Aboriginal community groups have invited TV veteran Kerri-Anne Kennerley to visit town camps in Central Australia as protesters once again gathered outside Network Ten studios in Sydney.
On Monday’s episode of Studio 10, the morning show co-host said “Invasion Day” demonstrators were not doing anything about sexual violence in remote Indigenous communities.
In a follow-up segment, Kennerely said she would be “very happy” to visit a town camp with Alice Springs councillor Jacinta Price and former Greens MP Lidia Thorpe.
Anecdotal evidence and media reports suggest that Indigenous women in Central Australia are up to 80 times more likely to be hospitalised due to family violence than non-Indigenous women in the general population.
In a letter posted to Facebook, the Tangentyere Women's Family Safety Group and Four Corners Men's Council asked the TV host to "learn about the work they do to make our communities safer places".
The groups specialise in early intervention and prevention of domestic violence issues.
“We want all Australians to know that the voices of Aboriginal men and women from the grassroots, people like us Town Campers, need to be heard and we have the solutions,” the letter said.
"We would welcome you to stand with us women and men, hear about our solutions and our experience and recognise the important work that is being done on a community level to deal with issues of domestic and family violence."
They also sent her a T-shirt emblazoned with the slogan from their latest campaign.
Outside the TV studios, tensions still ran high.
'My message to Kerri-Anne Kennerley is, are you going to apologise?” Bundjalung woman Venessa Turnbull-Roberts told NITV.
“Are you going to mean your apology when you say it? Are you going to go and educate yourself? We’re in the 21st Century, sis.”
