3. Little Children Report
While welcoming the focus on addressing the needs arising out of the Little Children are Sacred Report (the Report), the Commission is concerned that the national emergency response to the Report has detracted from the content of the Report and the urgent need for collaborative implementation of some of the recommendations which are vital to changing offending behaviour in the NT. In some important respects, most notably Income Management, the national emergency response diverts attention from the fundamental principle of community participation which the Report found to be so important:
It is critical that both governments commit to genuine consultation with Aboriginal people in designing initiatives for Aboriginal communities.1
The report contained valuable recommendations in relation to the need for proactive and long term approaches to addressing offending. There is a need to redirect some focus back to the content and recommendations of the Report. From a legal services perspective, we would welcome a renewed focus on the Report as a whole, with particular focus on the recommendations listed below:
FACS and Police
- Recommendation 16: That FACS and Police undertake greater liaison with family or clan groups when conducting investigations, including the conduct of post-case debriefings, and utilising trained community brokers where appropriate.
- Recommendation 26: That FACS and Police work to better integrate the Child Abuse Taskforce with other local joint Police/FACS responses, and further develop local coordinated, culturally appropriate multi-agency responses (such as the Peace at Home program) which can improve the statutory and therapeutic response for children, families and communities.
- Recommendation 29: That Police conduct effective, meaningful and ongoing consultations with individual Aboriginal communities with a view to developing protocols for working with the community and supporting each community’s own efforts at maintaining peace, law and order.
Offender Rehabilitation
- Recommendation 36: That the government provide more sex offender rehabilitation
programs with adequate resourcing and in particular that:
- wherever possible the court should structure sentences for sex offenders to provide the opportunity for community based rehabilitation
- Correctional Services must provide ongoing sex offender rehabilitation programs in jail (irrespective of length of sentence) and for persons on remand, including culturally appropriate programs
- supervision of parolees must be meaningful, and include:
- attendance at an offender rehabilitation program
- time back in their community
- written reports from the parole officer to the sentencing Judge.
- Recommendation 38: That the government to provide youth specific, culturally appropriate rehabilitation programs for juvenile sex offenders in detention, and for those on parole or subject to community-based orders.
- Recommendation 39: That the government to commence meaningful dialogue
as soon as possible with Aboriginal communities aimed at developing alternative
models of sentencing that incorporate Aboriginal notions of justice and
rely less on custodial sentences and more on
restoring the wellbeing of victims, offenders, families and communities.
Alcohol
- The ‘rivers of grog’ were identified as a core issue in relation to Aboriginal child sexual abuse. As we are too well aware, alcohol and substance addiction, often at extreme levels, are linked to offending behaviour in the NT. Nine recommendations were made in relation to addressing alcohol abuse, including Recommendation 61: That the government continue to implement the Alcohol Framework as a matter of urgency and focus on reducing overall alcohol consumption and intoxication…
Community Justice
- The Report made important findings about the impact of local Community Justice Initiatives. Recommendations 71 – 73 support government facilitated dialogue between community members and the legal profession and the subsequent establishment of Community Justice Groups in Aboriginal communities who desire them.
1. Report on the Inquiry into the Sexual Abuse of Aboriginal Children in the NT, P 7