A NORTHERN Territory Supreme Court judge has called for increased restrictions on the sale of alcohol to stop drunken violence among Aborigines that he says is devastating families, including children.
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Twenty months after the $1.5 billion federal indigenous intervention, Justice Trevor Riley says that alcohol is still "flying in extraordinary quantities" among Aboriginal people.
"It cannot go on. There needs to be some control," Justice Riley said yesterday after last week jailing three Aboriginal men following separate trials for violent acts in Tennant Creek.
"The violence is devastating people," he told ABC radio.
"Of course there are young children involved. They are in the families and in the houses and they are seeing things and will grow up with the same problems as their parents are experiencing."
The federal Minister for Indigenous Affairs, Jenny Macklin, said last night that the Government would strongly support any action by the NT Government to strengthen alcohol restrictions in places such as Tennant Creek.
"Since alcohol restrictions were introduced in the Kimberley town of Fitzroy Crossing in October 2007, we have seen marked improvement in health, education and safety," she said.
The Chief Minister of the Northern Territory, Paul Henderson, said that problems faced by indigenous Territorians "cannot be solved overnight". "It is is the greatest social task facing all Territorians and we require measurable results to be achieved at five, 10 and 20-year intervals," he said in a report on the government's $300 million "Closing the Gap" indigenous program.
