Warning: this article discusses racism and may be distressing to some readers.
The Northern Land Council (NLC) has told the federal inquiry into racism that it is an everyday reality for Aboriginal people and Traditional Owners across the Top End.
Speaking in Darwin on Wednesday at the public hearing of the Senate Inquiry into racism, hate and violence directed at Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people, the NLC said racism is not an abstract concept - it continues to impact communities across the Northern Territory.
"Today racism is directed at our people every day - and it's increased," NLC Chair Matthew Ryan told the inquiry.
"It is the hostile commentary that floods social media pages whenever Aboriginal rights are discussed and it is the verbal abuse directed at shopping centres, workplaces, in accessing services, and on streets.”
Matthew Ryan, the Barabarra, Wurrpann, and Gurindiji Chair of the NLC, told the inquiry that First Nations people are experiencing racism in other forms.
“It is institutional racism embedded in the government policies by design without our peoples’ consultation or input and it is systemic racism that operates through our health, child protection system and everything,” he stated.
The NLC represents more than 51,000 Aboriginal people and is governed by an elected Council comprised of 111 members from across the NLC region.
The Joint Standing Committee on Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Affairs adopted an inquiry into racism, hate and violence directed at Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander People on 4 March 2026, following a referral from the Minister for Indigenous Australians, Senator the Hon Malarndirri McCarthy.
The inquiry will also examine initiatives to reduce the individual and collective harm caused by racism, hatred and violence towards Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people.
In its 35-page written submission to the inquiry, the NLC highlighted the 2023 Indigenous Voice to Parliament referendum as a ‘critical inflection point’ in the prevalence and public acceptability of racism towards Aboriginal people in Australia.
“Since October 2023, the NLC has observed a clear increase in the openness and hostility of racism, a pattern corroborated by independent research the experiences of NLC community members,” they wrote.
“Racism in the digital sphere increased during the referendum period but also persisted in public discourse afterwards.
"This post-referendum comfort in expressing racist views poses a significant threat to Aboriginal people and is restricting progress towards self-determination.”
The NLC said that the conditions that enabled racism to increase during the referendum, including the racialised nature of political discourse and the associated media coverage and widespread dissemination of misinformation, must ‘be closely scrutinised to ensure racial bias cannot dominate public sentiment so acutely moving forward.’
Hit and run incidents show 'deeply rooted' racist attitudes
The NLC’s submission also highlighted hit-and-run incidents involving Aboriginal pedestrians in the NT as representing a particularly extreme intersection of racism, violence and the law.
They noted that Aboriginal people are disproportionately represented in NT road fatalities and serious injuries, far exceeding their proportion of the population.
“Studies in the Australian context have documented instances of motorists acting aggressively and recklessly around Aboriginal pedestrians, including deliberately speeding up when pedestrians attempt to crossroads,” the NLC wrote.
“Such behaviours reflect deeply rooted racist attitudes, underpinned by the dehumanisation of Aboriginal people, which enables targeted violence and is perpetuated by a culture of impunity and inadequate legal accountability.”
The NLC highlight the case of Jake Danby, "who on June 13, 2024, killed Elijah Whitehurst, a 39-year-old Aboriginal man and seriously injured another man in a hit-and-run incident in Darwin, exemplifies the intersection of racism and violence."
“Danby’s subsequent text messages – describing the victim as an “oxygen thief” and a “dog,” further stating “it was pretty funny watching them roll around on the road after going over my bonnet” as well as asserting that people “... [like him need] to take a hit to teach ...[them] a lifelong lesson” – are explicit expressions of racial hatred.”
Despite this, Danby was initially sentenced to a 12-month community corrections order with five months home detention (a sentence the NT Director of Public Prosecutions appealed as manifestly inadequate).
On appeal, the sentence was extended to two years of home detention, still without a single day of imprisonment.
“His documented racist motivation was not formally considered - an omission that reflects a systemic failure of the justice system to reckon honestly with racially motivated violence and adequately address it,” the NLC said.
Make social media accountable: NLC
Yuseph Deen, NLC’s CEO, spoke of the increase of hate on social media platforms and its impact on Aboriginal people – particularly on children.
“If you take the NLC as an example, our social media pages have become a front line - almost all the racist posts documented in our submission happened in early 2026.”
“Comments on posts about food relief, close the gap day, invasion day - the hostility is constant, and it is escalating,” he said.
“Only last week, NT Fisheries recently posted about Aboriginal land and sea rights and left comments unmoderated. The result was predictable and showed why NLC has to moderate our own pages. The majority of comments were unfiltered, racist views,” Mr Dead added.
Holding back tears, Mr Dean told the committee that the NLC’s highest concern is the impact of online racism and hate on young Aboriginal people.
“When Aboriginal children see how their communities are talked about online, it damages their sense of identity and belonging. That harm is real, and it is measurable,” he said.
The NLC said it believes that social media platform algorithms amplify divisive content by design.
“The scourge of social media platforms gaining attention and being utilized as a medium for hate speech is something that that impacts significantly on the psyche of Aboriginal people.”
“Social media is often the primary communication channel in communities where other infrastructure is limited, when those platforms are flooded with racist commentary about Aboriginal people, it affects community safety and well-being.”
To combat the rise in online hate, the NLC wants the inquiry to recommend to Government to legislate ‘platform accountability’ for the removal of hate speech and to hold them accountable for the timely removal of hate speech and racially vilifying content.
“These companies profit from hatred, and current law imposes no meaningful consequences for that.”
Time to be treated as equals
To address structural racism, the NLC recommended the Federal Government establish a Makarrata Commission with responsibility for truth-telling and treaty, and deliver a formal, independent national truth-telling body with the power to make binding recommendations for systemic reform.
“Only a formal truth-telling process, embedded within Australia’s legal and social frameworks, vested with binding authority, and properly resourced, can lay the foundation for a future in which Aboriginal people are genuinely treated as equals across all aspects of society,” they wrote.
In addition, they want the government to encourage and work with the NT government to recommence the NT Treaty process it abandoned in February 2025.
The NLC also asked the Inquiry to consider legislative options for criminalising racial vilification against Aboriginal people in recognition that this could offer legal protections and strengthen consequences for perpetrators.
While welcoming the Senate Inquiry, the NLC expressed disappointment that the inquiry was not constituted as a Royal Commission.
“The gravity and scale of racism, hate and violence directed at Aboriginal people, as documented in this submission, requires the investigative powers, formal authority and national attention that only a Royal Commission can provide,” they concluded.
The NLC said the time for action is now.
“The NLC is hopeful that this inquiry will be a powerful reminder to the Committee and the public more broadly of the significant human cost associated with these issues and provide a compelling impetus for decisive and meaningful action to address and eliminate all forms of racism, hatred, and violence directed at Aboriginal people.”
The committee – which met in Perth on Tuesday – will move to Alice Springs on Friday 17 July and will travel around the country to hear from people at public hearings until early August.
Almost 670 submissions had been made public by the Inquiry to date with the Committee due to report back to the Parliament by September.
Catch up on The Point’s episodes on Racism: The Ugly Side Of Australia and Racism is the New Black on SBS On Demand.
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