Ken Wyatt (Hasluck, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

In opening my address, I want to apply my comments universally across Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander communities. I want to make particular reference to the 4,000-plus Nyungar and Aboriginal constituents in my electorate. Closing the Gap has been a tremendous strategy to focus people's attention. I had the privilege of being involved in the COAG processes in which we considered: the overarching specific purpose payment arrangements between the Commonwealth and state governments; the national reform agreements, of which there are seven significant ones—in particular the National Indigenous Reform Agreement Closing the Gap; and some 23 national partnership agreements which identify broad areas of reform for service delivery, policy development and the coordination of services between state and territory and Commonwealth governments. In particular, the way in which the programs, targets, outputs and outcomes have been identified will make a difference in a range of areas.

What is strong about the National Indigenous Reform Agreement is its capacity to make a difference not only in the way in which Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people access targeted services but in the mindset of those who provide the resources for the provision of services at the local level. It allows them to think outside the square and to look at ways in which they can make a difference.

One of the greatest challenges relates to the way in which partnerships prevail. These kinds of partnerships have historically been one-sided. We have a tendency within government, and particularly as public servants, to work within the guidelines and frameworks that we are given and to make sure that programs roll out in such a way that the accountability and compliance requirements are met. We used to be rigid in the way that that occurred, and any deviation that might have had a far longer-lasting outcome was not always accommodated.

One of the things that I really like about the National Indigenous Reform Agreement is the way in which it focuses on some key areas: Indigenous early childhood development, remote service delivery and Indigenous economic participation. I must acknowledge the comments of the minister, who talked about the opportunities that he is creating with the trusts that will enable young Indigenous Australians to access the skilling required for the industry sectors they seek career pathways in. Other key areas are remote Indigenous housing, closing the gap in Indigenous health outcomes and, importantly, remote Indigenous public internet access. All of these provide an opportunity for us to focus on the differentials with the broader Australian population. There are many families within my electorate who are in low-socioeconomic circumstances, with a problematic level of disposable income, so they have similar challenges. But with the Indigenous population you have this inherent history of disadvantage—compounding layers of disadvantage. Having never been fully self-determining creates a sense of futility and frustration.

We have to remember that that prevailed up until the late 1950s and, in some jurisdictions, including in my own state, until 1972, with the repeal of the Native Welfare Act, under which I was raised and considered to be one of the natives of Western Australia. You have that contemporary historical context that has prevailed for some time. To break through those barriers is sometimes frustrating because you become conditioned by the way in which services are delivered, because services are delivered to you and you are not an active participant in shaping those services. Certainly in my own electorate when I talk to some of the Indigenous leadership and Aboriginal leaders and elders, that frustration and futility still prevails even in this contemporary period.

As I said just a couple of days ago in the chamber, we need to consider the total population. Often there is the notion that Aboriginal society lives in the Top End or the remote areas of Australia. In fact the 2001 census and the period to 2006 showed that the population of Aboriginal people living in capital cities or large regional centres rose from around 40 per cent to 74 per cent. That has shifted the dynamics. But our thinking does not always encapsulate the opportunity for providing programs and services that will close the gap in those very critical areas.

When I think about the whole process in COAG, one of the discussions and debates we had was about the universality in the way services are accessed. Recently, when talking to one of my own colleagues, I mentioned the urban population and their comment was: 'But don't Aboriginal people access all the mainstream services in a capital city? Surely, that is not a challenge or an issue.' In fact, it is. The Productivity Commission report that followed the inquiry into Indigenous expenditure made that comment very explicitly in either chapter 2 or chapter 5, I think, where they said, 'Aboriginal services become the substitute for government services.' What was happening in the delivery of services and the framing of policy was a mindset that it was an Aboriginal issue so therefore it had to be dealt with in Aboriginal programs. Yet Aboriginals are part of Australian society. We have never challenged that thinking—which needs to change—because we are comfortable with the mindsets and practices that have prevailed for a long time.

I have said before that it is a pity all the members in the House of Representatives and the Senate in this parliament do not get out and meet with every one of the Aboriginal communities and organisations within their electorates. If they did, they would get an understanding of the gap that exists within their electorates for populations of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people there. I know there are members who dedicate time and are involved, and I hear through the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander grapevine of the work that some members do, but the sad part is that a predominance of members do not have that degree of connection. I think that if we all understood the gaps within our own electorates we would be more likely to champion the need for some of the change in thinking and practice that should prevail. Australia is a First World country. We have a contemporary lifestyle that is the envy of so many others, and yet after 40-odd years of experience within Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander affairs in the areas of health and education, I find the existing gaps both challenging and interesting.

On my first sojourn into a particular community when I was a much younger man, having lived in a capital city, I got out of the car there, after flying in by charter and being taken by vehicles. I had a staff member there with me who refused to get out of the car. She said, 'Kenny, I can't get out of the car. I don't want to look. This is unreal; I have never seen this type of poverty. I have never seen a community like this.' She then stayed in the car for the duration of the time we were in that community. The challenge in that was her inability to really grasp the fact that there was still much to do in the closing of the gap.

One of our other key aspects in terms of urban populations is that we need to seriously think about the opportunities that we create. I know within my electorate there are people who are successful and do well and there are those who struggle on a daily basis. So there is a challenge in the way in which people access. Racism is still an issue for some people. Sometimes you can walk through those barriers but not always.

If we are to change things then we really should adopt the principles that are in the National Indigenous Reform Agreement. We really should ask the question: is the priority principle that programs and services should contribute to Closing the Gap by meeting the targets endorsed by COAG adhered to? And for COAG it is every reform agreement. There is the Indigenous engagement principle—engagement with Indigenous people being central to the design and delivery of programs and services. There is the sustainability principle, the access principle, the integration principle and accountability principle. I suspect that we will continue to fail unless we apply those principles uniformly across all agreements.

What I would dearly love to see for the Aboriginal people who live in my electorate is that they be equal participants in all things that affect them—that those principles are applied to those targeted programs. But more importantly, that, of those 23 NPAs and the seven national agreements, we should be measuring the gap closure in respect to every goal and KPI that is in those, and that the measures do not distinguish between Indigenous Australians and the rest of Australian society—that they are intrinsically linked.

If we are making a society better than what it currently is then the greatest benefit that we will leave as a legacy as members of this House is to have in place structures that account for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Island people to be part of everything that we appropriate and give an authority to—in bilateral agreements, in direct programs and in the services that are provided. Unless we do that I know that we will be having these types of discussions in the future—that I will be sitting in a wheelchair looking back on the history and saying, 'The progress we should have made has not been achieved because we missed an incredible opportunity.'

I would encourage any parliamentary colleague to set aside time to visit and get to know the diversity of their electorates—to get to know the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people who live within their electorates and to look at the issues that face them. We have a responsibility. We have been elected to represent all those within our electorates, regardless of our political affiliations. I believe that we have the capability, the capacity and the potential to close the gaps not by a national approach but by a localised approach, because we as individual members, whether we like it or not, are leaders in the communities that we influence.

I have the privilege of being a leader not only in my electorate by virtue of the role that I hold but also within the Indigenous community. Certainly I would encourage very strongly that if we are to close the gap and if we are to aspire to seeing a difference within the next 10 to 20 years, that in those leadership roles we have to facilitate processes that will bring about change. It is only by leadership that a society can be influenced and that groups that are disaffected can be given the opportunity to access and improve. Improvement comes with the opportunity of education, access to information, good health, access to good housing and then the opportunity to aspire to the belief that you have in yourself to do the things that you want and to take the career pathways that are available to any Australian who wants to look at that whole aspect of hope, aspiration, reward, gains and contribution. Unless we do that, I think the gap in key areas such as life expectancy will not improve.

It is a privilege to contribute to the debate on this and support the words of the Prime Minister and the Leader of the Opposition. If we encourage opportunity and we encourage taking the rewards that are available, then we contribute to the hope of those who have experienced long-term disadvantage. And certainly we would add to the work that is being done by many Indigenous Australians who have been highly successful in the jobs that they undertake, the influence they exert—the things that they do from a passion of their cultural identity and the passion wanting to see improvements within their communities, their families and themselves individually. Thank you.

Deborah O'Neill (Robertson, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Congratulations, Deputy Speaker Tehan, on your appointment to this role. It is an incredible privilege and honour for me to be speaking on this matter following on from the member for Hasluck, the first Indigenous member of the House of Representatives. While we may disagree about how we advance our nation I am absolutely certain from my work with him on the health policy committee that we share a commitment to our nation. Certainly to have the power of an Indigenous voice in this place is something that has a great deal to do with the healing we need to undertake as we address the great shame of the stolen generation.

It is four years since the important speech given by former Prime Minister Rudd in the House of Representatives saying sorry for the structural and institutional injustice that we have perpetrated upon our own first peoples. I was very privileged to be able to attend an event convened by Minister Macklin to consider where we are in our remembering of that day and how we might move forward.

One of the most powerful things that I heard that day was a story, and that day reinforced how important stories are for us to put things on the record about the way things were so that we might never make the mistake of making that happen again. One of the stories that we heard was from Donna Meehan. She identified herself as a Gamilaraay woman from Coonamble in north-west New South Wales. She spoke about finding her family at the age of 28. The thing that touched me so powerfully in her testimony that day at our public remembrance was that she described the day when her mother, a mother of 11 children, lost seven of her babies—that seven of them were taken away at once.

But she also had a healing story to tell, which was very important to hear in her voice, because on the day that the apology happened, after hearing it and responding to it in her community, she decided to take a day trip to Brisbane. She spoke about going into three different places on that day trip. In the first place she was asked for her opinion. It made me feel very sad that this was an extraordinary experience for her, so much so that four years later she was willing to say that that was an important experience. She was applauded, with the people she was travelling with—her mob—at a cafe. The most telling of all, that shows there is so much work to do, is that she noticed on that day that she was served with equal dignity in a shop. So we did something significant on that day.

In looking to the future—and that is what we were asked to do—we need to think about how we move towards redressing the wrongs and making sure that we give ordinary Australians, our fellow Australians, our first Australians, the best chance of living a full and wholesome life as Australian citizens in this modern democracy. That is to look to the future.

I do want to put on the record before I finish—and I am not going to speak much longer; I know that there is pressure on time for key members here to move on and do other important work—that I was a little underwhelmed by the representation of the media on the day that both the Prime Minister and the Leader of the Opposition gave very vivid, forthright and detailed speeches on Closing the Gap. This is a vital piece of work for all Australians to participate in. It is at the heart of the social justice initiative for members of all of the parties represented here. It is something much more worthy of attention in the media. I hope that next year when the Closing the Gap statement comes along the media is full to overbrimming, even more than they might be represented at question time, to cover this vital part of the way we move forward as a nation.

I want to commend two very important elements that I think are available to us as Australians right now as we learn more. One of them is a great pack that the federal government has funded. It has been sent to 5,250 schools and it is called Kutju Australia, which means Advance Australia. It is written in the Luritja language but the kit has been prepared so that we can all sing Advance Australia Fair in an Indigenous language and in English. Also, a very significant site was launched on the day, the Stolen Generation Testimonies site. People can google that site and have a look at what is going on. Debra Hocking, one of the survivors, points out:

There’s nothing more powerful than the personal story. For people to understand, we have to open ourselves up. It’s hard to tell our personal stories but we are doing this to educate people. For us to heal as a country these are the stories we need to share. They’re sad stories but they’re important stories. For me as a Stolen Generations’ Survivor, I know you don’t get over things.

She really asks for the stories to be read, and I encourage all teachers in all subjects to think about what they can do to open the young people of this country to those stories. I felt so moved by the stories that I read on the website that I put a little message on there myself, which is:

Congratulations on the wonderful launch of this important website today. I hope to speak in the parliament about my response to this the 4th anniversary of the Apology to the Stolen Generation. I believe in the healing power of stories, even the ones that are very difficult to tell. When I see you as separate from me I can ignore you, or fear you, or hurt you, or other you. But when I know your story you become my brother, my sister, my mother, my father, my uncle, my aunty, my friend.

Stories shared reveal our unique journeys but they also reveal our common humanity. When we learn that lesson of compassion and kindness then we really do have a bright future. I want to put on the public record my thanks for the stories that are on the Stolen Generation Testimonies site and I want to applaud those who have put them there, including the director of the film series, for sharing them and for your courage in leading us to a better Australia.

Debate adjourned.