Sorry, what was that you said, Kevin?

It's one year on from the national apology delivered by the new-age sensitive prime minister that was set to put everything right - that is, apparently,(Kevvy pic c/o SMH blog) far right.

Over the last year Federal IA Minister Jenny Macklin and her Heritage counterpart Peter Garrett have had some tough sells, but since the beginning of this year they've had to try to market completely unpalatable policies that seem to hark from decades of neglect of Indigenous living standards and blatantly inequitable policies that existed under the Howard government.

The latest move sees a step up from the 99 year leases of the NT, to a swap of native title claims in remote areas in exchange for acceptable housing that isn't 3rd world standard.

It will be interesting to see what the international arena think of K.Rudd's new uber-right wing swing which flies in the face of the push to Close the Gap & improve health, education and housing for the First Nation People of Australia.

It's difficult to believe Mr Rudd & his band of merry policy makers would live in the accommodation that many Aboriginal people will have to live in(such as unairconditioned sea containers in the red hot Kimberley) if they wish to retain the basic freedom to fight in court to be acknowledged as the spiritual custodians of the land.

Apart from rendering native title legislation virtually redundant, the policy seems to indicate a massive oversight by the Federal Government of how the land is intrinsically linked to Indigenous people's religious beliefs, and their freedom to practice that religion as stated in Article 18 of the Universal Declaration which "is a recognised influence on common law."



In many states of Australia long term prisoners have no right to vote,
under the various states' Prison Acts they have no access to the media to voice human rights or transparency concerns nor do the media have a right to access them,
and current incarceration rates(in West Australia for men it's around 44% predominantly for trivial offences such as traffic notices or 'disorderly' conduct; for women about 70% & for kids around 95%; in the North-West almost 100% of prisoners are Indigenous) prevent adequate representation of Aboriginal beliefs in the public sphere, thus grossly limiting objections to unfair policy decisions.