ABC “PERSPECTIVE”, 18 March 2005

Australia before the UN CERD Committee

Last week the Australian Government appeared before the UN Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination (or CERD) in Geneva, to explain its actions to eliminate racial discrimination.

Non-government organisations with experience in issues of racial discrimination lodged submissions with the Committee providing evidence of the Australian government’s failures in meeting its obligations under CERD. Over thirty non-governmental organisations from across Australia submitted a joint-NGO report. Three of these NGOs, including Australians for Native Title and Reconciliation, produced separate submissions focusing on Indigenous discrimination.

The Australian Government last appeared before the UN CERD Committee in 2000, when it faced heavy criticism, particularly in relation to Indigenous Peoples. The Government’s response was to reject the criticisms and accuse the CERD Committee of uncritically accepting the NGO submissions.

While some may argue that the Australian government has largely ignored this UN Committee, the government’s vociferous attack is also indicative of the strength of the Committee’s opinion against which the government felt it had to defend itself.

These international processes are critical to ensuring that there are universally accepted standards for human rights that we can all rely on. Without them there would be nothing preventing countries from adopting racially discriminatory practices and policies. Being part of the UN system is in the Australian peoples’ long-term interest.

And the fact that the present Australian government is antagonistic to the process does not absolve it from its responsibilities as a signatory to the Convention.

So what kinds of racial discrimination do Indigenous Australians face in 2005 – 30 years since Australia adopted the CERD Convention into domestic law through the passage of the Racial Discrimination Act in 1975?

The answer is manifold in Australia’s laws and policies and in Australian communities.

Undeniably the most serious discrimination relates to health and well-being. A stubbornly-resistant 20-year gap in life expectancy – far worse than in similar countries with Indigenous populations, such as Canada, New Zealand and the US – attests to Australia’s systemic failure in this area.

Many reports, such as Access Economics’ 2004 report commissioned by the AMA, document the critical under-resourcing of Indigenous health by Australian governments. Access Economics identified a spending shortfall of $452 million a year, yet the last federal budget provided only $40 million extra over four years – less than 3% of what is required.

Other areas of Indigenous socio-economic disadvantage such as employment, housing and education – all critical social determinants of health and well-being – suffer similar levels of government under-resourcing and neglect.

Despite the 1991 Royal Commission into Aboriginal Deaths in Custody, Indigenous incarceration is at record levels, on average sixteen times the rate for non-Indigenous people. 19.3 times for Indigenous women.

The Royal Commission’s recommendations remain largely unimplemented by federal, state and territory governments, resulting in ongoing discrimination within the justice system and unhealed relations which have resulted in the past year alone in at least two serious riots sparked by anger and frustration over Indigenous deaths in custody.

Australian Indigenous Peoples continue to be discriminated against in terms of their rights to participation. The CERD Convention requires governments to obtain the “informed consent” of Indigenous Peoples for policies affecting their lives. Yet, the Australian government repeatedly fails to negotiate or consult with Indigenous people over critical areas of Indigenous policy, such as the 1998 Native Title Act amendments, which the UN found to be racially discriminatory.

Most recently, without their consent, Indigenous Australians have been denied participation in governance and decision-making through the abolition of ATSIC and the transfer of Indigenous funding to mainstream departments. Indigenous communities are now being forced to sign paternalistic ‘shared-responsibility’ agreements in order to receive funding for basic human services – a situation not applied to non-Indigenous communities.

Governments increasingly scapegoat Indigenous communities as ‘the problem’, rather than engaging constructively with them and providing them with the authority and resources to take responsibility for solutions. This kind of vilification has the insidious effect of reinforcing racist stereotypes in the broader community.

Similar consequences flow from the government’s misuse of ‘equality of treatment’ arguments that fail to address historic and underlying discrimination against Indigenous people. Such arguments perpetuate Indigenous disadvantage.

These and many other issues were of interest to the CERD Committee last week, which also noted the Australian government’s defensive tone, with one member likening the government’s rhetoric to that of “Communist Bloc countries and Latin American dictatorships”.

Their report is likely to confirm that improving the lives of Indigenous Australians is not just a matter of providing a health centre or school, but about addressing the underlying racial discrimination Indigenous communities face and reinstating their right to self-determination.

Dr David Cooper
National Director
Australians for Native Title
And Reconciliation (ANTaR)