CRANAplus prais­es the Prime Min­is­ter, Attor­ney Gen­er­al, Chief Min­is­ter of the NT and the Human Rights Com­mis­sion­er for the prompt action in respond­ing to the hor­rif­ic and shock­ing footage shown on the ABC Four Cor­ners pro­gram last night.

CRANAplus CEO Christo­pher Cliffe said, ​“A cul­ture that allows peo­ple in author­i­ty to behave so bad­ly towards peo­ple in their care sends a shiv­er down our col­lec­tive spines. This is made all the more shock­ing as these peo­ple were minors, indi­vid­u­als who need­ed our pro­tec­tion and sup­port, regard­less of the circumstances”.

Deal­ing with chal­leng­ing, dif­fi­cult and vio­lent behav­iour is an unfor­tu­nate real­i­ty that many in the jus­tice and health sys­tems deal with. How­ev­er, restrain­ing in a chair and ​‘hood­ing’ some­one is a sign of a sys­tem in fail­ure, not one in control.

“This cer­tain­ly isn’t a time for fin­ger point­ing, it’s a time for a thor­ough inves­ti­ga­tion to under­stand why this occurred and was allowed to con­tin­ue. As health pro­fes­sion­als work­ing in many of the areas where these chil­dren are from, we need to be reas­sured that the juve­nile deten­tion sys­tem in the NT isn’t let­ting our already dis­ad­van­taged com­mu­ni­ties down”, said Mr Cliffe.

CRANAplus stands ready to assist the com­mis­sion in its inves­ti­ga­tion and activ­i­ties and would strong­ly encour­age that its scope is broad­ened. As a com­mu­ni­ty of health pro­fes­sion­als we must ensure this isn’t hap­pen­ing any­where else in the country.

CRANAplus is the pro­fes­sion­al Body for the Remote and Iso­lat­ed Health Work­force across Australia.

Media Con­tact:
CRANAplus Mar­ket­ing Man­ag­er (07) 4047 6400