Aboriginal Police Officers lodge racial discrimination complaint against NT government and Commissioner
In a landmark case, three serving Aboriginal Police Officers have lodged a representative complaint against the Northern Territory Government and the Police Commissioner with the Australian Human Rights Commission, alleging twenty years of racial discrimination. They allege racial vilification and derision, and an unequal system of pay and promotion.
Stewart Levitt of Levitt Robinson Solicitors, the firm representing the officers, said this is the first time that Police have “openly shown the courage and conviction, while still serving, to take collective action against the Territory and the Commissioner”.
“I am not aware of similar action being taken in any other State or Territory of Australia,” he said.
“If the matter is not successfully conciliated, (our) firm will take the case to the Federal Court, claiming damages for racial discrimination in respect of pay, conditions, as well as compensation for their pain and suffering, which they allege has been caused by systemic racism in the Northern Territory Police Service.”
While noting the apology of Commissioner Murphy, for “past harms and injustices, caused by members of the Northern Territory Police”, delivered 3 August this year, the three officers say the apology was itself offensive, as it implied that they had been complicit in the racist system: they should have been excluded from those members of the Northern Territory Police on whose behalf the apology was given.
“The Commissioner should have been apologising to us, too,” according to several of the officers who have instructed Levitt Robinson.
Dana Levitt, who is managing the case, said “the whole notion of having Aboriginal Community Police Officers with lower pay and worse conditions, to police Aboriginal people, is inherently racist, particularly where one-third of the population is indigenous, and the work of policing disproportionately effects indigenous Territorians”.
“A consistent theme amongst Aboriginal Community Police Officers (ACPOs) is that they joined the force to help their community and have been frequently deployed by their white superiors in ways which they believe harm their community,” she said.
National Indigenous Times has contacted the NT government for comment.
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