Federal, State and Territory gov­ern­ments should agree upon a defin­i­tion of ‘bias-motivated crime’ that is offi­cially recog­nised through­out Australia and establish an official, cent­ral­ised, system for the nation-wide recording of such crimes and their clas­si­fic­a­tion according to agreed cat­egor­ies, including race, national or ethnic origin, language, colour, religion, gender, age, mental or physical dis­ab­il­ity, sexual ori­ent­a­tion, or any other similar factor. Law enforce­ment officers should be provided with the skills and training necessary to correctly identify and classify reports of bias-motivated crimes. The methods by which data con­cern­ing bias-motivated crimes is collected and clas­si­fied in Canada should be emulated in Australia.
These are among the 14 recom­mend­a­tions made by the ECAJ in its sub­mis­sion to the current Senate Inquiry into pro­tect­ing and strength­en­ing Australia’s mul­ti­cul­tur­al­ism and social inclusion.
The sub­mis­sion also calls for the National Education Cur­riculum to include critical thinking skills to overcome prejudice, and the teaching of enlight­en­ment values as a part of core subjects such as History and Science. Education in these values should also be included in English language programs for adult new arrivals.
Please click HERE for access to the Sub­mis­sion.