When will ACT take our plight seriously?

"In fact, in the last eight years there has been a 279 per cent increase in Aboriginal incarceration and the Minister for Corrections (then Shane Rattenbury) has advised that 90 per cent of Aboriginal detainees in the AMC have a prior conviction.

"The policies and procedures purportedly in place in the ACT to address the disproportionate level of contact of Aboriginal peoples with the different arms of the justice system, whether it be the police, courts, prison, throughcare, community corrections or parole are quite simply failing to address the disproportionate levels of Indigenous incarceration."

I conclude my letter by asking the ACT government to: "initiate a detailed, comprehensive and independent inquiry into the effectiveness of all arms of the justice system in their contact with and response to the Aboriginal and Torres Strait islander community."

Nine months later, in March 2021, the now Attorney-General Shane Rattenbury and Minister Rachel Stephen-Smith convened a meeting involving a wide representation of the Aboriginal community to discuss the desired form of a commitment which the ACT government had given in response to my letter to: "a holistic review of the over representation of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people in the justice system, led by the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander community." Following that and additional meetings involving Aboriginal community leaders, the government was advised that the community's preferred option was a formal commission of inquiry pursuant to the Royal Commission Act.

The government refused to accede to that request and in the almost three years since then has simply refused to engage with either myself or the Aboriginal community more broadly, about the need for a rigorous inquiry into the most effective and best prospect for identifying and responding to the over-representation of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people in the ACT in touch with the justice system or incarcerated.

Interestingly, in the interim, the crude rate of imprisonment of Aboriginal men and women in the ACT has increased by 20 per cent and is today not only by far the highest in all of Australia but continues to grow at an alarming rate. While I am, of course, deeply disappointed that the ACT government has stubbornly refused, until now, to take the overrepresentation of Aboriginal peoples incarcerated in the ACT seriously, I am nevertheless encouraged by the decision it has been forced to take to engage the Jumbunna Institute of Indigenous Education and Research to investigate the over-representation of Aboriginal peoples in Canberra in the justice system.

I do, however, urge the government to release the terms of reference or the specifics of the task that Jumbunna has been contracted to undertake and I find it somewhat surprising that the local Aboriginal community were not consulted about the terms of engagement or the scope of the work to be undertaken.

My concern relates to the breadth or range of the investigation which Jumbunna will pursue, noting for example that Aboriginal people in Canberra experience among the worst outcomes in Australia on a whole range of indicators other than incarceration, including for example in education, child protection, housing and homelessness, health, poverty and unemployment.

In relation to child protection, for example, the Productivity Commission reported just last week that on June 30, 2023 there were 197 Aboriginal children and 523 non-Indigenous children in Canberra in out of home care. The rate per 1000 children aged 0-17 years in out of home care in Canberra is therefore 63.2 for Aboriginal children and 5.5 for non-Indigenous children. An Aboriginal child living in Canberra is, therefore 11.4 times more likely to be removed from their family than a non-Indigenous child.

It is notable that the Productivity Commission has previously reported that in 2013- 14 there were 152 Aboriginal children and 454 non-Indigenous children in out of home care in Canberra. The rate, at that time, per 1000 Aboriginal children was, therefore, 53.9 while that of non- Indigenous children was 5.5. An Aboriginal child living in Canberra 10 years ago was, therefore, less likely to be removed from their family than is the case today. In other words, we are going backwards.

Another very worrying and growing concern among a raft of disturbing outcomes being endured by the Aboriginal community of Canberra relates to educational outcomes within the public school system. For example, 52 per cent of Aboriginal children in year 3 were found to be not proficient in the 2023 NAPLAN reading assessment compared to 27 per cent of non-Indigenous students. Worryingly it has also been observed that the proportion of Aboriginal students with low literacy increase rather than shrink as they progress from primary to high school.

It goes without saying that unless and until each of the range of factors I mention above are addressed that the Aboriginal incarceration rate in Canberra will continue to escalate.