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The NHMRC 'Values and Ethics - Guidelines for Ethical Conduct in Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Health Research' are the official NHMRC guidelines for researchers undertaking research involving Aboriginal peoples in Australia.

The NHMRC guidelines "Keeping research on track: a guide for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples about health research ethics", is a resource document for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people to refer to when making decisions about health research in their communities.

However, the NACCHO Board of Directors has endorsed neither of these NHMRC Guidelines (with the exception of the NHMRC "Guidelines on Ethical Matters in Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Health Research" which were issued in 1991). The NACCHO Board has never been approached for their endorsement of these guidelines.

The view of NACCHO was that the revised guidelines are incomplete and fail to provide sufficient guidance to researchers on how ethical research should be conducted. The final version did not sufficiently take account of the submissions received by the Working Party from the Aboriginal Community Controlled Health Services sector during the public consultation phase.
For example, there is little advice to researchers on how they should consider dissemination of research results to participants and communities/bodies. In the NHMRC Statement on Consumer and Community Participation in Health and Medical Research (click here to down load pdf of this document) there is a checklist on this matter called "letting people know the results". Such information is absent from the Aboriginal health research guidelines.

The recommendations make no reference to community representative bodies established by Aboriginal peoples and thus has the potential to disempower them. The guidelines lack sufficient Aboriginal community mandate and their approval in contrast to the 1991 NHMRC guidelines and 1987 NAIHO report accompanying the 1991 guidelines.

The failure to seek NACCHO endorsement of these guidelines is in itself in breach of the recommendations of these guidelines. In particular, the anomaly of guidelines having been developed for Aboriginal peoples, without the endorsement of the representative body for Aboriginal people’s health is considered anomalous.

NACCHO is in the process of developing its own guidelines. NACCHO still considers the NHMRC 1991 guidelines to be valid. They can be sourced here .

In addition, guidelines developed by NACCHO Affiliates can be accessed here .