Michael McCormack (Riverina, National Party) Share this | Hansard source

Eddie Koiki Mabo and a group of Murray Islanders challenged almost two centuries of legal doctrine when they asked the courts to recognise them as the rightful owners of their land in the Torres Strait. On 3 June 1992, the High Court found the group did have native title and that it was a right that extended to all Indigenous Australians. Seven High Court judges declared:

… the Meriam people are entitled as against the whole world to possession, occupation, use and enjoyment of the lands of the Murray Islands …

Eddie Mabo died of cancer on 21 January 1992, just five months before this historic High Court ruling, which would change Australian land law. The judgment was so historic because it completely overturned the idea of terra nullius—land belonging to no-one—and said that native title survived in many places even though the land had been taken by the Crown. Today the ruling continues to play an important part in islander identity. On 3 June 2012, Aboriginal people across the nation marked 20 years since this historic decision, which changed the lives of Aboriginal people and the ties they had to their land.

The Wiradjuri tribe reside in my electorate, with large populations being in Griffith, Leeton, Narrandera, Wagga Wagga and West Wyalong, as well as a number of other places. Based on 2011 census data for the division of Riverina, there were 6,866 people identified as Indigenous persons in my electorate. On Saturday, 26 May, I attended the Sorry Day commemoration for Wagga Wagga and was moved by the words of local elder and chair of the Wagga Wagga Aboriginal Elders Group Isabel Reid. I would like to share with you her eloquent words, which were superbly delivered:

Sorry Day remembers the separation of Aboriginal children from their families and communities

Taking Aboriginal children away began in 1869 and possibly before then.

It was a Government policy of the past.

Today is the day to remember because it is important to remember the past.

But we do have to move on and make a future for ourselves and our children.

It is up to us as Aboriginal people to do this.

It is our time now to make things better.

Once we had no say but now we have.

We need to take all the opportunities available to us.

I'll do what I can but it is up to each person to make their own personal choice.

Life goes on.

The hurt does go away in time.

We need for you to be proud of everything that Aboriginal people have achieved.

Be positive.

If I can do it, so can you.

I was part of the Stolen Generations but I had to carry on.

I am very proud of what Aboriginal people have achieved and happy that so many are doing well.

You can do well too.

You can build on the work of the people like William Ferguson, Jack Kinchella, Helen Grosvenor, Selina and Jack Patten.

They began the struggle.

It's up to us all not to let them down.

They had the hard row and we need to make sure we keep on going and do the best we can.

The past is history.

Tomorrow is a mystery.

But today, is a gift. That is why they call it the present.

Brilliantly said, Aunty Isabel.

On 2 December 2011 the shadow minister for Indigenous affairs, Senator Nigel Scullion, and I had the pleasure of visiting an establishment which encompasses the words of Aunty Isabel. Tirkandi Inaburra Cultural and Development Centre is an Aboriginal community-run centre offering Aboriginal boys aged between 12 and 15 years a culturally based residential program aimed at reducing future contact with the criminal justice system by strengthening the boys' cultural identity, self-esteem and resilience. The centre houses 16 boys at a time, and the boys stay at the centre on a voluntary basis for three to six months. Whilst at the centre, the boys engage in educational, sport, recreational, life, living skills and cultural activities which have all been designed to incrementally develop each participant's skills and abilities. Schooling is providing on site by the New South Wales Department of Education and Training. The centre is located on a 780-hectare property between Coleambally and Darlington Point.

The name 'Tirkandi Inaburra' means 'to learn to dream' in the Wiradjuri language. Tirkandi Inaburra delivers a culturally based residential program aimed at strengthening cultural identity and resilience and empowering its young participants to reach their full potential in life. Boys who live in communities located between the Lachlan and the Murray and between Balranald and the western side of the Blue Mountains are eligible to apply to come to the centre. The boys choose to attend the program, they choose to stay and they choose to comply with the rules. The centre, well managed by Anthony Paulson—who is a wonderful role model—is having an encouraging impact on the lives of those who have been mentored there. Most of the boys who attend this centre thrive once they rejoin their communities, and it is places such as this which Senator Scullion believes should be replicated across this wide brown land and which would make the late Eddie Mabo very proud. It is a positive place where people are given responsibility for the path their lives can take.

All fair-minded Australians want to see respectful and adequate recognition of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people. As I said in my inaugural speech:

Nationally, we need to do more for Aboriginal health to increase the life expectancy and standard of living of our first nation people.

Help needs to go where it is most needed. Words are one thing, but genuine, desperately needed action is essential to enable better health outcomes, more affordable housing and greater job prospects for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people in rural and remote areas, including the Riverina. The money is there to achieve such goals; it just needs to be allocated appropriately so it does not end up in the pockets of bureaucrats and lawyers.

A recent account of where we are failing was shown by the ABC's 7.30 a few days shy of Mabo's 20th anniversary. On Wednesday, 30 May ABC reporter Caro Meldrum-Hanna was on the streets in a small Aboriginal community which has been plagued by abuse and violence. Less than 10 hours drive from Sydney, the world's seventh richest city, lies a community racked with despair, beset by strife of the worst imaginable kind. For decades the mission and its people went unnoticed and ignored until Marcus Einfeld, the then President of the Human Rights and Equal Opportunity Commission, crossed the divide in 1987 and launched an investigation into the living conditions and the state of housing inside Toomelah in northern New South Wales. What he found shamed the nation and forced people in high places to take action.

Dirt roads were paved, housing was built and a sewerage system was put in place. Yet despite tens of millions of dollars worth of government funding which was poured in over two decades, and despite the involvement of dozens of government agencies, the problems which plagued Toomelah of yesteryear are still sadly all too present today. According to elder Glynis McGrady, children as young as five are being raped and girls as young as nine were prostituting themselves at truck stops for cigarettes and money. Sexual abuse is rife in the community, yet little is done. How could we let this get so bad?

The federal member for Parkes, a colleague of mine, Mark Coulton, said the ABC's 7.30 shows exactly what is happening in Toomelah. He has been working with both Toomelah's local government and the Nationals state member Kevin Humphries to come up with a solution which will benefit the community. In 2009 the government closed down the Community Development Employment Projects, exacerbating social problems and intensifying the high level of unemployment. The Community Development Employment Projects, an initiative to assist unemployed Aboriginal people, was hugely popular in Toomelah and created local employment opportunities for residents. The community has unfortunately experienced a number of ill effects since the closure of the program.

The area holds a special place in my federal colleague's heart and he wants to see the right thing done for these people. He said: 'The people of Toomelah are good people. The community has a special place with me. Something needs to be done. I know most of the residents personally. I am very fond of them. They are wonderful people, but they are living in a very troubled society. While it may be fair for adults to choose how they live, the children that live within that community have no say as to the poverty they are brought up into and they need their safety secured.'

In his inaugural speech to the New South Wales parliament on 30 May 2007, Kevin Humphries said:

I would say, and am saying, sorry—sorry for what we have not achieved for Aboriginal people in this country. It is 40 years since the recognition of Aboriginal citizenship and I can honestly say we have a very long way to go in closing the gaps that exist between the lives of indigenous and non­indigenous people. I am committed to growing and supporting leadership within our Aboriginal communities, growing community capacity and encouraging all people to take advantage of what mainstream Australia has to offer.

However, with bad examples come good ones. On 27 March this year, as part of the fly-in fly-out inquiry of the House of Representatives Standing Committee on Regional Australia, I had the pleasure of visiting Milikapiti, a community on Melville Island off the coast of the Northern Territory. The health centre staff on the island include Raelene Mungatopi, who won the 2010 award for excellence from the Northern Territory health service for having the highest blood testing rates in Australia for diabetes diagnosis and ongoing management. Another Aboriginal health worker, Miriam Daniels, has achieved one of the highest child immunisation rates in any Aboriginal community in the Territory. Both women noted that they had taken up training on the urging—might I say insistence—of Raelene's aunty but were finding it hard to find successors because of the need to go to Darwin for training.

The Aboriginal people in my electorate of Riverina are another example of people moving on and making a future for themselves and for their children. In the past few months I have attended openings of Aboriginal medical centres in the larger centres of Griffith and Wagga Wagga and was lucky enough to tour these great new facilities. The Aboriginal people are taking what they have and moving forward to establish a better future for the younger generations. On Friday, 8 June the Griffith Aboriginal Medical Service was officially opened. The service is dedicated to the entire community and currently has 6,500 clients on its books, with 2,000 being Aboriginal people. The Griffith Aboriginal Medical Service was established in July 2000 and now has a centre of which it should be rightly proud.

The original organisation was a community controlled health service in name only, having no resources to provide healthcare services to Aboriginal people within the region at the western end of the Riverina electorate. In May 2004 the Aboriginal medical service received funding from the Department of Health and Ageing. In 2009 the Aboriginal medical service received capital works funding to purchase and refurbish an existing building and to relocate existing services into a more spacious facility. The relocation occurred in November 2011. On the first day of the following month, Senator Scullion and I toured the new centre in Jondaryan Avenue. I was most impressed with the outlook of this new centre, which not only featured services for medical treatment but represented a safe place for teenagers, new mothers, struggling community members and anyone in need of help of any kind to go. The centre offers a comprehensive range of services to assist the community.

A similar service is being established in Wagga Wagga. The Riverina Medical and Dental Aboriginal Corporation clinical services building opening took place on Friday, 18 May. I acknowledge the government's investment in these important Aboriginal facilities. We all need to help close the gap—today, tomorrow and into the future—not just for Aboriginal Australians but for all those whose home is girt by sea.

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