Warren Snowdon (Lingiari, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for External Territories) Share this | Hansard source

Today is National Close the Gap Day, and it is my privilege to be able to address the House on this very important matter. It is important that we accept our responsibilities as a national parliament to close the gap in life expectancy and in educational, employment and, indeed, justice outcomes for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Australians. Today is very important for us all to recommit our efforts to addressing those issues which will help us close the gap. But to do that we have to treat communities as a whole. We have to understand that fixing the housing problem in communities will have an impact on health, education and employment outcomes. All of these are very important things.

I know that our leader, Mr Shorten, has committed the Labor Party to justice targets. That is a very important thing as well. But I would say to the government that the best thing you can do at the moment, in my view, is to recommit yourself to the National Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Health Plan, which I know you have adopted in a bipartisan way, and to fund in this forthcoming budget the implementation strategy for that plan. The plan provides a comprehensive approach to helping us address the enormous health gap between Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Australians and the rest of us. I ask the government to make sure that the budget, whenever it is—we do not know when it is; it could have been yesterday!—ensures that this issue is properly funded.

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