Shayne Neumann (Blair, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Indigenous Affairs) Share this | Hansard source

First up I want to congratulate the Close the Gap Campaign Steering Committee and Oxfam for bringing more than 200,000 Australians together to take a stand to support Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander health equality. I want to congratulate them for the work they do. People from all walks of life have come together at events around the country to pledge their commitment to making sure that we improve the health and life expectancy of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people in this country.

The Leader of the Opposition correctly outlined that Labor remains ready, willing and able to negotiate with the government in relation to constitutional recognition. But, as Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people have said to us, 'Nothing about us without us', to quote Les Malezer, who is the co-chair of the National Congress of Australia's First Peoples. And the feedback we have got on our joint select committee on constitutional recognition is that preamble or symbolic change to our Constitution is simply not acceptable but that indeed real and substantive change based on the recommendations of the expert panel, including serious consideration of section 116A of the amendment to the Constitution, should be looked at in terms of what we are doing.

But one of the first things this government did was cut $534 million from front-line services to Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people, many of them community controlled services, and one of the first things they did was claim that it was all an efficiency dividend, red tape reduction and bureaucratic streamlining. In fact, that is not true. In fact, in Senate estimates it was shown that it is clearly the case that front-line services have been cut across the country. Language and learning funding has been cut, and $43 million of funding to legal aid services has been cut across the country. In the Northern Territory, NAAJA cannot deliver the kinds of services they need there. In urban areas as well, where Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people live mostly, services have been cut.

But we have a Prime Minister who does not understand the connection between language and land, between culture and country. And making those disgraceful and insensitive remarks in relation to lifestyle choices cannot be dismissed. You cannot ask Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people to support you in constitutional recognition and not apologise as Labor has called for. You cannot cut $534 million in the budget and then say that it is of no consequence, and you cannot run out a so-called Indigenous advancement strategy—which we call an Indigenous confusion strategy—and roll out only a small amount of money compared with the $2.3 billion that was supposed to be available. We have front-line services delivering a range of programs—tertiary tuition, legal aid services, language services, support for mums and dads, anti-domestic-violence services, support for children, and children and family centres. They have been cut, and cut again, and the government does not realise the consequences. You cannot close the gap by cutting your way to it. It will not work.

So, the Leader of the Opposition has written to the Prime Minister saying that we need to sit down with Indigenous elders and have a conversation with them and try to advance this and get this back on track, because the government does not appreciate what they have done. I think there are people of goodwill on that side with the intention of closing the gap. And I acknowledge the Prime Minister's personal commitment. But he does not quite get it, and I think people on the other side do not quite understand the consequences. I have seen it in Cherbourg in South-East Queensland at an Indigenous settlement there, and in Glebe in Sydney, where there is a large population, and in the Torres Strait, meeting with the Torres Strait Regional Authority, and in Tasmania, with the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people being treated so shabbily in the long history of this country, and in Western Australia, where services for remote communities are being cut without any consultation. And the Prime Minister thinks they should be compliant and should be going ahead with the constitutional recognition. What is he talking about, dispossessing these people who have had 200 years of disadvantage and dispossession and discrimination? And he wants them to go with him? This is a cause we should all adopt and believe in, and there are people on that side who believe in it too, and I urge them to change the Prime Minister's mind, have this meeting, sit down with respected Indigenous leaders and try to get the Close the Gap strategy back on track.

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