Warren Snowdon (Lingiari, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Northern Australia and Indigenous Affairs) Share this | Hansard source

I participate in the debate on the Social Security and Other Legislation Amendment (Welfare Payment Reform) Bill 2007 and cognate legislation with mixed feelings. Firstly, the announcement of a national emergency was made six weeks ago. Secondly, it is clear from the contribution of the member for Grey that the pesky rights that people might have are just so pesky that we cannot allow them to have an appeal to an independent tribunal outside the social security system. We will have an internal review of any decisions but not an independent review externally. That says a lot to me about the way in which some in this place approach these measures. At a later point, I will address some elements of what the member for Grey has said and indeed what the Minister for Families, Community Services and Indigenous Affairs said during his contribution. I do not want anyone in this place or anyone who may be listening to misunderstand the concern out in the Aboriginal communities of the Northern Territory about what the government is doing. They need to understand very clearly that there is great concern.

Six weeks ago, on a Thursday, there was a press conference at 1.30 pm, finishing at 1.40 pm, then there was question time, and then decisions and announcements were made. Then came a whole range of measures which were put in place to focus the national attention on this national emergency which, you will recall, included at that point compulsory medical checks for children under 16. That, thankfully, is no longer the case. Sanity has prevailed and it is clear that these medical checks are voluntary, and indeed people are thankful for them. But after six weeks there are still communities in the Northern Territory who have not had a visit from an officer of the Commonwealth to explain to them what the government’s national emergency is about.

On the Monday after the national emergency was announced I rang the minister’s office and I said to the person in the minister’s office, his principal adviser on these matters: ‘You need to understand there is legitimate concern in the community because of misinformation, misunderstanding or whatever it might be. There is genuine fear in some places that this is all about taking the kids away.’ I later heard a story from a person in a community in the Barkly region of the Northern Territory—and recall that all of the communities which are affected by this legislation are in my electorate of Lingiari; 40 per cent of my electorate is Indigenous people and all of them are affected by this legislation. That person in Barkly said she was concerned because she thought the Army was coming to take her young boys away so they would fight in Iraq. Of course, that was absurd, but such was the misinformation and lack of communication which came out of this government after this decision was made that people were left confused and dismayed—and I might say many are still confused and dismayed because they lack information.

I go to the fact that a week ago I attended a meeting of the Central Land Council at a property adjoining Hamilton Downs in the Northern Territory, the McCormack place. I listened to a presentation made by two members of the task force: the chair of the task force, Magistrate Sue Gordon; and General Chalmers. What I found illuminating from that presentation was the lack of information they were able to provide. They could not answer so many basic questions. The response from Magistrate Gordon at one stage was, ‘We’re working on the details as we go.’ Is it any wonder that people are left confused, dismayed and concerned? They do not know what is being proposed.

Yesterday 600-odd pages of legislation—if you include the appropriation legislation it is probably closer to 700 pages—and 350 or 400 pages of explanatory memoranda were given to us in the opposition and to the general public at late morning. We got them, I think, at about 11 am. We were then supposed to digest all of that information and come up with an informed position so that we could debate the legislation here this afternoon and have it out of this place later tonight. I have to say that is an abuse of due process. What that does is show the contempt that this government has for bringing people into the tent, sharing information with them and showing them exactly what it is proposing.

We made the decision at the time this was announced to give it in-principle bipartisan support, because we share the concern about kids being abused. But isn’t it strange that the people who were left to go out and canvass the case, who were talking to communities around the Northern Territory—the advance party, if you like—were not Commonwealth government officials but in fact Labor members of the Northern Territory legislative assembly? They included frontbenchers Marion Scrymgour and Elliot McAdam and backbenchers Alison Anderson, Barbara McCarthy, Karl Hampton and Matthew Bonson—all of whom are Indigenous. They went out, not particularly liking what was announced but nevertheless going out there because of their concern that their communities, the people they represented, were not being given information. I want to thank them greatly for the work they did.

I attended a few of the meetings that they attended. At one of those meetings there were 120 people and at another meeting 150. One was at Milingimbi and one was at Ramingining on the same day. I remember these meetings vividly. Here we were, announcing the government’s proposals and being asked to respond to questions about government policy and about the details of what the government was proposing. We did not have information—as it turns out, neither did the task force nor anyone else—but what we were able to say was: ‘Don’t worry. This is not going to be the end of the world, at least in terms of the arrival of the police and the Army and such like. That is not going to happen. You should relax about that.’

What was very clear in every one of the meetings—it was reported on by each of those members of parliament and by me and my colleague Senator Trish Crossin—was the absolute concern that was being expressed about the proposals to amend those parts of the legislation which address the permit system and those parts which address land issues. What these people saw was the Little children are sacred report, released a few days prior to the Howard government’s announcement, and they said, legitimately: ‘Hang on—what’s this all about? We appreciate the need to address the recommendations in this report, but we do not see the relationship between those land and permit issues and this report.’ This report does not mention those things and, subsequent to this report being released, both of its authors have condemned the government’s position on the issues of land and permits. They say it does not relate to what they were on about.

Frankly, I have a concern about this. It goes to the understanding that people may or may not have about what the relationship between Aboriginal people and country and culture means. If you take from people their ability to live on their land, if you remove them or relocate them, for whatever purpose, or if you do not give them the capacity to retain their cultural identity, you will create severe difficulties for those people and the communities in which they live—difficulties which, no doubt, will lead to family pressures, particularly on children. The psychological wellbeing of Aboriginal Territorians has not been addressed in any way, shape or form by the proposals put forward by the government.

I am conscious of the arguments put by the member for Grey in his response to the shadow minister. But let me make it very clear: no-one with any background or experience in Indigenous affairs in the Northern Territory, with any deep knowledge of these matters—the police, the churches and government workers—supports the idea of removing permits in the way in which the government proposes. Communities themselves find it abhorrent. The Central Land Council, on more than one occasion, has been forced to withdraw the permits of people. What sort of people? Let me give you one example, among many: a storekeeper living in a remote Aboriginal community in the Northern Territory trading in art. What was he doing trading in art? You might say it is not an inappropriate thing to trade in art. He was trading art for Viagra. What is the relationship between art and Viagra? I might ask the same question. You can imagine the implications for the women and children in that community of trading art for Viagra.

This government now proposes to remove the ability of the land councils to remove those permits. In this particular instance, as soon as the land council became apprised of this person’s activity, they had him out of that community within 24 hours by withdrawing the permit. These are the dodgy people, whom my colleague the shadow minister referred to, who would get great joy out of this. Only recently I was talking to a policeman in Maningrida. He said: ‘Can you imagine if this town were an open community and no permits were required to enter? You could drive along the street, take photographs of nude kids and then that afternoon post them on the internet.’ That is true. I have seen some real scumbags in Aboriginal communities—people whom I have no time for—but I have also seen some very good people. It is the scumbags we want to keep out of these communities, and that is why the permit system is so important. Never mind the tommyrot which is coming from the government—we know why the permit system is important, we know why the Aboriginal people in the Northern Territory want to retain the permit system and that is why the opposition intends to move an amendment which will ensure its retention largely in the form that we have it.

I briefly want to talk about a number of other elements of the package, not necessarily about things which have been addressed in these proposals, although I do want to go to one matter. The Minister for Families, Community Services and Indigenous Affairs, in his second reading speech on the Northern Territory National Emergency Response Bill 2007, referred to the issue of town camps. The minister said that the Northern Territory government has announced that it will not resume or forfeit the town camps. He says that it has walked away from its responsibilities. Remember the portrayal he gave in the House at question time of the town camps around Alice Springs and the way in which he illuminated his presentation by commenting on people being attacked and violated. The reason why we have this legislation, to the point where the government now wants to step in the shoes of the Northern Territory government and resume the special purpose leases of the town camps around Alice Springs, is no other reason than the incapability of this minister to negotiate a deal. He set unacceptable preconditions on the negotiations of that deal.

These people in the town camps are not stupid. They, more than the minister, more than any one of us—more than any person who does not live in those town camps—want the improvements that would come from investment of $60 million in the town camps. Let it be clear: they want it. They understand what it means for them and their families, yet this minister says that, because he cannot do a deal, because he cannot negotiate a set of arrangements, because the Northern Territory government says it respects the views of those people, he will override their interests and give himself the power to resume those leases, despite their concerns. I think that says a lot about this minister. But it also portrays some of the issues which we have yet to illuminate in this discussion.

We have heard much about welfare reforms, but the lengths to which this government has gone to put more than 8,000 Aboriginal people out of work and on the dole to facilitate quarantining have not been widely publicised. That has been done by the abolition of CDEP. It has knowingly put CDEP workers—most of them engaged in positive things—out of work, work such as ranger work and community enterprises, work in shops and work in schools and health centres. The government wants to place them into the STEP program or Work for the Dole and, if we are very lucky and we support this, a transition into real jobs. We want them to have real jobs. And those people on CDEP in jobs—which ought to be paid for by the Commonwealth government, the Northern Territory government or local government—should be paid their wage entitlements by that respective level of government. But the immediate impact on communities and community programs will be dramatic. It will spell the death knell of many programs, it will see the erosion of the effectiveness of night patrol community safety efforts, it will erode the profitability of community stores and therefore jobs in the stores, it will make it difficult for homeland outstation support and enterprises generated by CDEP will have no guarantees of continued support. There is a range of impacts with this. The link between CDEP wages and child abuse and substance abuse is spurious and, indeed, insulting, and there is no solid reason for abolishing CDEP.

Most remote area communities have no immediate local economy. They do not have large mines in their vicinity. There is very little in the way of job markets to tap into—and that is one of the issues here. There is no real appreciation of these small area labour markets by anyone in the government, least of all the minister. Community management is funded at least in part by CDEP. What happens to the jobs of tradespersons and other specialists, accountants and administrators, who are currently working because of the $4,000-plus that is paid into CDEP for each participant?

This is a very important issue and it is something which we think might mean that people relocate away from outstations, for example—and this could well be a purpose behind this—to major communities, and perhaps from major communities, towns and cities. What will that do? It will create enormous pressure on those towns and cities like Alice Springs, Darwin and Katherine, where people are concerned genuinely about antisocial behaviour, where people are concerned about the conditions in which people live.

We need to understand that some of the implications of these decisions, which in this case are not part of the legislation, make it very difficult for people to comprehend the motives behind what the government is doing. We share, as I said at the outset, the intention of the government to ensure we address the issue of children who are abused. But isn’t it funny? There are people in this chamber—a person in this chamber and a person in the other chamber—who very recently travelled to the Tiwi Islands aboard a boat. The Tiwi Islands is a restricted area. You are not allowed to take alcohol onto the islands. In this particular instance, Senator Scullion; a minister in a portfolio, Minister Brough; the member for Solomon; and a Northern Territory member of parliament, a CLP member, among others, got off the boat and drank on the land. They then put an esky on a bus. The bus was driven through the community to an airstrip. Two of them, the member for Solomon and the other CLP member from the Northern Territory, were observed drinking bottled beer. They put the empty beer bottles in a bin. Not only is that illegal because it is a restricted area but they have not told us the truth.

There is a real issue here because this legislation, among other things, aims to ban alcohol completely from many communities across the Northern Territory, and here we had a circumstance where alcohol was already banned. (Time expired)

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