If you want to close the gap, cut the crap! This year’s NAIDOC theme is: “voice treaty, truth: let’s work together for a shared future”. The truth is that Aboriginal people already have voice and a treaty will not solve the serious problems to many of them face. Now that I’ve made contribution to NAIDOC week I would like to discuss some ideas for closing the gap, that we hear so much about, and rightly so. The gap between the general health and wellbeing of Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal Australians is a national shame. But there are some other gaps that we generally don’t hear about. These need to be acknowledged if we are to bring living standards, health and wellbeing, and quality of life
Much has been written about Aboriginal deaths in custody—much of it is the usual crap pumped out by the Aboriginal victim brigade. Fortunately, there have been some sensible counterviews. The Australian Institute of Criminology recently published ‘Indigenous deaths in custody: 25 years since the Royal Commission into Aboriginal Deaths in Custody.’ It states what many of us already know: “NDICP data show Indigenous people are now less likely than non-Indigenous people to die in prison custody, largely due to a decrease in the death rate of Indigenous prisoners from 1999–2000 to 2005–06.” Similarly, another earlier document by The Australian Institute for Health and Welfare (AIHW) entitled ‘Th
