“The government’s failures are utterly reprehensible,” VALS wrote, adding that “while you wait, while you bide your time, while you look into the next election cycle, Aboriginal people continue to be locked up in Victoria at ever increasing rates and continue to die in custody. This is happening on your watch.” 

Thirty years after the “watershed” royal commission report was handed down, only some recommendations have been introduced. On top of criticising the “shameful and self-serving” PR strategy in which governments have actioned the little changes they have made, the human rights groups said they have gone backwards. 

More specifically, the groups have taken issue with the bail laws, introduced in 2017 in response to the Victorian Bourke Street Massacre when James Gargasoulas, who was on bail, drove into crowds of pedestrians and killed six people. The changes put further onus on the accused person to prove they are not an unacceptable risk. 

The letter set out that under the bail laws requirement that the accused person give a compelling reason or exceptional circumstance why they should get bail has “inappropriately restricted the granting of bail to Aboriginal people” while ensuring that the option of imprisonment is not utilised only as a sanction of last resort. 

“We demand that the Victorian government immediately begin the process of implementing the necessary legislative reforms to undo the failed policy of its punitive bail laws, which disproportionately impacts Aboriginal people, especially women, many of whom are victim-survivors of domestic and family violence,” it read. 

Since the royal commission report was handed down, 470 Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people have died in custody. As the numbers continue to climb, the letter took aim at the democratic society’s expectations that governments build a “just and fair country” for everyone, not just a privileged few. 

“A nation built on violent dispossession, that tried to wipe out Aboriginal people and their culture; first through massacres, then through policies of protectionism and assimilation, now continues to lock Aboriginal people up at staggering rates and perpetrate violence and neglect on Aboriginal people in custody, seemingly without consequence,” it read. 

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The 36 organisations, plus VALS, are:

•     Aboriginal Justice Caucus
•     VACCHO
•     Djirra
•     Dardi Munwurro: Indigenous Leadership Training & Coaching 
•     Federation of Community Legal Centres Vic
•     Flemington & Kensington Community Legal Centre
•     Inner Melbourne Community Legal
•     Youthlaw
•     Fitzroy Legal Service
•     Human Rights Law Centre
•     St Kilda Legal Service
•     Justice Connect
•     West Justice
•     Liberty Victoria
•     Flat Out
•     VMIAC
•     Doogue + George Defence Lawyers
•     Stary Norton Halphen
•     Robinson Gill Lawyers
•     Whittlesea Community Connections
•     Youth Affairs Council Victoria
•     Australian Lawyers Alliance
•     NATSILS
•     Amnesty International
•     Civil Liberties Australia
•     Grata Fund
•     Change the Record
•     Human Rights for All
•     National Justice Project
•     Democracy in Colour
•     GetUp!
•     ColourCode
•     University of Technology Sydney – Institute for Indigenous Education and Research
•     The University of Melbourne – The Indigenous Law and Justice Hub
•     APT: Association for the prevention of torture
•     Law & Advocacy Centre for Women