed Mr Marks eleven times, once with a pair of scissors and the remainder with a knife. However the medical evidence suggests that only a knife was used. One at least of the stabs was fatal: Mr Marks died.

The appellant himself sustained injuries to the neck. Later when he was back in Coober Pedy he was seen covered in blood. His account gave rise to the defence of self defence: that he killed Mr Marks in the course of defending himself from Mr Marks’ attacks. I should say that the appellant was at the time a man of twenty-three. Mr Marks was forty-two. Whatever caused Mr Marks’ death, apparently the accused dragged his body some distance and hid it in a culvert. The appellant then drove in Mr Marks’ vehicle back to Coober Pedy wearing a pair of Mr Marks’ shoes and his jumper.

He was back there between 7 and 8 o’clock in the evening and started looking for Miss Spendlove. A shop keeper, struck by his appearance, called the police.

They came and asked him what had happened.

In the next few hours the appellant told many different stories, most of which the police, upon checking, quickly found to be false. Police suspicions deepened. Eventually before the end of the evening the appellant was charged with illegal use and giving a false name and address. That was before Mr Marks’ body had been found.

During the course of the evening the appellant twice went to the hospital accompanied by police. He drove himself there the first time in Mr Marks’ vehicle. He became impatient and would not wait for the doctor to treat him. He discharged himself but the police would not let him drive back to the police station. They have given two reasons – first that the nurse had expressed the view that the appellant should not drive for long distances in his condition (he had said he had to get on to Alice Springs) and secondly the police were becoming more and more suspicious.

…

Eventually about 11 o’clock the police had a formal interview with him about the vehicle. He continued to tell lies about how he came by it. In the course of the interview police suspicions hardened (a bill of sale was found in the glove box bearing no name which the appellant had used) and the appellant was cautioned. He continued thereafter to answer questions. After the interview he was arrested, charged and put in the cells.

The next morning, the body of the unfortunate Mr Marks having been discovered, the police had another interview with the appellant.

I’m sure there is a lot more to find out about the unfortunate death of Ron Marks and all that flows from those few minutes of violence on the side of a south Australian highway.

Hopefully the sentencing remarks from Harris’ trials may give me a few more clues. And maybe his family and friends in Alice Springs might have something more to say about the death of Ron Marks.

How – and why – Canberra’s law saved NT Chief Minister Paul Henderson’s flailing government.

The obvious story about what happened in NT politics over that past couple of weeks is now well known and widely reported – best by the ABC in Alice Springs and Darwin and the local Darwin-based and Murdoch-owned daily, the NT News.

Labor’s saviour Gerry Wood spelled it out chapter and verse in this remarkable and refreshingly frank speech to the NT Legislative Assembly on Friday 14 August that reveals his decision-making processes and (some of) the machinations behind the recent chaos in the NT.

But none of the press – local or national – or commentators appear to have caught the real back-story to this chaos.

And, as always in politics, law and the lawyers – while not having the last word – had a substantial part to play in the result.

The legal structure imposed by the NT Self-Government Act 1978, an Act of the Commonwealth Parliament, is ultimately administered in the NT by the local gubernatorial equivalent, NT Administrator (and former NT Solicitor-General) Tom Pauling QC.

In the NT a vote of no-confidence in the government of the day would be taken under Part V of the NT’s Electoral Act – legislation subordinate to the NT Self-Government Act.

The Northern Myth’s reading of this legal situation – where local NT law determines the process involved in a no-confidence vote but Commonwealth law provides the constitutional backstop – is that any competent constitutional lawyer would have made it clear to anyone seeking their advice that the ultimate decision as to whether a proposed Chief Minister had the confidence of a thirteen member majority of the Legislative Assembly would be made by the Administrator – an office appointed by the Governor-General of Australia.

Important in this analysis is that Wood only needed to make one deal – as he did with Henderson – to maintain Labor in power. If he had supported the CLP there would have been three deals – between Wood and CLP opposition leader Terry Mills, between Mills and Alison Anderson and between Wood and Anderson.

In that scenario the risk of any of those three deals going pear-shaped, particularly those involving Anderson, was substantially higher than with the single deal between Wood and Henderson.

It is also interesting to speculate as to whether the Administrator would lightly have accepted that any minority government relying on Alison Anderson’s support could be stable.

And, as Gerry Wood made clear during his public statements and in his speech to the Legislative Assembly on Friday 14 August, his primary consideration was the stability of any future government.

Wood and CLP Opposition leader Terry Mills have consulted regularly since the last election just a year ago and it is understood that until early August this year both accepted that Wood would support Mills as the new Chief Minister when Alison Anderson eventually spat the dummy and defected from Labor – as I predicted in Crikey as long ago as February this year that she was always going to do.

But that Mills could rely on Wood’s support was bad analysis – by Wood, by Mills, and not least by The Australian – which had consistently expressed a Machiavellian support for Anderson – because that analysis was made without any appreciation or focus on the precise legal structure imposed by the NT Self-Government Act 1978, or on the position which the Administrator ultimately may have taken in the responsible performance of his function under that statute.

And the failure to appreciate this scenario falls hardest on Anderson and the mob of advisers that so gleefully assisted with her failed attempt at king-making – they didn’t appreciate the importance of the Administrator in the whole affair.

Wood (at least early in the game), Mills, Anderson and her gang of boosters must have all thought that seizing power in the NT was like a coup at a footy club – all you need to do is get the numbers and you are in!

On this analysis, once Gerry Wood accepted – following legal advice he would have received in the first week or two of August – the character of the legal structure created by the local Electoral Act and the Commonwealth’s gift of restrained power inherent in the NT Self-Government Act – and also accepted the widely held view that Anderson was a self-indulgent loose cannon who should not be in any parliament, let alone be in any government that he would be a part of – then an agreement with Paul Henderson for a minority Labor Government emerges as the only realistic prospect that would preserve not only stability in government but also keep him in the game.

The third option of an election would likely have left Gerry Wood as no more than an independent with little real influence against the substantial CLP majority the likely result of a landslide electoral victory.

A year ago Terry Mills and the CLP came within 82 votes of seizing power in the NT. This past month he has come within a hairs breadth of grabbing it again. The CLP now smells the blood of the Henderson government in the muddied waters of NT politics and has, rightfully, been pressing it’s challenges to the Government with renewed vigour.

But, as I have shown here, as long as Alison Anderson remains the only means by which Mills and the CLP can unseat Henderson and Labor, or unless Anderson somehow undertakes the very difficult task of remaking herself as the voice of reason and reliability, Mills cannot rely on Anderson to help him form an alternative government.

Assuming that Henderson can make his deal with Wood stick until the next election in 2012 I offer the following tentative views on the near future of NT politics.

As usual, it is all about survival – and naked ambition.

Henderson’s government is fragile at best – but thanks to Wood he has his bum on the seat of power and after the hard lessons he and his government have learned over the past twelve months he should (with substantial qualifications!) hold on to power until the next election. But Henderson’s deal with Wood says that all bets are off if he loses the leadership of his party – and even before Henderson’s recent troubles there were plenty of rumblings about likely and expectant challengers for his job. This presents a real problem for Labor – Henderson’s deal with Wood effectively stymies any reasonable succession planning before the next election, by which time Henderson may still present as a substantial electoral liability.

Mills has his own demons within the CLP and has also learned some tough lessons over the past twelve months. For mine at least, he deserves a third tilt at the top job – providing he can avoid any reckless challenges from within his own party. But for many in the CLP  he is a bit too much of a nice guy – and there is every chance that he will be toppled in the very near future by any of the, at least, three very keen challengers lining up behind him. And the haste with which he recently offered both Wood and Anderson senior ministries will be seen as poor judgement – as will his silly proposal that his first Ministry would consist of less than ten Ministers – that would have, once Wood and Anderson were allocated Ministries, denied many of those in the CLP with legitimate (and the ill-founded) ambitions of higher office and created unnecessary tensions.

And for Anderson – prior to the last election – and as recently as a month or two ago – she was saying that she would only serve two terms in the NT parliament. Less than four weeks ago the NT News reported that she had anointed her (then) electorate officer, the 28 year-old Alice Springs Deputy Mayor, John Rawnsley, as her successor for the seat of MacDonnell. No-one – perhaps not even Anderson – knows what will happen next but Anderson could (a) step down soon and force a by-election; (b) stay in until the next general election is held in 2012 or sooner and then retire; or (c) re-contest the seat at the next general election as an independent. Whatever happens she will be a rather lonely figure on the cross-benches in the Legislative Assembly.

And Gerry Wood – ’nuff said – he has done a great job for his electorate, and most likely the NT, and has secured his seat for as long as he wants it!

And if ever anyone wanted a good reason why the NT will never achieve Statehood – at least not in my lifetime – events in the past year in NT politics provide several salutary lessons.

Centrecorp is, as the Federal Government’s own Office of Evaluation and Audit (Indigenous Programs) noted in a Report of November 2008, a:

…very successful private organisation which has received approximately $25.1m in support from the Australian Government. As noted in its various establishment documents, Centrecorp has taken “advantage of investment and commercial opportunities” for the benefit of Aboriginal people in Central Australia and have built an impressive asset base over the past 23 years.

The Office of Evaluation and Audit (Indigenous Programs) provides the Commonwealth government with:

…objective advice to the Australian Government about the management and performance of its programs for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples. We make recommendations about how Indigenous-specific programs can be improved, and how the Australian Government can deliver better outcomes for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples.

Originally part of the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Commission (ATSIC), OEA was established administratively within the Department of Finance and Deregulation in July 2004 and confirmed in legislation by section 193W of the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Act 2005.

Centrecorp was established in 1985 to, according to its Memorandum of Association:

“… undertake and implement activities which further the economic and social development of Aboriginals and which are conducive to the advancement of Aboriginals.”

Three of the five $1 shares in of Centrecorp are owned by the Central Land Council. Centrecorp operates two charitable trusts of which it is a trustee and through a combination of good management, fortune and circumstance Centrecorp has grown to be one of the largest investors in central Australia, with interests in a car dealership, a shopping centre, a real estate agency, supermarkets, a gas pipeline, tourist resort and various other small projects.

The value of Centrecorp’s investments are, on a national scale, relatively modest — however in the the poisonous atmosphere of small-town Northern Territory politics the combination of blackfellas, money and complex corporate structures are bound to attract some negative attention — particularly among the uninformed and those that remain wilfully blind to the objective facts.

The Alice Springs News is a freebie local weekly that usually runs to about 16 modest pages and is often more entertaining than informative. Like many freebie newspapers, on occasion the Alice Springs News can seem more like a hobby-horse for the proprietors pet peeves, predilections and prejudices.

And so it is, it seems, with Centrecorp and the three $1 shares owned by the Central Land Council.

On its own admission, the Alice Springs News has:

“… been covering the Centrecorp controversy in 44 reports and comment pieces since April 1998, and a dossier of Alice Springs News reports was a substantial part of the briefing NT Senator Nigel Scullion gave Senator Brandis.”

The reference to Senators Scullion and Brandis links to a series of questions asked by Senator Brandis of David Ross, Director of the Central Land Council, in Senate Community Affairs Committee Supplementary Estimates Hearings in late October 2008 and followup questions in early 2009.

On 14 May 2009 the Senate referred to the Finance and Public Administration References Committee a brief to investigate the relationship between the Central Land Council and Centrecorp.

The Terms of Reference direct the Committee to inquire and report by 11 August 2009 on:

1. the relationship between the Central Land Council and Centrecorp Aboriginal Investment Corporation Pty Ltd (‘Centrecorp’);

2. the committee must inquire into and report upon:

(i) the financial and management relationship between the Central Land Council and Centrecorp, including (without limitation) any equitable relationship between those entities,

(ii) whether taxpayers’ funds have been paid or transferred to Centrecorp and how those monies have been treated in the accounts of the Central Land Council and Centrecorp,

(iii) the nature and extent of Centrecorp’s business activities,

(iv) Centrecorp’s sources of revenue,

(v) the beneficiaries of Centrecorp business and other activities and any additional revenue it receives,

(vi) the nature and extent of Centrecorp disbursements to any charitable trusts or like entities,

(vii) the extent to which any Centrecorp beneficiaries and the Central Land Council are informed of Centrecorp’s business activities,

(viii) how Aboriginal Australians living in the Central Australia region benefit from Centrecorp’s business and charitable operations, and

(ix) all other matters considered necessary by the committee; and

3. the committee must hear evidence inter alia from:

(i) the Central Land Council,

(ii) the Auditor-General, and

(iii) Centrecorp.

One problem for the Senate’s committee is that not only has Centrecorp been the subject of a recent comprehensive investigation by the Office of Evaluation and Audit — which, while slapping it across the wrist on a couple of minor points, largely found it to be, as noted above, a “very successful private organisation”.

Another problem is that it seems that the bulk of the allegations against Centrecorp and the Central Land Council are based upon a long series of allegations promoted by the Alice Springs News .

Earlier last week the Senate committee published three of the submissions received by its inquiry – you can read them for yourself here.

The first submission, by the Commonwealth Auditor-General runs to a mere three-pages and notes that:

“As the trust deed specifically excludes CLC from receiving any benefit from the trust, CLC is not considered to have control over Centrecorp.”

That is a pretty succinct answer to the first of the Committee’s Terms of Reference – and something that anyone on reasonable enquiry would have been able to determine without wasting the Senate’s time.

The Central Land Council’s submission is extensive and notes the link between Senator Brandis’ question in Estimates of late October 2008 and early 2009 the persistent, and it says wrong-headed, coverage of the Centrecorp issue by the Alice Springs News since 1998, and the current Inquiry by the Senate Committee.

The Central Land Council notes, at page three of its submission, that:

Leaving aside for the present whether there has ever been a genuine controversy about Centrecorp, this claim that a dossier of Alice Springs News reports was a substantial part of the briefing provided to Senator Brandis, if correct, may explain how or why two Senate committees have been motivated to inquire into Centrecorp.

For that reason the multitude of factual errors and distortions evident in [the] Alice Springs News stories have been separately addressed in Appendix 2.

The CLC has appended this material in order to provide an objective measure, Hansard, to enable the Committee to see for itself how the Alice Springs News either distorts facts, or manufactures ‘facts’, in order to maintain its campaign against both Centrecorp and the CLC.

The Central Land Council refers to what it says may be evidence of the link between Senator Brandis and the campaign by the Alice Springs News against Centrecorp and the Central Land Council.

In Senate Estimates on 24 October 2008 Senator Brandis asked:

Question 126 — “Is it the case that the capital Centrecorp has used in order to acquire this large asset portfolio was seed funded from royalties paid by mining companies and other commercial entities with obligations to the central Australian Aboriginal people under the Aboriginal Land Rights (Northern Territory) or other relevant Commonwealth and Northern Territory statutes?”

In response the Central Land Council notes in its submission that:

Question 126 picks up a theme of the Alice Springs News first published in 1998, and repeated many times since, to the effect that Centrecorp is the beneficiary of royalties paid by mining companies…The Alice Springs News has been told repeatedly that the CLC has never paid a cent of royalties to Centrecorp, and there is not a shred of evidence to justify its allegations. It makes no difference, it [the Alice Springs News] has continued to publish this false allegation as fact.

Embedded in this allegation is the necessary inference that the CLC as:

• A Commonwealth statutory authority;
• That is governed by a representative council of 90 Aboriginal people from throughout
central Australia;
• That is independently audited annually by the Commonwealth’s Australian National Audit
Office;
• That is subject to the Commonwealth Authorities and Companies Act;
• That is subject to the Commonwealth Financial Management Act;
• Whose budget is approved annually by the Commonwealth Minister;
• That lodges its annual report with the Minister; and
• The Minister tables the annual report in Parliament every year;

has, in spite of all of that scrutiny and all of those controls, year after year somehow concealed a series of unlawful actions involving the wrongful transfer to Centrecorp, of large amounts of compensation funds received on behalf of traditional landowners.

Setting the proposition out in this way demonstrates how ridiculous the allegations are.

Appendix 2 of the CLC Submission examines quotes from 22 articles published in the 11 years that the Alice Springs News has written about Centrecorp and lists the CLC’s responses and comments on those articles.

The responses, because this issue goes to the heart of the CLC’s business and public accountability, focus on the repeated allegations by the Alice Springs News that Centrecorp was overly secretive and that it’s revenue and capital were sourced from mining and related royalties the responsibility of the CLC, as per these examples from April, May and August 2006 respectively:

The foundation of Centrecorp’s fabulous wealth isn’t hard work but a never ending stream of “sitdown” money (sic) created by the strike of a government pen.

…

The main source of Centrecorp’s revenue is beleved to be royalties required to be paid by resource companies operating on Aboriginal land.

…

[Centrecorp]…founded as a charitable institution to invest mining, oil and gas royalties on behalf of the Aboriginal people to whom they are due…

A single CLC response, to the publication by the Alice Springs News (online) on 19 December 2008) of questions by Senator Brandis in Estimates in December 2008, serves to highlight their concerns with these claims:

The question closely follows the spurious allegation published repeatedly by the Alice Springs News since 1998, to the effect that Centrecorp has received royalties from mining activities on Aboriginal land.

It has not.

Whether the Senate’s inquiry into the Central Land Council and Centrecorp is yet another case of going off half-cocked on the basis of inaccurate or otherwise flawed information remains to be seen.

Hearings of the Senate Committee scheduled for Alice Springs and Canberra have been postponed — no alternative dates for those Hearings have been set.

Maybe the good Senators realise that there is nothing left to inquire about and that they’ve been sold a pup?

Here Miliwanga talks about the NT Intervention and how the Intervention – for good or ill – has affected them. Miliwanga also told how she feels about the continuing suspension of the Racial Discrimination Act in relation to Aboriginal people in the NT, and has a look back at how conditions where for her family when she was growing up, what life is like now, and the hopes and fears she has for the future.

We also talked a lot about law – the laws that are made in Parliaments around the country and the original laws that still run in much of Aboriginal Australia.

Miliwanga Sandy, Wugularr, NT. June 2009

Miliwanga Sandy: And you know, many, many people – particularly Munanga [white] people – they don’t understand that our law, Aboriginal law, still operates in this country.

Our law is very strong and it doesn’t change – it is flexible when it is applied – but it has always been the same law that we know from when it first started right up to this modern generation today.

That western law – it changes all the time – it is very confusing for us to try to fit into that law – but our law, Aboriginal law, it holds strict control of whatever things we must not do, including like in the western law if someone goes to court and has committed a very severe crime then they have to be sentenced.

MS: And Aboriginal law – what many people don’t understand is that we still abide by it – without it we wouldn’t be living close to our country and with our people and families up close. We have our laws for violence, for domestic violence, for child abuse, laws for respect between man and women and between people.

And we have laws for marriage and for food as well. Everyone here at Wugularr  knows about our laws – but many outside people they don’t know how strong it is – until somebody breaks that law.

They might be able to see a little bit about what happens…but we don’t have laws for alcohol, or for drugs, like that western side does – those things don’t exist in our culture – but we have rules for how people have to behave properly.

TNM: And your daughter Laureena – she is an ACPO (Aboriginal Community Police Officer) in the Northern Territory Police Force – so she works in the law – but on the western side?

MS: Yes, and I am so proud of her – my older daughter Andrea was also the first ACPO for this area – Barunga, Beswick, Eva Valley, Bulman and Mountain Valley and she did all this before the other Police came. They had Aboriginal Police Aides here before but now my daughter Laureena and Valerie Lane – they are two strong, young Aboriginal women – and they get respect from people – from drunken men and all that.

MS: They have to stand up in the position they have – they have to stand up in the positions they have and they have the power and authority and people give them respect for that.

But they they must also remember their customary laws and have that respect for their kinship relationships towards others – especially men. So when they come to lock up their cousins and poison cousins – especially men, and brothers and cousin-brothers [classificatory kinship relationships requiring avoidance or restricted verbal and physical contact]. I’m really proud of those young women – their job is an important link between the community and the normal police – they have both-way duties to do.

TNM: What about the future of Wugularr – what do you think the future holds? Are the recent changes for the good or bad?

MS: Well, we have this Shire thing [recent local government reforms] and we are not familiar with that yet – we are still trying to see how it works for our community and – we also have that Intervention – which I don’t agree with at all.

TNM: That was my next question…

MS: There was a lot of people upset about those early days of the Intervention – that, whatyoucallit – compulsory health check business – that was just really silly!

All of us women here, when that news was going around that they were going to come around and check all the children – including the babies – by strangers, who we’ve never seen – us women, we met and said “Oh, yeah – on that day when they come to check the children we will go over to the [Beswick] waterfall, 20 kilometres out of town, and we’ll stop there until they all go home. Then we’ll come back.” So we had planned, we planned everything beforehand, before they came.

TNM: And what happened when they came?

MS: When they came it was totally different. If it hadn’t been for Phil, who was our senior health nurse – Phil got up and told those people from the Intervention – “These kids, we screen these kids all the time – we know these kids and we would know for sure if they were being abused. We do the school screening, and for babies – you know, when they have their immunisation and weight checks.”

So Phil stood up to them so they didn’t have to go ahead with that. And the Sunrise Health Service that run our clinic they are very strong – and I work with them too. Yes, I’ve helped them promote that Closing the Gap thing.

MS: And nowadays – two years almost after that Intervention – well, there are a lot more Munanga [white people] here now and they took over the store here.

We wanted ALPA (Arnhem Land Progress Association) to help us to run that store. But the Intervention mob they wanted Outback Stores – and I see they finally joined that Outback Stores – that Intervention mob – that FaHCSIA mob. And the government owns that Outback Stores.

Now we have to waste all our money on that stuff here – normal things in that Outback Store cost a big mob of money – it is much more expensive than ever before here or than in town – there is powdered milk there for… that Black and Gold one for $12.50 and that Sunshine milk powder for $13 something – and I could get that for $5 at Woolies in Katherine.

MS: And yes I have a BASICSCARD – and it is bad – so I’m saving up my own money in my own bank account – because they don’t leave me any money in there to save.

The money that is left in my Keycard account I have to buy food, Powercard, fuel for vehicles, clothing – and what do I have left? Nothing.

MS: And that new way – where they are going to make every Aboriginal person do a test to get off that Income Management – that just makes me wild. When I first heard about the Intervention, I became very furious – because it reminded me of when I used to line up with my parents for ration days – the government took control of my parent’s money and they used to have like…there wasn’t enough money for food from the store so we would go hunting for bush tucker a lot in those days – to have enough food to survive on.

So when this Intervention came along, I thought “I don’t want my grandchildren and my children, to live like how my parents and I used to live in the ration days – we shouldn’t be going back to those old days – life should be getting better for us – not like those hard days before.”

We want to have that freedom of choice, freedom to do this – freedom to spend our money on whatever we want.

MS: In those early days of the Intervention, the way they were talking about Aboriginal men, you know, saying that they were all doing child abuse and sexual molesters and all that.

A lot of our men became shamed when the Government said that about them and a lot of them were angry and upset – and it hurt us – not just the men but the women too – to have our husbands and sons and nephews talked about like that.

In the olden days we never had things like that – if anyone did anything like the old people would deal with them through that Makarrata – which was a matter of life and death – with the spear throwing – and if ever we had people doing that kind of thing in our community we would ban them from our community – they would be exiled away from their family to another place.

In our law, that person has to go to the Makarrata and that person has to face a lot of these men with spears flying at him – and if he is good at protecting himself from these spears then in the end they will all agree to jab his thigh – but it won’t be with an ordinary spear – it will be with a barbed-wire spear – it is different from the other spears – it has a lot of hooks in it and when it goes into the thigh it is very hard to get it out.

TNM: There is another law that came in with the Intervention that where before the Judge could take Aboriginal customary law into account for sentencing but now they cannot…

MS: Well, that discriminates against us and I disagree with that – for example – with children, we have to discipline them. And this is like the rest of that Intervention – the Government can’t make the Intervention any better until they come and sit down and talk to us in person and they have to come out and see things and listen. Thats how we hold our meetings – we don’t hold our meetings in secret or somewhere else – you have to come and each person has to face each other to see what we need or see what our problem is.

And we are still being treated unfairly – and that is why I’m fighting, still fighting for my people and their freedom and for getting jobs and freedom to have to spend our money in our own ways and where we want to have the freedom to be able to control our own situations.

Another thing is that I think that taking away the Racial Discrimination Act was a very cruel thing – we are all human and shouldn’t be treated as slaves.

We’ve lived here longer than anyone – this is our country and we should have the freedom and the right to be treated properly – by any person – but we are fighting against them for taking that law away from us – we sent a letter to the United Nations – and they agree with us that we should have those rights and freedoms back – particularly that Racial Discrimination Act.

Miliwanga Sandy will speak at the AIATSIS Symposium “Bilingual Education in the Northern Territory: Principles, policy and practice” at the Visions Theatre, National Museum of Australia, Canberra today, 26 June 2009.