Lore

The Bar Association of NSW's submission to a Law Reform Commission inquiry into First Nations incarceration calls for a new approach to sentencing which takes into account the deprivation and disadvantage inherent in an individual's Aboriginal background. The association also calls for an end to mandatory sentences, which make it impossible for courts to make any allowance for such disadvantage in their decisions. The rate at which Aboriginal people end up in jail is appalling and in NSW last year Aboriginal people were 3 per cent of the population, but 24 per cent of the prison population. [node:read-more:link]

The most strategic move for First Nations, at this time of an imploding Commonwealth government wracked by illegal parliamentarians who hold dual citizenship in breach of the Constitution, is to rise up and rebuild the governance, independence, cultural and economic development of one's own Nation and then for our First Nations to treaty with each other first, just as the Northern Basin Aboriginal Nations (NBAN) have done, demonstrating a way forward. The more First Nations treaty amongst themselves, the more the writing is on the wall for the colonial government ruling in right of the British Crown. [node:read-more:link]

Ghillar, Michael Anderson provides an insight into a viable pathway going forward:
At the Referendum Council's National Convention, the line was drawn in the sand. There are no objections to those who want to be absorbed into our oppressor's society. For us who seek to stand and fight, then we must set our sights on looking at the details of how we develop ourselves as self-determining Nations and Peoples, being guided by international legal norms, whilst living next door to our oppressor. [node:read-more:link]

The new Biodiversity law is tantamount to a declaration of War against First Nations Peoples. These changes will seriously impact on our Laws, culture, religion and spirituality in the State of New South Wales. The new law is deregulation in its worst form, farmers can now basically do on "their" land what they want, clearing, destroying ecosystem and shoot whatever moves. Our sites, be it archaeological campsites, burial grounds or even sacred places have lost the little bit of protection they had, no we will not even be notified, if there is no Native Title claim over the area. [node:read-more:link]

ne of the basic fundamental facets to achieve true decolonisation, that is, we must learn to decolonise our minds. This essentially means that we must stop thinking like our oppressor and thereby stop trying to fit a round peg in a square hole.

I say this because every time we talk about progressing forward in our ambition to achieve self-determination and independence, too often our people revert to saying: We have to ask the government, or we need to ask them for money. [node:read-more:link]