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The 2000-01 reporting year was a year of consolidation for the Commission’s Complaint Handling Section (CHS) following the legislative changes to the complaint handling function in April 2000.

The reporting period for this Report is 1 July 2008 to 30 June 2009. Throughout this period, there was significantly more activity in native title law and policy than I witnessed in the first five years of my term as the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Social Justice Commissioner.

Under section 46C(1)(a) of the Human Rights and Equal Opportunity Commission Act 1986 (Cth), the Social Justice Commissioner is required annually to submit a report to the Attorney-General on the exercise and enjoyment of human rights by Aboriginal persons and Torres Strait Islanders (the Social Justice Report).

The International Labour Organisation Convention 111 deals with discrimination in employment and occupation. Australian adherence to this Convention provides that all people have the right to equal treatment in employment and occupation without discrimination on the basis of:

The past year has been one of great contrasts. On the one hand, we have experienced the apparent harmony and healing of the walk across the Sydney Harbour Bridge and similar walks in other states and on the other hand, the national outpourings of grief and anger at the death of a 15-year-old boy in custody in Don Dale Detention Centre in Darwin in February.

The Complaint Handling Section (CHS) is responsible for investigating and conciliating complaints lodged under federal anti-discrimination and human rights law. Accordingly, the CHS plays a key role in fulfilling the Commission’s objective of delivering an Australian society in which human rights are protected.

In my role as Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Social Justice Commissioner, I am required to prepare two reports on Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples’ human rights issues each year – the Native Title Report and the Social Justice Report.

This Appendix provides an overview of main events since the introduction of the new arrangements for the administration of Indigenous affairs on 1 July 2004. It commences with a summary table and is followed by a detailed description of each event.

This week's conference could not happen at a more opportune time. While we discuss ways to engage Indigenous communities, as we listen to that ways government can engage with its citizens, a radical change is occurring in the way the Australian government and Indigenous Australians engage.

This report covers the period from 1 July 2004 to 30 June 2005. It considers two issues that are of major concern to Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples.

A century ago, the Australian people engaged in a debate about creating a nation. They held meetings...They wrote articles and letters in newspapers. Many views were canvassed and voices were heard. The separate colonies, having divided up the land between them, discussed ways of sharing powers in order to achieve a vision of a united Australia. The result was the Australian Constitution, establishing the Commonwealth of Australia in 1901.

The Senate Legal and Constitutional References Committee conducted an inquiry this year into the federal government's implementation of recommendations made by the Human Rights and Equal Opportunity Commission in Bringing them home. The inquiry considered proposals for the establishment of an alternative dispute resolution tribunal for members of the stolen generations; and considered the consistency of the government's response to the recommendations with the reconciliation process and the aspirations and needs of members of the stolen generations.