Finally that key Indigenous agencies such as Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Commission (ATSIC) were complicit in this tragic set of unfolding events (Langton 2008).
The Intervention addressed the protection of children's rights, recognized in the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child. It privileged such rights over others, including the prohibition on discrimination and equality before the law. (UNESCO, 2013) Despite the rhetoric created, the aim of the Intervention as stated by Children's Court Magistrate and chairperson of the Intervention Sue Gordon (2007), in her Four Corners interview "We need to think of the children for the future" (ABC. Four Corners, 2007). She further asserted that the Northern Territory Government and Indigenous leaders had known of the issues around child protection twenty years prior to the intervention and had failed the communities.
The Northern Territory Intervention Response polarized Indigenous academic views on the treatment of the Indigenous people clearly one of the focus areas has been on the responsibility of parents and carers in providing them with the building blocks for opportunities to become engaged in education and training. Again Sue Gordon (2007) in her Four Corners interview made these valid points in relation to the Commonwealth Development Employment Program (CDEP). That CDEP marginalizes Aboriginals by treating them as second-class citizens as they are in a sense working for the dole. That CDEP "does nothing for providing Aboriginal people with training and skills in getting them into real jobs paying award wages" (Four Corners, 2007). Hard hitting was her comment, "I have had young people in my court at 15 aspiring to go on CDEP at 16, this is not good enough". (Four Corners, 2007). The NT Intervention identified that there is a real need for literacy and numeracy skills to be upgraded before Indigenous people can be put into real jobs, which I argue needs to be started at an early age.
