Officially recognised as Australia Day, January 26 also sees annual rallies drawing attention to the injustices faced by Indigenous people
Officially recognised as Australia Day, January 26 also sees annual rallies drawing attention to the injustices faced by Indigenous people AFP / William WEST

A new report presented by the Australian Human Rights Commission (AHRC) has revealed that the government was failing to take enough measures to address the issue of racism in the country.

It further accused the government of showing reluctance to use the term "racism" and a lack of coordinated action across all levels.

"You have to name the demon to slay it," Australia's Race Discrimination Commissioner's Giridharan Sivaraman told the ABC.

The AHRC report highlighted that maximum discrimination was directed toward First Nations people as well as Muslims, Jews, Asians, and other culturally and linguistically diverse communities, which only denoted systematic failure on the government's part.

To tackle the issue, the agency recommended recognition of a uniform definition of racism and forming a national anti-racism council to provide strategic policy guidance to the government.

The report also called on the government to adopt a "whole-of-society" approach and implement anti-racism measures at all levels of government and across various sectors, including business, education, health, and justice.

Showing not an iota of surprise, Victoria's acting co-chair, Emily Poelina-Hunter, a Nyikina woman, referred to last year as the "devastating year of racism" following the Voice referendum results.

Voters in Australia rejected the constitutional recognition of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples by voting against Voice to Parliament. With the exception of the ACT, which was predicted to vote yes, the referendum was unable to garner a double majority.

"Based on the Voice referendum results, I worry that the national anti-racism framework will not work for addressing racism against Indigenous Australians, and that we will have to wait for trickle-down effects that are decades away, once racism against other groups is finally understood," Dr Poelina-Hunter told ABC.

Poelina-Hunter proposed that a culture of fear, denial, and a lack of empathy were the root causes of racism toward First Nations people.

Sivaraman, in the meantime, highlighted structural shortcomings in tackling the rise in racism against different ethnicities, pointing to larger social difficulties in resisting discriminatory beliefs and actions.

"Racism is about power and negatively racialised people don't have power. Racism allows you to maintain power," Sivaraman said.