Over the past couple of days, a team of dedicated lawyers and support workers, working late into the night, have been run off their feet.
Northern Territory Police are in the midst of a blitz in remote communities, picking up people who have had warrants issued for their arrest.
It is this team's job to provide lifesaving welfare checks and critical legal advice to distressed young Aboriginal children taken into police custody, breast feeding mothers, and people with chronic illnesses.
Inside the North Australian Aboriginal Justice Agency's 24-hour a day Custody Notification Service, long and busy nights on the phone to NT Police stations, advocating and triaging support for Aboriginal people who have just been arrested is the norm.
It is a service that has worked quietly in the background since 2019, but last year funding became precarious despite previous assurances.
While the service was thrown a 12-month lifeline by the Commonwealth this week in the federal budget, funding beyond that is yet to be secured.
"I think bewilderment really," Stephen Karpeles, the criminal lawyer in charge of the six-person CNS team, said of the news the service was, and still is, in jeopardy.
"There were deaths in custody, and significant issues of people in custody, who were not being afforded their rights … and being prejudiced.
"You only have to see the footage that came out of the Alice Springs watch house just before the custody notification service started … [which showed] racial taunting and mistreatment.
"I'm not saying that these things occur routinely. Actually, I've been very impressed with the way police conduct themselves.
"But what I'm trying to say is that the level of scrutiny that the CNS provides … has really assisted Aboriginal people who are going through that journey through the criminal justice system.
Calls for ongoing funding from NT government
After months of angst, Mr Karpeles said the budget lifeline – although temporary – was a "relief".
In 2018, the service was funded by the federal government for three years.
The CNS was set up in the NT in response to a recommendation of the 1991 Royal Commission into Deaths in Custody to create a legislative requirement that police contact the Aboriginal Legal Service whenever an Indigenous person is taken into custody.
Mr Karpeles said it was agreed at the onset the NT government would take over funding the service at the end of the three years, and protection of the service would be entrenched in legislation.
But that has not happened.
He said of particular concern is the rate of youth incarceration – which has almost doubled since the introduction of the NT's youth bail law reforms — and questioned who would provide support and legal advice late into the night if the service was defunded.
Attorney-General Selena Uibo has rejected the notion funding is within the NT government's remit, and could not provide any assurances for the service after the Commonwealth funding ran out.
"The Custody Notification Service is funded by the federal government," she said.
"During this time a review of the service will be conducted, which will be a useful evaluation tool to decide upon future changes to the service, including its future funding needs."
Over the past year, the CNS team has aided 8,000 Aboriginal Territorians.
Of those, 750 were under the age of 18, almost 200 of them required interpreters, more than 50 were pregnant, a further 60 were breastfeeding at the time, and around 1,500 people required medication for critical chronic illnesses.
"You really do have a greater chance of avoidable harm coming to pass for someone who comes into custody, because police might not extract the information from that person that we're able to," Mr Karpeles said.
"Maybe the person just doesn't trust [police] enough to tell them that they've just been sexually assaulted, or to tell them their medication is at home, or that their two-year-old child is at home in a room with nobody to look after them.
"These are the sorts of things that our service is picking up because we are communicating with Aboriginal people in a culturally sensitive way."
Service essential for justice
Annmarie Lumsden, director of the Northern Territory Legal Aid Commission, said defunding the CNS could ultimately lead to an increase in deaths of Indigenous Australians in custody.
She said 61 per cent of the NT Legal Aid Commission's clients are Indigenous, and over the past three years the service has had a major impact.
"The NT has the highest rates of Indigenous incarceration in the country and is the only jurisdiction where police are not required by law to tell people in custody that they have a right to talk to a lawyer," Ms Lumsden said.
"Most importantly, the CNS asks the person if they are okay. Often the answer is no.
"Threats of self-harm or suicide are common. Concerns about access to medication are common. Injuries that need to be examined by health professionals can also be common."
Northern Territory Senator Malarndirri McCarthy echoed the sentiments of the Legal Aid Commission, and lamented the stopgap support.
"The custody notification service and other vital services delivered by NAAJA are paramount to the welfare and wellbeing of their clients — many of whom are children," she said.
"We have to deal with the root causes that see Indigenous people end up in custody in the first place."
