Race-based alcohol policies now positive discrimination: Indigenous groups

The NT government’s refusal to maintain Intervention-era grog bans is undermining one of its own best measures for stopping alcohol-fuelled violence, experts say.

The Northern Territory government’s refusal to maintain Intervention-era grog bans is undermining one of its own best measures for stopping alcohol-fuelled violence, say experts who have urged the government to rethink.

Police Auxiliary Licencing ­Inspectors were introduced in 2018 to stand outside bottle shops and refuse service to anyone with an address in a restricted area.

The Labor policy replaced a conservative iteration using sworn police officers.

The scheme has been credited with a swift drop in alcohol-fuelled and domestic violence in places such as Alice Springs.

Allowing grog bans to lapse in about 400 communities and outstations means people living there can buy booze again.

Donna Ah Chee. Picture: Emma Murray

The inspectors scheme has been attacked as racially discriminatory, including by some of Labor’s former MPs, but is being maintained by the government. But the government is scrapping blanket grog bans introduced as part of the Howard government’s NT Emergency Response on the basis that was “race-based policy” without consultation.

Donna Ah Chee, head of the health service Central Australian Aboriginal Congress, says her ­organisation’s clinics have been struggling to cope with more intoxicated patients on top of an ­already-crippling pandemic burden, since the alcohol rules changed on July 17.

“All these people need extra support from our staff, who are working in a health system that’s already in crisis from dealing with Covid-19,” she said.

The emergency response (dubbed the Intervention) was ­opposed by many Indigenous groups that were concerned about discriminatory policy. Ironically, some of those groups are at the forefront of arguing for the Intervention-era grog bans to be reinstated.

A coalition including Aboriginal Medical Alliance Services NT, National Aboriginal Community Controlled Health Organisation and the North Australian Aboriginal Justice Agency wrote to Indigenous Australians Minister Linda Burney on June 9.

In their six-page letter, they ­argued the provisions were “not … racist or negative discrimination”.

“Rather, they are … positive and beneficial special measures in keeping with the High Court’s latest definition,” they wrote.

NT Chief Minister Natasha Fyles insisted in parliament this week that her government’s decision to scrap the grog bans was based on consultation with “hundreds” of communities. Sources in the Aboriginal community service sector denied this and said they ­believed the government acted on an incorrect legal interpretation.

Ms Fyles spokeswoman said her government “cannot extend a commonwealth law, nor will we support paternalistic policies which criminalise Aboriginal communities”. The government has not answered requests to provide evidence about its consultation process or to show the changes are not causing harm.

The Country Liberal opposition has launched its own domestic and family violence policy, promising legal reforms to prioritise the interests of victims and electronic monitoring for domestic violence offenders.

Opposition domestic violence spokesman Steve Edgington said levels of domestic violence were “unacceptably high”, up 42 per cent since 2016.

“The catastrophic increase in domestic violence across the Territory under Labor’s watch has got to stop,” he said. “Unlike Labor, we will always put the rights of victims above those of offenders. The Fyles government has failed Territorians and failed to keep them safe. In Alice Springs last week, police ­reported 54 cases of domestic violence over a 48-hour period.”