Culture

Need to delete sections 268.121 – 268.122 of the law against genocide in International Criminal Court Consequential Amendments Act 2002. The release on 29 November of The Family Matters Report 2017 details the 'escalating national crisis’ of the rate of removal of First Nations children from families. From our perspective the core issue is being left out of the debate. Removal of children from the group is one of the five definitions of genocide. The alarming rate of the removal of First Nations children 'from the group’ is only possible because the Commonwealth of Australia has not imported the full force of the 1948 Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide. etc ... [node:read-more:link]

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]

Response to the Referendum Council's so-called modest and substantive recommendation of a referendum to have an advisory-only 'Indigenous Voice' in parliament. $800 million plus has now gone down the gurgler, but then this is what happens when a government meets resistance, a resistance that has been going since 1770. It must be an enormous disappointment for the Turnbull government and Shorten's expectations that Leibler and his First Nations cohorts have failed miserably to deliver the goods, that is to assimilate First Nations Peoples in to the colonial constitution. Turnbull is clearly aware of a looming 'heroic failure'. [node:read-more:link]

As Chairperson of APY Law and Culture, I have written to the Referendum Council to say the Tjilpis are insulted that the Referendum Council did not respect protocol and procedure before they called a meeting for discussion on having Anangu/Aboriginal people all over Australia included in Australia's Constitution. We, the Traditional Owners for Uluru and Anangu Pitjantjatjara Yankunytjatjara country argue that our Law is the Law of the Land in this part of the world and not the whiteman law. We know we have been controlled by the whiteman law because we didn't have enough warriors and clever Lawmen who can take the fight up to these people who occupy our lands illegally. [node:read-more:link]

Treaty: Northern Basin Aboriginal Nations (NBAN) - Inter Nation Multilateral Treaty at the original site of the 1972 Embassy in Canberra, 10:00am Wednesday 10 May 2017.
23 First Nations across southern Queensland and northern, north west, upper western and western New South Wales gathered in Canberra yesterday for today's signing of a Multilateral Treaty between these First Nations, which affirms each Nation's independent sovereign status.       ... [node:read-more:link]

The Referendum Council has been having invitation-only dialogue meetings with Aboriginal people across Australia which we called 'secret meetings' because only selected First Nations people were allowed to attend and many Tribes and Nations were not represented.  Now we find that there is an additional 'Invitation-Only' meeting in Canberra. First Nations people who have been seeking a voice for the 'NO' vote have discovered this meeting in Canberra on Wednesday 10 May 2017, because as it was poorly advertised many people do not know about it, so are unable to attend. [node:read-more:link]

"Members from First Nations across the continent successfully participated in the Coalition for Community Energy held in Melbourne Town Hall on 27 - 28 February 2017 and took the initiative to form the First Nations Renewable Energy Alliance to partner with private enterprise and other community energy alliances to support First Nations communities across Australia to transition to renewable energy. "This Alliance initiative is directed at ensuring remote and isolated communities are sufficiently catered for in respect to their energy needs ... " [node:read-more:link]