White heat: Blacks deaths

• A reduction in deaths in police cells in favour of prisons
• Cross cultural training for the police, the judiciary and custodial staff
• A small growth in Indigenous community-based schemes for cell and prison visitors, night patrols and Indigenous-run community programs for offenders.

But we are still playing at the edges. These are band-aid measures.

In my view the way forward recommended by the Royal Commission has been lost between the narrow vision of a national government and vote buying law and order campaigns at State and Territory level. The white heat appears to have gone from the debate.

The Commonwealth government's policy directions towards Indigenous people is very narrowly focused on health, housing, education and employment which it describes as 'practical reconciliation'. It directly opposes a policy of self-determination for Indigenous peoples. Instead there is a focus on the welfare mould and calls to 'get off welfare'.

There is much talk of mutual obligation. But it appears to run only one way. Indigenous people feel that white Australia has an obligation to us to reverse the trends highlighted 10 years ago and which show no sign of diminishing.

White Australia needs to understand that Indigenous people have the energy, will and desire to do things for themselves. Millions of Australians have demonstrated their support for reconciliation, a process which stemmed directly from the Royal Commission.

In my view we need to ensure all of those non-Indigenous Australians who have marched for reconciliation realise its achievement must involve recognition. Their attention and their support - their white heat, if you like, must be harnessed to point they way to an acceptance by our national government of self determination.

We need them to lobby their local, State and Federal MP's to support self determination. Until there is recognition and action on this at the national level, our aspirations for self-determination will never be realised ... and the fundamental issues clearly addressed by the Royal Commission will never be properly implemented.

National action needs to be matched by fundamental reform at the State level. State election campaigns too often slide into vote buying law and order auctions.

Worryingly, both sides of politics in Western Australia committed to increasing compulsory jailing regimes during the recent State election campaign.

The introduction of mandatory sentencing in Western Australia and the Northern Territory is of major concern. These laws strike at the heart of the Royal Commission findings. Obscenely, this policy has compulsorily jailed petrol sniffers for receiving as little as $2 worth of petrol to feed their addiction.

Tragically, it has led to the death of a mentally disturbed boy in detention on minor theft charges, with evidence on the public record that he should not have been jailed at all.