Closing the

Gap on

InDigenous

Birth Registration

If you are an Indigenous Australian, anywhere in Australia,  who has run into problems with:

1. ✴    obtaining a birth certificate for yourself or your children,
   

2. ✴    registering the birth of your children,
   

3. ✴    finding out whether your own birth was properly registered,
   

4. ✴    proving your personal identity when trying to obtain:
   

5. •    a drivers licence,
   

6. •    a bank account,
   

7. •    a tax file number,
   

8. •    a passport,
   

9. •    a “working with children” card,
   

10. •    a “proof of age” card,
    

11. •    Centrelink benefits or health care,
    

12. •    entry to school
    

13. •    entry to the workforce   
    

14. •    or any other “official” form of documentation
    

15. ✴   or any other difficulty with proving who you are to the authorities
    

...THEN WE’D LOVE TO HEAR FROM YOU!

Contact us by email, phone or letter at:

email:   roderic.hagen@monash.edu

phone: 03 9905 4205 or 0419 371 848

postal address:    Indigenous Birth Registration Project

                            Castan Centre for Human Rights Law

                            Faculty of Law,

                            Monash University, Vic., 3800

                            Australia

What’s in it for me?

The main potential benefits of this study are to the general Indigenous community. Improving the extent of Indigenous birth registration will make it easier for some people in future to access government services, to obtain driver’s licences & passports, to obtain tax file numbers to reduce the amount of tax taken from their pay and so forth. It also has the potential to improve the quality of statistical information about indigenous health, education, etc., making it easier to target programs at specific problem areas effectively.

Please note that we are NOT a “legal service” or government agency that will be able to resolve individual problems of identification directly.

Nevertheless, where people who we interview have ongoing problems related to birth registration, certification or personal identification we will also endeavour to assist them to resolve their problems by adopting a “go-between” role with relevant government agencies and Indigenous non-government organisations, seeking ways to resolve their problems, or provide them with contact with others who may be able to help them.

  INTRODUCTION        THE RESEARCH PROJECT        THE PROJECT AIMS         THE STATISTICAL STUDY       THE QUALITATIVE STUDY - 1        THE QUALITATIVE STUDY - 2

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