SAM WATSON is the president of the Aboriginal Legal Service in Brisbane. He was interviewed for Â鶹´«Ã½ Weekly by SUJATHA FERNANDES.
What forms of discrimination do Aborigines and Torres Strait Islanders face in the Australian legal system?
Firstly, by virtue of the very fact that Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people have to live under the laws of a colonial invader.
There was resistance from day one of the white invasion, and Aboriginal and Islander people are still fighting against that colonial war of aggression. So the legal system that we are forced to live under is totally aimed at the destruction of our traditional society and the destruction of our traditional values. From day one of white settlement, we have been living under a foreign and malignant system or code of law.
Secondly, because Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people are such a minority within the Australian system, we play no part in the parliamentary system that drafts and brings the laws into being. We play no part in the judicial system which makes judgments on those laws, and we play no part in the police forces which enforce those laws.
We have no control at any level of the criminal administration system. Perpetually, from day one of white invasion, we have been victims of that system.
What were the aims of the Royal Commission into Aboriginal Deaths in Custody, and were these aims achieved?
The royal commission was established in October 1987 to inquire into the deaths of 99 Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people who died while in custody of the institutional correctional services. The circumstances of those deaths were examined over some three years by Commissioner Evatt and staff, calling for evidence and travelling right around Australia.
Finally they handed down a brief in 1991 and handed down findings about the 99 deaths and also handed down 339 recommendations to address the circumstances surrounding the detention of Aboriginal and Islander people and how Aboriginal and Islander people should be incarcerated and how their needs should be addressed.
Now, there has been a perception within the Aboriginal community that the royal commission was a bit of a circus and a bit of a non-event. There has been substantial support for the view that it was a money making operation for lawyers, and Aboriginal people down at the community level did not receive any direct benefits from this.
The circumstances of the 99 deaths were highlighted and the issues placed before the Australian public for a long time, yet the royal commission did not in fact recommend charges against any police officer or any custodial officer. Since the federal government has announced its support of the recommendations and the state governments have generally responded, there have been dollars and resources flying down to the Black community so that the indigenous legal services can address problems that are associated with Aboriginal deaths in custody.
Given the recent death of Daniel Yock, can we say that these recommendations have been implemented?
No. The Queensland police services had access to the royal commission document for some three years and yet I seriously question their commitment towards carrying out the recommendations.
There were a large number of police officers who were involved with the arrest and detention of Daniel Yock on November 7, 1993 — at the scene of the incident where Daniel was arrested, the transport of Daniel to the watchtower, and the arrival of Daniel at the watchtower. Not one of those police officers had even read the recommendations; they were not even aware of the intent or principles of the recommendation and indeed had not even read their own police custody manual.
There has to be a clear commitment not only at the political level, but also at the level of working police. This has to be done through selling the product to the police union, which in Queensland is still very powerful and essentially still runs the police force.
The commitment has to be there so that recommendations, such as arrest being the last resort, is not only there in black and white on paper but comes into actual practice, so that once Aboriginal people are taken into custody, certain protocol and procedures are then applied, and if an Aboriginal or an Islander person is at risk, these prisoners are supported in particular ways.
Now this has all come down through the royal commission and needs to be adhered to and needs to be applied from the ministerial level right down to the most humble cop on the beat.
If the recommendations of the royal commission haven't worked and the courts haven't given the people justice, what other strategies can be used?
Well, I really believe that the community should have far more control over policing within our society. We should have a mechanism whereby the community in a particular area should have representatives sitting on a committee that has a substantial amount of control or supervision or monitoring of policing practices within the neighbourhood.
Since the Fitzgerald inquiry here in Queensland, the police really do see the public as being on the other side of the fence. They have a siege mentality, and in times of stress or drama the police unite against the outside world.
The hard-core right wing have been running the Queensland police force since time immemorial, and that stranglehold needs to be broken. Ordinary police can be encouraged to play a more positive and productive role within their own union, so that more and more police will turn up and elect union officials. The police union needs to be made more accountable and more accessible to the public, and the public needs to play a more productive role in the administration of policing procedures within the local neighbourhood.
On the broader issues, the politicians have to take a more responsible attitude towards social direction such as basic policing procedures, so that they don't just visit issues but are more involved at a street level.
If there are problems occurring between police and particular Â鶹´«Ã½ of the community politicians must be out there on the street. They must know what is happening, and know what's causing these problems so that they can make a more responsible statement about the situation.
The community also needs to be more involved in the training and preparation of police officers, who are presently being trained in a vacuum, totally dominated by police personnel and police who are off-beat. They need to be placed out in the community more so that they are not seen as some sort of paramilitary force, but rather have a meeting point with ordinary members of the public. [Sam Watson will be a guest speaker at the International Â鶹´«Ã½ Conference being held April 1-4 at the University of NSW.]