New approach to justice in Bourke

For many years the remote New South Wales town of Bourke was renowned for its high crime levels. Now, however, following a new approach to preventing crime, locals are slowly seeing improvement.  

Two years ago local elder and Bourke Aboriginal Working Group chair Alistair Ferguson watched the crime rate in his home town continue to spiral and decided that some fresh thinking was needed to curb crime.

“We realised that if we wanted to decrease crime we had to engage with the community, and ensure the services offered were tailored to community and individual needs,” Alistair said. 

In response, the Working Group conceived the idea of ’Maranguka’, translated from the local Ngemba language as ‘caring for others’. Maranguka is aimed at creating better coordinated support for vulnerable families and children through empowering the local Aboriginal community.

“We found that a lot of crime in Bourke was related to poverty and lack of opportunities. So we ran a series of drivers’ licence programmes which were successful in getting 88 people their licence; half of which were younger than 25,” he said.

“These people are now chasing job opportunities around Bourke or in other towns.”

Alistair and the Working Group have worked closely with local police and the courts to develop the “justice reinvestment” project, whereby funding was spent on crime prevention measures rather than on prisons.

One measure is the creation of a “warrant clinic”.

“When a warrant is issued most people go to ground,” Alistair said.

“They don’t attend appointments for fear of being locked up so get cut from Centrelink and so on. So now instead of a warrant issued for non-serious cases, we work out why they offended, which can be mental health, alcohol or family-related reasons, and then develop a plan to help them.”

Alistair adds that many locals have had little education which has affected their employment prospects.

“The school system failed many of us in the past but programmes like “Yes I can” adult literacy has helped people read,” Alistair said.

“Things like this and improved school attendance will help lower crime. This will lead to jobs and better health for locals and a better future for the whole community.”

Alistair agrees that Bourke has had a bad reputation but says there have been big changes in the last 18 months.

“More locals are taking a pride in Bourke and keeping it clean so a visitor’s first impression is now a clean, peaceful town,” Alistair said.

“In 10 years I want to see people who left Bourke years ago return because they know it’s a safe place to live.”