Andrew Southcott (Boothby, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

I am pleased to speak on the Closing the Gap statement. It has now been six years since Prime Minister Rudd made the apology and began the Closing the Gap program. It is a good time to do a stock take to see how we are doing on the goals that were set at that time. I think it is well known that, for Prime Minister Abbott, Indigenous affairs is something that is very close to his heart. He has said that he wants to spend a week each year in a remote community. He will be doing that in Arnhem Land this year. He has taken time off to work in communities in Cape York to get a real sense of what sort of problems those communities are dealing with.

I want to speak specifically about the health of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people. While it is true that it is improving in many areas, there is still a long way to go. One of the goals of Closing the Gap is improving the health of Indigenous Australians. One area where for limited cost we could see large improvements that will last over lifetimes is making sure that all Indigenous Australians get the type of antenatal care that every Australian should expect. We know that problems later in life, such as the higher prevalence of diabetes and problems with general health, relate very much to the antenatal environment that people had before they were born. If we do not address having good antenatal care for Indigenous Australians then these problems will continue throughout their lives.

The government is working with the National Congress of Australia's First Peoples, the National Aboriginal Community Controlled Health Organisation, and state and territory governments to create a 10-year National Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Health Plan. A comprehensive approach to chronic disease management is being undertaken through local health services, encouraging people in communities to undergo health checks and ensuring systematic follow-ups.

One of the parts of Closing the Gap which was good was the recognition that you had to do a lot through primary care, to do it through general practices, because while a lot of Indigenous people use the NACCHOs, the National Aboriginal Community Controlled Health Organisation, something like 50 per cent will go to a GP who is not a NACCHO. There were incentives on the MBS for people to give Indigenous health checks for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanders.

On the most recent figures, the life expectancy of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanders is 10.6 years lower than that of the non-Indigenous population for males. That is, an Aboriginal or Torres Strait Islander born between 2010 and 2012 can expect to live to 69.1 years. For Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander women it is 73.7 years. Life expectancy is about a decade less than the non-Indigenous population. One of the goals of Closing the Gap was to reduce the gap in life expectancy within a decade. The report card shows that only the Northern Territory is on track to meet this target.

Since 2005-2007, Indigenous life expectancy at birth for boys has increased by 1.6 years and by 0.6 years for girls. Over the same period, the gap between Indigenous and non-Indigenous life expectancy narrowed by 0.8 years for males and 0.1 years for females. So there have been small improvements in Indigenous life expectancy, but a lot more needs to be done for the future of Indigenous Australia.

It is clear that we are failing to make progress in many areas. Twice as many Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander infants as non-Indigenous infants are born of low birth weight. Only one per cent of people working in the health workforce are Indigenous. Indigenous death rates are highest, compared with non-Indigenous rates, between the ages 25 and 64. The causes of death with the largest contribution to excess mortality are circulatory diseases, external causes, neoplasms, respiratory diseases and endocrine, metabolic and nutritional disorders such as diabetes. There are a lot of risk factors that lead to excess Indigenous mortality. They have much higher rates of tobacco smoking, much higher rates of excessive alcohol consumption and higher rates of overweight and obesity. They have poor nutrition and they use health services less.

There is encouraging news on mortality rates for Indigenous children. One of the goals was to halve the gap in mortality rates for Indigenous children under five within a decade. If the trend over the last 15 years continues we should achieve that target by 2018.

This Closing the Gap statement is an interim report card. It shows that the Northern Territory, for example, is doing very well in closing the gap in life expectancy and that there has been improvement in reducing mortality rates for Indigenous children. But there is still a lot more to be done.

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