Janelle Saffin (Page, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

In speaking in support of the Indigenous Affairs Legislation Amendment Bill (No. 2) 2011, I would like to make a few points and then make some general comments about something that I am involved in in this area. Firstly, the bill makes minor governance and business changes for bodies within the Indigenous affairs portfolio, including the IBA, Indigenous Business Australia, and AHL, Aboriginal Hostels Ltd. It is important that organisations that are supporting the government's and the community's efforts in closing the gap are able to operate efficiently.

I will make a few points about what the IBA and AHL do. IBA is a statutory authority. It was established under the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Act—the ATSI Act 2005. It is creating opportunities for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people to facilitate them to procure or build assets. It is about wealth as well. Home ownership is an important step in economic independence. It is fundamentally important and IBA provides access to affordable home loans for eligible Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Australians.

I am told that since 1975 IBA has assisted over 14,000 families into home ownership. That is a good thing. It is estimated to have generated a massive $1.43 billion of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander wealth. It has also approved 363 new housing loans in 2009-10, with a total value of some $82.2 million, with 92 per cent of these loans going to first home buyers. That is also a good thing. IBA is charged to help eligible Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanders to establish, acquire and grow businesses by providing business support services and business finance. I know some people who have been helped directly through that process.

Aboriginal Hostels Ltd provide temporary hostel accommodation to Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people throughout Australia to enable them to access education, employment, health and other services. And they do more than that—much more. They operate a range of hostels and other programs around Australia. In speaking broadly about the Indigenous affairs portfolio area and also to these amendments, I would like to talk about a national conversation on constitutional recognition that I am involved in. We know that late last year the Prime Minister appointed a 20-member panel. One of its primary terms of reference was, among other things, to lead a national conversation on how Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples could be recognised in the Australian Constitution. It is now a 22-member panel, as the panel had the power to co-opt two more members.

As a panel member, my job is to talk with as many people as I can, as the panel explores ways to recognise in our Constitution the culture, heritage, history and great contribution of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples. Included on the panel are community leaders, legal experts—which I am glad to have on the panel—and four members of parliament. The members of parliament are me, Ken Wyatt, Rob Oakeshott and Rachel Siewert. I know I am not supposed to name them, but the four honourable members are on this panel to broadly represent the multipartisan views of the parliament and the electorate, and we work that way. Eleven members of our panel are Aboriginal or Torres Strait Islander people. The panel has multiparty support, and the Australian government, the opposition, the Australian Greens and the Independent members of the federal parliament have given in-principle support to recognising Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples in the Constitution.

The panel has been travelling across the country to every state and territory, to urban, regional and remote areas, to speak directly to as many people as possible. There have been over 200 consultations Australia-wide. People always want the panel members to come back because, once the members are in the community talking with and listening to the community, having that conversation, a whole lot of questions come out of it and people raise a whole lot of issues that are not necessarily about constitutional recognition. Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people say, 'This is a really nice opportunity to have a conversation about some of the issues that concern us and, yes, we are very interested in this issue of constitutional recognition.'

We are asking Australians to think about constitutional change and to put their views to the panel. Over the last few weeks, in my area two consultations took place, one in Grafton and one in Lismore, which were really well attended. The way that we work is to talk with local community leaders and meet with the mayors in various places, to have a roundtable with local Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander leaders and then to have a public meeting. That format has been working very well; everybody gets to have their say.

Before the panel embarked on the round of consultations, they released a discussion paper, and that was the starting point for the national consultation. It can be found on our website, which is www.youmeunity.org.au. The paper sets out background information about the Constitution and how the Constitution can be changed, through rigorous and exacting processes, and the potential benefits for all Australians from Constitutional recognition. It also explores possible ideas for constitutional recognition that are discussed and developed during the panel's community consultations. The ideas for constitutional change referred to were just the starting point for consultations to gather the views of the Australian people.

The panel has not agreed to or endorsed any ideas on constitutional recognition but has put in a paper some of the ideas that have come from the community. It does not endorse them but uses them as a point of conversation. The panel will carefully consider all ideas for recognition over the course of consultations.

What the panel did do was agree on four principles that guide our consideration of how we approach the conversation, the consultations and the ideas put before the panel. The first principle is to contribute to a more unified and reconciled nation, and I cannot see anybody disagreeing with that. The second is to be of benefit to and accord with the wishes of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples. Again, I cannot see any disagreement with that, because it involves looking at recognition for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people in the Constitution. The third is to be capable of being supported by an overwhelming majority of Australians, from across the political and social spectrums. Again, I cannot see anybody disagreeing with that, because we know that for constitutional change to happen it has to happen as a process of referendum, and we know the history of referendums in Australia. Referendums are successful because they put an idea before the Australian people for endorsement and, if the idea has broad political and social support from all the political and social spectrums, then it stands a good chance of being supported.

The fourth principle was that it must be technically and legally sound. That presents the panel with some challenges in looking at what is technically and legally sound when you come to looking at the Constitution. There are many minds turning themselves to this question, and there are people on the panel who have wonderful expertise and backgrounds in this area. We are drawing from a broad group of Australians and experts in that area on that particular issue. These broad principles are guiding the thinking but, beyond that, there is—

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