Father of reconcilation Pat Dodson urges for action on indigenous deaths in custody

Anthony Albanese’s reconcilation envoy Pat Dodson has urged his government to act on the ‘national disgrace’ of indigenous deaths in custody.

Labor reconciliation envoy Pat Dodson says the government should not wait for a voice to parliament before taking action on Indigenous deaths in custody, calling the issue “a national ­disgrace”.

“We are faced with ensuring that safety of people taken into custody is upheld. There’s no ­licence to kill people here,” he told Nine newspapers. “I’m tired of seeing lives being lost because of a lack of change. Leadership shown by the federal government in this space is what is required.”

He called for the immediate implementation of recommendations of the 1991 Royal Commission into Aboriginal Deaths in Custody, on which he served as a commissioner.

The Albanese government has strongly backed a voice to parliament, but Senator Dodson said this should not lead to a delay in acting on deaths in custody. “This government is not immune from the obligations to implement recommendations that we’ve committed to as a ­nation, that were commissioned by a past government,” he said.

He said he was expecting ­“robust discussions” with ­Attorney-General Mark Dreyfus about enacting the recommendations. “You need national leadership in order to make the significant change that the royal commission expected,” he said.

He also demanded a national Indigenous justice committee to oversee inquests and Indigenous-tailored health services in jails.

He also criticised the Victorian Labor government for its failure to fix bail laws. “Victoria was slow and slack in implementing that recommendation (from the commission), and there’s been deaths as a consequence of that one failure. There’s no excuse,” he said.

Victorian Attorney-General Jaclyn Symes conceded there had been a disproportionate impact on vulnerable people, including Indigenous women, and bail laws would be changed.

“The royal commission was about a national disgrace that we were facing back 30 years ago, and we’ve compounded that because we’ve had knowledge of … how to deal with and stop a lot of those deaths, and we’ve failed,” she said. “We’ve failed miserably in doing something about it.”

Senator Dodson also spoke on the death of Veronica Nelson in 2020, who a coroner found was subject to “cruel and degrading treatment” by prison staff at Dame Phyllis Frost Centre.

“This person was clearly ill and crying in pain, and the offhandedness with which her condition was treated is an absolute indictment on the system,” he said.