Human Rights

Two Indigenous Australians who suffered through ice addictions have told a Parliament House forum they did not get any professional help on their journey to sobriety.
The former methylamphetamine addicts spoke at the event, hosted by the National Aboriginal Community Controlled Health Organisation (NACCHO). Laurence Riley, a Nunga man from southern South Australia, said his addiction came as the result of searching for an escape from depression at work. bHe said ice had been "readily available" to him in Perth. [node:read-more:link]

"Income management through the BasicsCard Does not achieve what it sets out to achieve," said Alice Springs' Tangentyere Council research coordinator Matthew Campbell, whose team helped collect data for the study.

Income management in the Northern Territory has not led to people on welfare drinking less alcohol, sending their children to school more often or buying healthier food, according to the findings of a three-year study commissioned by the Federal Government. [node:read-more:link]

:The governments and politicians have no excuses and cannot plea ignorance, we have published many articles about the crisis and so have mainstream media sources. Here is one from last year that covers the tear gas incident and much more. 29 July 2016

The complete transcript of Jeff McMullen's Lecture at Charles Darwin University on 6 Augus 2015 - Vincent Lingiari knew who he was and that this land held him close to its heart. "You can keep your gold. We just want our land back." The Old Man knew that the answer was in the hearts of good men and women who stood together as the best of mates. He never doubted what was right, no matter how long it took or how many tried to buy him off. The Old Man outlasted all the naysayers because he lived his value system and he led good people with him on the long road towards equality. [node:read-more:link]

Mr Scott's death was one of the 99 cases examined by the Royal Commission into Aboriginal Deaths in Custody in 1989. Mrs Scott were shown photographs of Mr Scott hanging in his cell by two lawyers assisting the Commission in the Northern Territory. Mrs Scott said the photographs showed him suspended inches from a grate in the nine-foot-high ceiling with his feet dangling two to three feet from the floor, the noose around his neck made from a plain and tightly twisted sheet that was neatly tied in multiple knots which were tight and close together. She did not believe her husband made the noose. [node:read-more:link]

Teenager Jordan Chapman can name half a dozen young people in his circle of friends who have taken their own lives. "On Facebook one night she (a friend) just inboxed me, seeing how was I going but I didn't have enough time to reply and I just logged out because I was going to sleep," he said. "I found out the next morning she committed suicide." Asked how someone of his age deals with that kind of loss, 17-year-old Jordan responded quietly: "I don't know. Just play football, go to school, keep my mind off it, don't really think about it." [node:read-more:link]

DEREK'S friends got him into stealing in his mid-teens. He was thrown in juvenile detention twice, cut off from his family and missing school, instead surrounded by endless opportunities for further crime. "It's not easy, you got no family to talk to," he said. "They said, as soon as you hit 18, you'll be heading to the big prison, the man's prison." Derek was one of the lucky ones. While on parole, his uncle organised for him to do community service and later to work at a tourism organisation on his traditional Aboriginal country in the Kimberley. [node:read-more:link]

Kokenarup massacre: In 1880, a family group of approximately 36 First Nations people were massacred about 15 kilometres from the Ravensthorpe in Western Australia's south west region. One account states that John Dunn, a farm worker, attacked and raped a young Nyoongar girl and in accordance with the Nyoongar lore of that region he was subsequently killed by Yandawulla Dibbs and a group of local Nyoongar men. Dunn's overseer sent out word of the killing, and returned with a large group of armed settlers who rounded up and slaughtered around 36 Nyoongar men, women and children. [node:read-more:link]