Andrew Bartlett (Queensland, Australian Democrats) Share this | Hansard source

My question is to the Minister representing the Minister for Employment and Workplace Relations, Senator Abetz. My question follows on from one I asked the minister last week regarding the impact on some Aboriginal communities in Far North Queensland of the government’s changes to the Community Development Employment Project and the way they are being implemented. In the minister’s answer last week he stated that, with CDEP funding, the government is concerned about the individual outcomes for individual participants. Does this mean that the government is not giving any consideration to the impacts and outcomes for the community? If so, does this mean that the community development component of the CDEP no longer applies? The minister also said that the competitive tender process was done on the basis of the normal sorts of qualities that are looked for: issues of governance, financial capacity and viability. Does this mean that those bodies that lost funding were assessed as not meeting those standards of governance, financial capacity and viability?