Ian Causley (Page, Deputy-Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

On behalf of the Joint Standing Committee on the National Capital and External Territories, I present the committee’s report entitled Current and future governance arrangements for the Indian Ocean Territories.

Ordered that the report be made a parliamentary paper.

It is a pleasure to present the abovementioned report and speak on it in the House this afternoon. I note that the honourable member for Lingiari will speak as well. He attended the meetings we had with the territories, and it is his electorate, so I am sure he will be very interested in the arrangements. The report is part of a program of inquiries that the committee has undertaken in recent years with regard to governance and related issues in Australia’s external territories. In this report, we have turned our attention to pressing issues of governance and accountability confronting the Indian Ocean Territories of Christmas Island and the Cocos (Keeling) Islands. I am pleased to advise the House that this is a unanimous report, making 13 recommendations.

The evidence presented to the committee during our inquiry drew us to several conclusions. Firstly, there needs to be greater accountability and transparency in decision making by government in relation to the Indian Ocean Territories. Seemingly trivial decisions taken from a great distance in Canberra can have a disproportionately large impact upon these small and isolated communities. The people in those territories need to know why decisions which affect their future are being taken, how those decisions are being made, and how problems will be redressed. Moreover, they need to know that their voices will be heard by governments and departments in Perth and Canberra. There also needs to be greater consultation between government, departments and residents in the Indian Ocean Territories. The level and quality of consultation currently depends on interpersonal relationships between islanders and departmental staff. The committee has received evidence that those relationships have not always been effective in promoting good communications between community and government. There needs to be a formal consultation process put in place, mandated by legislation, to bring community and government together for their mutual benefit. This is especially true of the processes surrounding the application of Western Australian laws in the Indian Ocean Territories and the implementation of service delivery arrangements.

The report also makes a number of recommendations in regard to specific economic issues. The committee has recommended that in future all Commonwealth land released for private development on Christmas Island should be sold at market rates. This is to prevent releases of free land from undermining the property market. The committee has also called for an investigation of the cost of sea freight to and from the territories and the abolition of customs and quarantine charges on freight travelling between the territories and the mainland. It is hoped that this will remove imposts on economic activity. The committee has called for increases in the number of flights between the territories and the mainland, and the opening of international routes, to promote tourism and increase economic activity. Perhaps most significantly, the committee has recommended that the government review its decision to block the licensing of the Christmas Island casino with a view to reissuing the licence.

The committee’s report also addresses wider issues of governance. The options canvassed include maintaining current governance arrangements with some refinement, incorporation of the Indian Ocean Territories into Western Australia and some form of limited self-government. The committee has not shown a preference for any of these options. Rather, it has taken the view that the virtues and drawbacks of all should be considered by the Australian government in conjunction with the community of the Indian Ocean Territories and that the community should be given the chance to make an informed decision on its own behalf as to how the Indian Ocean Territories should be governed in the future. Whatever alterations to the system of governance ultimately result from this inquiry, however, they should be the result of a realistic appreciation of what can be achieved.

I would like to express, on behalf of the committee, our gratitude to all those who participated in the inquiry and to the staff of the secretariat. I have great pleasure in commending the report to the House.

Warren Snowdon (Lingiari, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Northern Australia and Indigenous Affairs) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I thank the member for Page for his presentation and also for presenting the report of the Joint Standing Committee on the National Capital and External Territories to the chamber. I thank the secretariat, as the member for Page has done, for the way in which it helped us to carry out this inquiry. I want to particularly commend the other members of the committee. We were able to reach a unanimous position on the report and its recommendations and I commend members of the committee for the bipartisan way in which they approached this work.

I especially welcome the report because the Indian Ocean Territories of Christmas Island and the Cocos (Keeling) Islands are part of my electorate of Lingiari. I first started working with the communities at the end of 1987. That long-term relationship has provided me with a unique opportunity to have an insight into the cultures and lifestyle of, the level of services available to and the needs of these communities. I have been able to observe the establishment and consolidation of local government in both jurisdictions. Amongst the islanders there is great interest in the issue of governance. The submissions by the shire councils on both islands and the submission by the Christmas Island Chamber of Commerce have given important insights into their views as to the Commonwealth managing the affairs of the islands through its Department of Transport and Regional Services and the service delivery agreements with Western Australian agencies. The islands clearly want a more informed and cooperative dialogue with the Commonwealth and more input into service delivery regardless of whom ultimately delivers the service.

I know that this report will be read by both island communities with a great deal of interest and even, dare I say, eager anticipation. I believe the islanders will welcome the recommendations as they provide a basis on which to move forward by addressing the root causes of many of the islanders’ frustrations. Most importantly, as the member for Page has indicated, there needs to be greater accountability and transparency in decision making by government in relation to the Indian Ocean Territories.

At the public hearings on both Christmas Island and the Cocos (Keeling) Islands, the message was given to the committee loud and clear that the communities want to be involved in decision making and want to work toward greater autonomy as their experience and capacity for control and responsibility increases. The communities want to work with the Commonwealth in a constructive way to achieve this greater autonomy in a sustainable manner. They want increasing opportunities to be involved in decision making and be responsible themselves for the direction of affairs in the Indian Ocean Territories. As the member for Page has said, they do not want to see decisions taken by people in places as far away as Perth or Canberra.

It should be remembered that, although the Cocos and Christmas Island communities share similar colonial histories, each has its own identity, areas of interest and levels of skills in governance. It is wrong for political and bureaucratic masters to assume, from the comfort of the Perth or Canberra offices of DOTARS, that what is good for Christmas Island will necessarily be good for Cocos and vice versa. The report highlights the dilemma of moving forward governance of the IOT as an entity while ensuring that each islander’s needs are addressed and their ideas heard.

Given my experience of these communities, I know that the greatest continuous frustration that the islanders have—and they have had this since I have been involved with them—is their incapacity to be able to influence the decisions that are taken for them or on their behalf and the things that are done to them, not with them. It is about time we recognised, as this report does, the frustrations that they have experienced and the need for government to take a far more involved approach. I also want to make particular reference to an example of that. It concerns the recommendation by the committee:

... that the Australian Government review the decision to block the licensing of a casino on Christmas Island, in consultation with the Christmas Island community, with a view to reissuing a casino licence, at the earliest opportunity.

While we do not have time to canvass all the areas involved in this particular issue, it is clear that the decision by the government to pre-emptively prevent any application for a casino licence on that island has cost the island community millions of dollars in income and certainly hundreds of jobs. The decision was very short sighted, politically expedient and inappropriate, and the government should review it.