ACT holds its lock-up record for indigenous people

THE data revealed in the latest Productivity Commission’s “Report on Corrective Services” is an indictment of the ACT government.

It shows, once again, that the ACT locks up its Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander residents at a greater rate than any other Australian state or territory.

Worryingly, it indicates that the government is no longer committed to any of the ideals or principles that underpinned the original decision to establish the Alexander Maconochie Centre as a human rights compliant, rehabilitation-focused prison.

The report reveals that the crude imprisonment rate in the ACT per 100,000 men is 220.5 while that of women is 17.5. However, the crude rate of imprisonment of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people per 100,000 adults in the ACT is 1770 while that of the non-indigenous community is 86.5. Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples constituted 26.1 per cent of the AMC prisoner population despite being only 1.9 per cent of the ACT population.

The Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander crude imprisonment rate ratio per 100,000 adults in the ACT is 20.5, that is, an Aboriginal person is 20 times more likely to be imprisoned in Canberra than a non-Aboriginal person, which is the highest in Australia, and 20 per cent higher than the average across all jurisdictions.

The Australian Bureau of Statistics, in its latest report on “Prisons in Australia”, also reports that 96 per cent of Aboriginal prisoners in the AMC have served at least one prior sentence of imprisonment, which is the highest recidivism rate in Australia.

The ACT government is, of course, acutely aware of these dire outcomes and obviously conscious of the fact that when it comes to locking up Aboriginal peoples, we Canberrans are in a class of our own. However, the evidence suggests that while the government signals from time to time that it is aware of and determined to address these shocking outcomes, it knows that there is no broad community expectation, let alone pressure, for it to do so.

A couple of examples of the government’s blasé approach to promises it has made jumped out at me as I was re-reading the incoming ministers’ briefs prepared at the time of the last ACT election for the attorney-general, minister for corrections and justice minister.

Those briefs include the following gems: “In December 2019, the Minister for Corrections reported to the Legislative Assembly on the progress of the Reintegration Centre.

“The Budget bid to support the works being undertaken will be submitted as part of the 2020-21 Budget process.”

“Key milestones achieved to date include:

• May 2019 design consultant appointed.

• December 2019, 80 per cent Preliminary Sketch Plan issued.

• May 2020 Development Application submitted.

• July 2020, 100 per cent Sketch Plan phase.”

The Reintegration Centre was championed by Greens leader Shane Rattenbury when he was corrections minister and was to be an 80-bed purpose-built facility intended to address the Australia-high incarceration and recidivism rates which exist in the ACT.

Unfortunately, for reasons that have never been explained, following the Labor/Greens victory in the 2020 election, the Reintegration Centre and the “Building Communities not Prisons” program (of which it was the central feature) were quietly abandoned. Whatever the formal reason for ditching the projects, the fact that the ACT has the highest rate of Aboriginal incarceration and the highest Aboriginal recidivism rate in Australia suggests that it should be reinstated.

In a similar vein, the incoming minister’s brief highlighted another “priority”, indeed one described in the extract below as a “key election commitment”, which has, unfortunately, also been abandoned.

The briefing says: “Commission a review of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander over-representation in the justice system.”

“Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people are over-represented across the ACT justice system. Although over-representation is a persistent and growing problem across Australia with incarceration rates increasing by 51 per cent between 2012 and 2018, the degree of urgency in the ACT is more acute with a 135 per cent increase over the same period. Moreover, diversion rates are low.”

“We estimate that, to achieve parity with non-indigenous incarceration rates by 2060, the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander incarceration rate would need to be decreased by

24.4 per cent by 2031 and 83.0 per cent by 2060.

“The directorate will work with relevant ministers, in consultation with Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander representatives and community organisations to scope the review, establish terms of reference and a statement of requirements to support the review.”

Almost three years after this commitment was made by Labor and the Greens to institute, as a “priority”, an inquiry into Aboriginal overrepresentation in the justice system, not only has no inquiry been initiated, despite repeated requests from Julie Tongs, CEO of Winnunga Nimmityjah, and a range of other Aboriginal leaders for an inquiry, but that the incarceration rate has in fact worsened, and is the highest in Australia.

Where, one might ask, is Senator Lidia Thorpe, a former Green with guts and a conscience, when you need her?

Jon Stanhope was ACT chief minister from 2001 to 2011.