Jenny Macklin (Jagajaga, Australian Labor Party, Minister for Families, Housing, Community Services and Indigenous Affairs) Share this | Hansard source

Following the shocking findings of the Little children are sacred report and the recommendations that it made, the Northern Territory emergency response was launched in June last year. Initiated by the Howard government when we were in opposition, we supported the measures, acknowledging the need for an urgent response and we offered bipartisan backing. As I said in my press statement when I released the Northern Territory emergency response review report this week, the government remains committed to continuing and strengthening the Northern Territory emergency response. We are determined to work in partnership with Indigenous Australians to improve the safety and wellbeing of children and families in remote Northern Territory communities and to make real inroads towards closing the gap.

We are also committed to an approach that examines the facts and makes policy decisions based on evidence, anchored in what works. The Prime Minister reiterated this government’s commitment to evidence based policy after yesterday’s Press Club address. He said, ‘Our approach will be to embrace all those things that have worked in the intervention and be mindful of where there may have been shortcomings and how we can improve them.’ He stated:

This Government is driven by one thing: how do you close the gap between Indigenous and non-Indigenous Australians and what in practical terms makes that work.

That is why we commissioned a review into the effectiveness of the Northern Territory emergency response measures—to examine what has been effective and what needs to be strengthened and to make recommendations for the future.

I received the report on Monday and made it public. I did not receive any drafts. I thank the members of the review board and the expert group for their personal commitment in preparing this report. I note in particular that they made a number of visits—over 30 individual visits—to remote communities, met with many delegations of interested people and reviewed over 200 submissions to make sure that they heard the concerns of all people affected by the Northern Territory emergency response.

The report makes three overarching recommendations and sets out 48 specific recommendations on a number of different emergency response measures. In recognition of the importance and complexity of the issues and the need to make sure that we understand the implications of solutions recommended by the review board, the government will take a small amount of time to consider the report. I do expect that there will be a comprehensive response from the government by the end of the year.

The government committed in the 2008-09 budget $666 million to address Indigenous disadvantage in the Northern Territory. As part of that, we will be continuing all the current Northern Territory emergency response initiatives while we considered the review report’s recommendations. We also made almost $100 million available for 200 extra teachers and almost $30 million for three Indigenous boarding colleges in the Northern Territory. One of the very concerning findings in the review report’s analysis is that there is an enormous amount more to be done in education. The regular attendance of children at school is still nowhere near good enough.

Income management is continuing in the Northern Territory to make sure that welfare payments are used for the benefit of children and to increase the financial security of families raising those children. As at 10 October this year, over 15,500 customers were being income managed in 70 Northern Territory communities and their associated outstations and 10 town camp regions.

The food security of communities has been assessed and upgraded on a region by region basis through community stores’ licensing arrangements. As at 15 October, 68 community stores have been licensed for income managed customers and five communities have access to bush order food security. The introduction of a school nutrition program operating in 68 communities and associated outstations and 10 town camps is providing breakfast and lunch to school-aged children. We certainly hope that that is improving their concentration and engagement in education.

The government decided this week to make a down payment on pension reform—a payment of $1,400 for single pensioners and $2,100 for couples—and a one-off payment of $1,000 per child to family tax benefit A families. These significant payments will be made automatically in early December. Eligible pensioners and families will receive this payment in the same way as other existing Centrelink payments. I announce today that this means that if a person’s pension or payment is currently subject to income management then 100 per cent of the one-off payment will be quarantined.

Income management is currently operational in the Northern Territory and in Cape York and, subject to the agreement of the new Western Australian government, income management is due to have commenced in selected urban and remote areas of Western Australia by that payment date. People will be able to discuss with Centrelink how they want to allocate the extra funding towards meeting priority needs under the income management system. Income management of these payments will prevent a sudden flow of cash towards items such as alcohol, tobacco, gambling or pornography, which has unfortunately happened in the past with one-off bonus payments.

The income management of these funds will support the government’s objective of protecting the health and safety of children. This is tangible evidence of our commitment to get our approach to protecting vulnerable families and children right and to put in place comprehensive welfare reform policy for all Australians. We certainly know that housing is critical to children’s safety, wellbeing and health. No family can function in substandard, overcrowded houses and we know that there are far too many of those in Indigenous communities in the Northern Territory. We have announced that we are investing $813 million in remote Indigenous housing and infrastructure in the Northern Territory. We did that in a joint agreement with the Northern Territory government.

Just last week, while I was in Wadeye, I announced details of three building industry consortiums that will deliver the largest upgrade of housing ever undertaken in remote Indigenous communities in the Northern Territory. Each of these consortiums will design and construct housing works packages with an emphasis on training and jobs for Indigenous people. A key focus of the program is to provide local jobs and training opportunities for Indigenous people. Specific targets for employment and training will be negotiated with alliance partners.

The housing works packages will be delivered across 73 communities and targeted urban living areas, 16 communities will receive major capital works and 57 communities will receive housing refurbishments. We expect to see around 750 new homes built, including new subdivisions, more than 230 new houses to replace homes that will have to be demolished, more than 2,500 major housing upgrades, essential infrastructure to support new homes, and improvements to living conditions in town camps. Long-term leases must be in place in the 16 communities before work can commence. Leases have already been secured at Nguiu, and negotiations are well under way at Tennant Creek and on Groote Eylandt. These leases are expected to be finalised later this month.

The Australian and Northern Territory governments are working with land councils, communities and town camps to secure appropriate land tenure in the remaining communities. Work on upgrading essential services is expected to commence in Tennant Creek and Nguiu in November this year, with housing works to follow in Tennant Creek, in Nguiu and on Groote Eylandt from April next year. The entire program is scheduled for completion by June 2013.

The Australian government also recognises that creating socially and economically viable communities in remote Indigenous parts of Australia is a huge challenge. Our approach, as is known by the parliament, has been to set high-level targets to close the gap, to identify effective policy building blocks and to then put in place the policy and program settings to reach those targets. On employment, our target is to halve the gap in Indigenous employment within a decade. This is critical if we are to see economic participation, especially in remote communities. It is fundamental also to sustainable long-term improvement in the life outcomes for Indigenous Australians. Lifting Indigenous economic participation demands concerted, cooperative effort and attitudinal change from governments, industry and Indigenous people themselves.

Under the Northern Territory emergency response, as of 8 October over 1,500 Australian government funded jobs have been created in areas such as night patrols, rangers, broadcasting, education support, child care and municipal services. On 6 October 2008, the government released a paper on the government’s preferred model for Indigenous employment programs. It is called ‘Increasing Indigenous employment opportunity’. The model includes reforms to the Community Development Employment Projects program and the Indigenous Employment Program. These reforms are a key element to meeting our target of halving the employment gap between Indigenous and non-Indigenous Australians within a decade. We know that we have to create opportunities and also give Indigenous people the skills and training that they need to get and keep a job.

The government also welcomes the Australian Employment Covenant proposal initiated by Mr Forrest to work with Australia’s major corporations to provide 50,000 employment opportunities for Indigenous Australians. The Prime Minister has indicated that the Australian government will help bridge any training gap through the provision of appropriate employment related training.

Our Commonwealth agencies will work very closely with the business sector to make sure that we have the smooth implementation of this initiative and to maximise the employment opportunities that it will create. The proposed changes to the Community Development Employment Projects and the changes to the Indigenous Employment Program will certainly assist the Employment Covenant’s task. We want the Community Development Employment Projects to focus on work readiness skills. We want to see more Indigenous people able to get regular jobs in their communities and in nearby places. We want to see people moving into regular jobs where opportunities exist and, of course, to bring about the arrangements with the private sector that will see those job opportunities created.

Minister O’Connor has also announced the proposed changes to the universal employment service, which will begin from 1 July 2009. These changes too will see a much more tailored, individualised response, especially to the most disadvantaged jobseekers in this country. We intend to consult on our Community Development Employment Projects proposals. These consultations will be held from 20 October to early November. Following feedback from those consultations, the government will make final decisions and announce reforms that are expected to start on 1 July next year.

The government also values its relationship with Indigenous communities in the Northern Territory and in particular has made every effort to listen to the voices of the most vulnerable—and I would have to say that they are the women and children in these communities. We respect the positive leadership coming from many men in the Northern Territory and that was especially displayed at the Aboriginal Male Health Summit this year, when hundreds of Aboriginal men apologised to Aboriginal women for the impact of family violence. (Time expired)

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