Aboriginal leaders say they're hopeful of a "new beginning" for relations with police following the police commissioner's historic apology. At the Garma Festival this weekend, commissioner Michael Murphy apologised for past harms and injustice perpetrated by police and pledged to eliminate racism within the agency. But the Police Union is already pushing back on some of what the commissioner had to say.
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00:00For veteran advocates like John Patterson, the walls of Darwin's overcrowded prison testify
00:07to the results of colonisation and a history of injustice against Aboriginal people.
00:12You know, jails in the Northern Territory, over 80% Aboriginal population.
00:18Yesterday in a historic public address, the Police Commissioner issued an apology for
00:22the role of police in those injustices, from frontier massacres to more recent events including
00:28the Stolen Generations and the NT Intervention.
00:31He set an Indigenous employment target of 30% across all ranks and promised an anti-racism
00:37strategy.
00:38It's been welcomed today by those who called for an apology months ago, as the inquest
00:43into the fatal police shooting of Kumunjai Walker unearthed more and more evidence of
00:48racist conduct within the ranks.
00:51You know, I see it as a new dawning, you know, a new dawning in the way police and Aboriginal
00:58communities and people will treat each other in the future, hopefully.
01:04I'm hoping now that this apology means that he is learning and growing and changing and
01:10I hope that means that other members of the force will do that too.
01:14The Commissioner has promised a separate apology to Yundamu and the Walpuri Nation after the
01:18inquest ends into Kumunjai Walker's death.
01:21In his speech, the Commissioner said he'd need to bring everyone along for the journey.
01:26But there's already been pushback.
01:28Today the Police Union responded with a statement saying members weren't told well in advance
01:33that the apology was coming and it's not the role of the Police Commissioner to comment
01:37on government policies including the Stolen Generations and the Intervention.
01:42They haven't outright rejected the Commissioner's calls for change, but say officers shouldn't
01:46unfairly be overburdened with blame.
01:49The Territory's Indigenous leaders urging the force to have courage.
01:53Be bold, brave and game and do things differently.
01:56You know, I think that's what this opportunity provides.