Where Aboriginal Customary Law Conflicts with Australian Law - Part 1
Australia is a modern, vibrant and fair country whose society and governance is the envy of the world.
Despite many injustices suffered by Australia’s Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples in the past, great strides have been made in improving the lives and equity of our Indigenous peoples today.
However, there must come a time when Australian society needs to say No to some Indigenous cultural practices that are no longer appropriate to our modern Australian way of life.
This post is about one of those cultural practices - the harvesting of our native wildlife outside of officially regulated and government sanctioned control.
We believe it is time for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples to show goodwill to the rest of us Australians, and to our modern society, by voluntarily adhering to the same wildlife control laws as the rest of us Australians are subject to.
The following images allegedly show Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples perhaps not adhering to the same wildlife laws that govern the rest of us.
“Please help us…by supporting Aboriginal participation in the growing and marketing of our traditional foods”.
- Bruce Pascoe, Gourmet Traveller, NOV 27, 2016
Freshwater Turtle Protection in NSW
Under NSW law it is an offence to harm native turtles without a licence, and heavy penalties apply. If you suspect that someone has unlawfully harmed a turtle of other native animal, please report it to the Environment Line (131 555). Please report suspected illegal fishing nets to the nearest Fisheries Office or the Fishers Watch Phoneline (1800 043 536).
A typical day’s taking by exempt “Indigenous” hunters - Goanna and echidna carcasses and wallaby thighs.
Lace Monitors and other Goannas
Mutilated goannas spark animal cruelty fears, message to Indigenous hunters
- ABC News 20 Jan January 2017
And Echindas too!
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These are alleged to be Clarence River Cod whose taking is severely restricted. It is illegal to catch and keep, buy, sell, possess or harm Eastern Freshwater Cod (or any other threatened species in NSW) without a specific permit, licence or other appropriate approval, and significant penalties apply.
For endangered species, these penalties can include fines of up to $220,000 and up to 2 years in prison…
To protect breeding Eastern Freshwater Cod, all fishing is prohibited from August to October inclusive in the Mann River and all of its tributaries upstream of its junction with the Clarence River and the Nymboida River. The possession of fishing gear in, or adjacent to closed waters is also an offense.
Now maybe these cod were taken under licence, but in the spirit of Bruce Pascoe’s philosophy of sustainability maybe Indigenous Australia should show goodwill to our country and its wildlife and agree not to harvest any more cod. At least until the population has rebuilt to near pre-colonial numbers?
And who could forget the completely legal stoning to death of a wombat by an Indigenous policeman?
Maybe this is one Aboriginal cultural practice that we Australians need to say No to?
And does there come a time when Aboriginal people need to say ‘we need to change our ways if we are truely to be part of Australian society and walk with other Australians?’
Further Reading - Bruce Pascoe’s, Dark Emu,
‘Once entrepreneurs realised that Australian Chinese were exporting abalone meat, they lobbied the Departments of Primary Industry to establish licensing, quotas, and closed marketing boards, which operated like cartels. Aboriginal people are now seen as poachers simply because the shellfish is so enormously valuable. When it was ‘mutton fish’, they were allowed to harvest as much as they wanted. Today they are jailed for pursuing their traditional harvest’ - Dark Emu, electronic copy, page 226.
No Bruce, maybe the Departments of Primary Industry were just doing their tax-payer funded jobs properly and protecting the scarce abalone for future generations from over-zealous, Aboriginal harvesting (poaching)?
