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Northern Territory National Emergency Response

The Northern Territory National Emergency Response, also known as “The Intervention”, began in June 2007 when the Australian Government declared a national emergency in the Northern Territory in response to the Little Children are Sacred Report which reported that neglect and sexual abuse of children in Indigenous communities had spiked and emergency intervention was necessary.

Measures
Along with the Northern Territory National Emergency Response Act 2007, came a $587 million package that included a series of broad measures to be introduced in Indigenous communities. Mal Brough, Minister for Indigenous Affairs, described these measures in a media release on 21 June 2007 as followed : [you add a source here, and useful detail, but I would sync this with the existing Measures and use that more succinct style]
 * “Introducing widespread alcohol restrictions on Northern Territory Aboriginal land.
 * Introducing welfare reforms to stem the flow of cash going toward substance abuse and to ensure funds meant to be for children’s welfare are used for that purpose
 * Enforcing school attendance by linking income support and family assistance payments to school attendance for all people living on Aboriginal land and providing meals for children at school at parents’ cost
 * Introducing compulsory health checks for all Aboriginal children to identify and treat health problems and any effects of abuse
 * Acquiring townships prescribed by the Australian Government through five-year leases including payment of just terms compensation
 * As part of the immediate emergency response, increasing policing levels in prescribed communities, including requesting secondments from other jurisdictions to supplement NT resources, funded by the Australian Government.
 * Requiring intensified on ground clean up and repair of communities to make them safer and healthier by marshalling local workforces through work-for-the-dole
 * Improving housing and reforming community living arrangements in prescribed communities including the introduction of market-based rents and normal tenancy arrangements
 * Banning the possession of X-rated pornography and introducing audits of all publicly funded computers to identify illegal material
 * Scrapping the permit system for common areas, road corridors and airstrips for prescribed communities on Aboriginal land, and;
 * Improving governance by appointing managers of all government business in prescribed communities.”

Results
There has been some criticism of the fact that there is minimal evidence to support the positive outcome of the Northern Territory Intervention’s special measures. Despite the Intervention’s $587 million package of legislation that enforced the special measures in specified Indigenous communities in the Northern Territory, many of the social problems have actually become worse.

Child Removal and Residential Care
The Intervention saw that the Australian Government would fund “child protection” services in the Northern Territory with the budget for the Minister for Territory Families increasing from $10 million in 2006 to $36 million in 2015. However, instead of those resources going to the support of struggling families, the resources focused on the surveillance and removal of Indigenous children. According to the Productivity Commission, the number of Indigenous children in the Northern Territory that are in residential care since the beginning of the Intervention has increased from 265 children in June 2007 to 920 children in June 2016. Over the same time period, the number of non-Indigenous children being placed in residential care has reduced from 113 children to just 48. The current Northern Territory Royal Commission has reported stories of Indigenous children (including newborn babies) being taken away from their families and communities as far as hundreds of kilometres away and as a result, would lose all contact with Indigenous culture.

School Attendance
Despite the measure of enforcing school attendance by linking income support and family assistance payment, there was a significant decrease in preschool, primary, and secondary school attendance and NAPLAN results. Despite the punitive measures that were put in place by the Intervention that penalises the parents whose children do not attend school, there was very little improvement in literacy and numeracy skills in both primary and secondary education levels.

Income Management
Compulsory income management was responsible for quarantining or managing 50% of a recipient’s welfare payment. The income was managed and monitored by the release of the ‘BasicsCard’ which can only be used to purchase approved items at approved stores of which the government had chosen. The aim of the ‘BasicsCard’ is to reduce the expenditure on alcohol, illicit drugs, and pornography in Indigenous communities. However, in 2012, with approximately 90% of Indigenous peoples in the Northern Territory on income management, a government commissioned review surveyed people on income management and found that the scheme had not made their lives easier or better and only made things worse. With the evaluation of the income management scheme in 2014, there was no evidence to provide significant change to its objectives including monitoring and managing peoples spending and there was no evidence to show improvements within the communities and the wellbeing of Indigenous children.

Unemployment
With the abolishment of Community Development Employment Projects (CDEP) scheme, there has been a rise in the number of unemployed Indigenous peoples as it replaced part-time community work with below award monitored work. The government introduced a Northern Territory Jobs Package to replace the CDEP and promised 2241 new job positions for Indigenous peoples; however, over half of those jobs were only part-time positions and were on the lowest level of public sector pay. Without the CDEP, many enthusiastic local and young Indigenous peoples missed out on work opportunities as the work was given to external contactors. With this, there has been a consistent increase in Indigenous peoples in the Northern Territory receiving unemployment benefits (NewStart allowance) which was at 26.7% according to the 2016 Census for Aboriginal Territorians in comparison to only 3.8% non-Indigenous people in the Northern Territory at the same time.

Domestic Violence, Youth Suicide, and Self Harm
By October 2009, the Closing the Gap in the Northern Territory report found that reports of domestic violence had increased by 61%, substance abuse was up by 77%, and there was a 34% rise in alcohol-related crime. The Minister of Indigenous Affairs, Jenny Macklin, emphasises that these increases were highly likely to be associated with the increases in police numbers in the prescribed communities and therefore more reports of a number of offences were being made. Along with the rise of domestic violence reports, there was a massive increase in reports of attempted suicide and self-harm. At the beginning of the Intervention (2006-2007), there were 57 reported incidents of attempted suicide and self-harm of young Indigenous peoples and in 2011-2012, there were 316 reported incidents. The 2012 Indigenous Social Justice Report found that in the Northern Territory between 2006 and 2010, the rate of suicide for Indigenous young people aged between 10 and 17 years old was 30.1% per 100,000 compared to the rate of non-Indigenous young people of 2.6% per 100,000. When compared to the previous period between 2001 and 2005, the incident rate of Indigenous young people increased by a massive 160%.

Indigenous Imprisonment Rates
In June 2011, the rate of Indigenous peoples in prison in the Northern Territory had risen by 40% since the beginning of the Intervention. The number of Indigenous peoples in prison has risen from 698 in March 2007 to 1,433 in March 2017. Indigenous adults make up 84% of the Northern Territory’s prison population and Indigenous children and young people make up 94% of the Northern Territory prison population. The Royal Commission into the Protection and Detention of Children in the Northern Territory reported the number of reports has increased by more than double since the beginning of the Intervention.