Alicia Payne (Canberra, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

It is a great honour to be part of this debate on the statement on closing the gap this year. I want to make my own acknowledgement that we are meeting, as this parliament does every day, on the land of the Ngunawal and Ngambri people. I acknowledge their contribution to our community and region and acknowledge their elders past, present and emerging.

It is a great honour to follow many of the speakers in this debate, who have devoted their lives to reconciliation and to closing that gap in the lives of Indigenous and non-Indigenous Australians. I want to acknowledge the Minister for Indigenous Australians and the shadow minister, the member for Barton, who spoke before me, and also the member for Lingiari, who, in his many years in this place, has worked very hard on this issue. It is an honour to be on our Labor First Nations caucus committee with the member for Barton and Senators McCarthy and Dodson, and to work with them on these issues. It was a particular honour on Reconciliation Day here in the ACT to host a panel discussion on reconciliation with Senator Dodson, Senator McCarthy and the member for Barton, and to hear their views on reconciliation and, very much so, the importance of the Uluru Statement from the Heart to this.

As we look at closing the gap each year, the depth of the gap that is experienced between First Nations people and other Australians is a shame on this nation. This year is no different. Of 17 targets, only three are on track to be met. As the member for Grayndler, our leader, said in his statement:

A gap is something that is easily crossed or closed. The unflinching litany of lopsided statistics before us makes it clear that this is a chasm.

Young Indigenous Australians are 24 times more likely to be incarcerated than their non-Indigenous peers and they make up 100 per cent of children in detention in the Northern Territory. Indigenous Australians are the most incarcerated group of people on this earth, and that is a shame on this nation and this parliament. Indigenous children today are being placed in out-of-home care at 10 times the rate of non-Indigenous children and make up 36 per cent of children living away from their parents, even though they represent only six per cent of all children.

As we look at the targets, even if the adult incarceration goal were to be met, which is a 15 per cent reduction by 2031, the rate would still be more than 11 times higher than for the non-Indigenous population. Even if the youth incarceration goal were to be met, a 30 per cent reduction by 2031, the rate would still be more than 12 times higher than for the non-Indigenous population. And even if the out-of-home-care goal for children were met, a 45 per cent reduction by 2031, the rate would still be five times higher than that for the non-Indigenous population. And there isn't even a defined suicide reduction goal—there's a range of trajectories, from a 20 per cent to a 75 per cent reduction.

As the member for Barton has said, we must not become desensitised to this level of deprivation. As others have also talked about, what is central to solving these problems, which we see after years of looking at the Closing the Gap targets every year, is that we need to do this differently. We have listened to First Nations Australians through the process of the Uluru Statement from the Heart, and they have said what it is they want to change. They have respectfully asked this parliament for voice, treaty and truth, but that respect, at this point, is not being returned. We are not truly listening to First Nations Australians until we implement this in full, and that will help to address these problems. We, as non-Indigenous Australians, cannot begin to fully understand the intergenerational trauma that is experienced as a result of the settlement of this country. But what we can't ignore is that the dispossession of First Nations Australians is fundamental to the establishment of Australia as we know it today, and that trauma continues in these statistics that we look at each year.

The Uluru statement has asked for truth-telling, for a process in order to come to terms with our very dark history in this country, and to move on from that. As the member for Barton also said, truth-telling is not about shame or guilt, but about moving forward, and that is something that we need to do together. The statement has asked for a voice to this parliament, a constitutionally enshrined voice to this parliament so that the answers to some of these problems can be found independent of the government of the day. This is incredibly important, and this is something that I'm proud that Labor is committed to in full. I call on the government and the Greens party to follow us in this. It is incredibly important to address these issues and have a voice enshrined in the Constitution to give a meaningful voice to this parliament on how to address the trauma and the issues facing First Nations people today. The Uluru statement has asked for a treaty, a makarrata commission, and a Labor government would be committed to establishing this with urgency.

Last week we saw the Prime Minister announce a $380 million redress scheme for survivors of the stolen generations in the ACT, the Northern Territory and the Jervis Bay Territory. Labor welcomes this, of course, and I particularly want to welcome it on behalf of my Canberra community, many of whom will be impacted by this. I want to acknowledge that, while there is a financial payment in recognition of the unthinkable treatment that people endured, an important part of this scheme is also the opportunity to tell their story, if they would like to, and to receive an apology. I acknowledge how important that is for the broader addressing of this. We welcome that, but we need to do so much more. We need to be listening to First Nations people about how to address some of these issues, and that is exactly what a voice to parliament that is enshrined in the Constitution, a makarrata commission, would enable us to do.

There are proven ways to reduce the causes of incarceration and deaths in custody. It has been more than 30 years since the Royal Commission into Aboriginal Deaths in Custody handed down its findings and 339 recommendations. But, tragically, hundreds of First Nations Australians have died in custody or in police pursuits since then. I commend the Change the Record movement for what they have been doing on that. A key issue linked to the incarceration of Indigenous people in Australia is the age of criminal responsibility. I'm proud that the ACT is the first jurisdiction to commit to lowering this, as the UN has recommended, because at the moment in this country children as young as 10 can be incarcerated. I think that is clearly wrong. I'm proud that the ACT has made that commitment, but it is something that all states and territories will hopefully move towards, and it is something we should address with urgency. There are proven ways to reduce the causes of incarceration and deaths in custody, and Labor has announced a plan to turn the tide on incarceration and deaths in custody by building on the success of the existing justice reinvestment programs in Bourke to tackle the root causes of crime and reoffending. These include rehabilitation services, family or domestic violence support, homelessness support and school retention initiatives. Where we see programs that are working, we should try to replicate them. Labor will provide specific standalone funding for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander legal services to ensure First Nations families can access culturally appropriate, timely and fair legal assistance before, during and after all coronial processes, and Labor would ensure that deaths in custody are nationally reported in real time. It is extraordinary that in 2021 this counts as innovation.

In 1967 First Nations people asked to be counted, and in 2017 they asked to be heard. I call on the government to implement the Uluru statement in full.

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