Rachel Siewert (WA, Australian Greens) Share this | Hansard source

The Greens will be supporting this amendment. As I said earlier it is similar to one of ours but ours is a bit broader. As I have articulated in this place earlier in the debate, we believe that this clause is unacceptable. The issue of consultation was raised earlier in the debate. HREOC made a submission to the one-day inquiry, but unfortunately due to time we were not able to go through these issues as thoroughly as I, and I suspect as much as they, would have liked. They pointed out in their submission that they do not support the emergency response measures being exempt from the RDA. They also made some very pertinent points about the issues around special measures. They said:

These laws clearly have a number of significant actual and potential negative impacts upon the rights of Indigenous people which are discriminatory. The laws generally must therefore be justifiable as a ‘special measure’.

This is what we have been talking about. They went on to say:

HREOC submits that a fundamental feature of ‘special measures’ is that they are done following effective consultation with the intended beneficiaries and generally with their consent. The absence of effective consultation with Indigenous people concerning the NTNER measures is therefore a matter of serious concern. HREOC accepts the need for urgent action. However, the success of that action both immediately and in the long term will depend upon effective consultation. And such consultation is fundamental to respecting the human rights of Indigenous people.

We have heard it said many times over in the last hours of this debate that the Commonwealth have done extensive consultation in the past and it is time for urgent action now. The government use that to justify the fact that they did not go out to talk about the special measures or consult with the Aboriginal community and those affected by these special measures, because this was urgent action. We reject that notion. Talking to Aboriginal communities generally about issues around abuse and disadvantage—and I accept that the government have been doing that—does not justify the fact that the government are taking these most extraordinary measures. It does not justify that because they cannot say that they have consulted with the community.

During the short committee hearing that we had last week, I asked a question of Andrew Johnson, who appeared with the ACOSS delegation. He also happens to be an expert in international child protection and is a former consultant to UNICEF and the UNHCR on emergency interventions. I thought it was an ideal opportunity to ask for his opinion of what you do in emergency situations and in emergency responses. He said:

In an emergency setting, the first thing a UN agency would do, under the direction of OCHA, is to ensure proper consultation on the ground. That is done within the first 24 to 48 hours and it is quite extensive. They then sit down with the communities to find out what supports and services they need. They set up safe houses and ensure that there are safe places for children to play. The international community ensures that there is safe and proper housing, water and access to medical services. The international community is able to do things quite quickly in a refugee camp, and that is based on consultation and asking the population themselves what they need. The biggest lesson learnt from all interventions internationally is that they always fail when they do not involve and empower the local communities to take part in the interventions that are taking place. If you look across the world at the operations that have been successful in resource-poor communities, the fundamental thing that crosses through all those interventions has been the giving of ownership, empowerment and control to the people themselves to ensure children are protected and families and communities are safe.

I do not buy the excuse that this was an emergency response and that therefore, ‘We could not go out and talk to the communities about what a special measure is.’ The government have failed in the basic outline of justifying a special measure and in justifying these provisions as special measures. There is no excuse for not going out and talking to the communities about these extraordinary powers the government are taking upon themselves. HREOC goes on in its submission:

More broadly, HREOC is concerned that the … measures are likely to produce unintended negative consequences that adversely impact upon the rights of Indigenous people.

Some examples are given later in the submission. They then outline some examples of how they are concerned about the special measures and how the special measures may have negative impacts, which would then make them not special measures, because they are not to the advantage of Aboriginal people.

HREOC point out, for example, the phasing out of CDEP—we will have a substantive debate about CDEP later, so I will not go into too much detail right now—and that CDEP may increase unemployment, movement to urban centres and the risk of family violence. Bear in mind that 7,000 CDEP people are being moved off CDEP. Currently, they can only identify around 2,000 jobs. During the committee hearing, in answers to some questions that we asked, it became clear that $76 million is being taken out of CDEP and, to balance that, only $46.9 million is going into increased income support. That is a reduction of $30 million going directly into the pockets of Indigenous peoples in community. I would suggest that will have a negative impact on community. HREOC also talk about the unintended negative impacts on Indigenous physical and mental health and wellbeing and quote some evidence from overseas. They state:

International and domestic evidence links the mental health impacts of dispossession, the removal of children, loss of culture and a general sense of powerlessness that Indigenous peoples have experienced with the social dysfunction that is evident in some Indigenous communities.

For example, the landmark study by Chandler and Lalonde in Canada showed that those First Nations communities that had some form of self-government and settled land claims had much lower rates of youth suicide as a result. Those communities that did not, have excessively high suicide rates.

Given the highly interventionist approach of several aspects of the government’s emergency response, it is reasonable to expect that more functional communities will feel disempowered by measures that distance them from control over daily decision-making responsibilities. For example, the role and functions of the government business managers may have the unintended impact of undermining Indigenous authority structures and dispute resolution practices.

I would suggest that going in and quarantining 50 per cent of people’s income support, irrespective of whether they have children and irrespective of whether they are spending their money exactly how the government thinks they should be spending their money, will also disempower communities. HREOC state that the quarantining of welfare payments may increase the risk of violence against women. They also highlight the fact that quarantining payments for school attendance may disproportionately impact on families in areas without adequate schools and teachers. Further, they suggest that the amendments to the permit system may work against efforts to reduce substance abuse. They point out that alcohol bans may result in an increase in the prison population and that rapid intervention may result in undesirable compromises.

HREOC have very strong concerns that these measures do not necessarily qualify as special measures and they do not support measures that are being exempt from the Racial Discrimination Act. They have very strong concerns about these so-called special measures and believe that the measures should not be exempt from the RDA.

The government did not consult on these measures. They are saying: ‘These are special measures, give them a tick. We’re calling them special measures; therefore, they are special measures.’ These measures will have unacceptable impacts on many Aboriginal people. I do not dispute the fact that the government genuinely want to do something about child abuse in the Northern Territory. They are going about it the wrong way, which is why the Greens do not support this package. We do not support it because we do not believe that the measures outlined there will in fact deliver the outcomes that the government want. They are dressing up their response measures and the provisions in this legislation by saying they are special measures. Calling something a special measure that does not meet the internationally accepted criteria for what is a special measure does not make it a special measure.

I went onto the HREOC website and I looked at what the convention calls a ‘special measure’. The Greens do not believe that these measures qualify as special measures under the convention. In fact, I have very serious concerns that it takes the RDA outside the purview of the convention. HREOC expresses concerns, the legal community expresses concerns and the Aboriginal people, who have been inundating me with emails, do not believe these are special measures. They strongly highlight the fact that they have not been consulted about these so-called special measures. They have not been consulted about the bills, the acts or the measures that the government intends to put in place. They say that the government have not justified why they have to take our land as a special measure and how it will address child abuse. They say: ‘They have not consulted us about how changing the permit system will address child abuse or justified it and how it is a special measure.’ The government have not justified why the spelling out, specifically of Indigenous child abuse and violence, by the Crime Commission is a special measure. And they have not justified why they have to take such extreme measures in welfare reform and why they have to convert the jobs from CDEP to special measures.

But we know why they have done that. They have done that because they found out that they could not quarantine payments under the CDEP. People may remember that, when this plan was first announced on 21 June, the government said that they were going to be quarantining payments out of the CDEP. They backtracked on that one because they realised that they could not do that. That is why they are cancelling the CDEP. Not only is it the case that 7,000 people are going to 2,000 jobs but also many vital services that are being delivered in Aboriginal communities are dependent on the CDEP. So what is the government going to do there? Oh, that is right: ‘We’re going to come in and use those special provisions under the business management areas, where we can go and sit on the boards of community entities and put our spies on those boards and take their assets. That is how we are going to do that.’ That is a special measure as well!

It is ill thought out legislation that does not meet the absolute objectives that the government say they have, so they are giving themselves blanket exemption from the Racial Discrimination Act. The legislation is discriminatory—the government have acknowledged that it is discriminatory—and it will not deliver what they say it is going to deliver. They accuse us of filibustering, because they do not want these sorts of things exposed to the light of day. We are going to do everything we can to show how discriminatory this legislation is and show that it is not going to deliver the objectives that the government say that they are trying to deliver. If the government were genuine they would start listening to people and start listening to the communities that are saying, ‘We want you to do something, but we don’t want you to do this.’ Those communities have got really well thought out plans on how you can address these issues, but you do not want to listen to them or talk to them because they are saying things that you do not want to hear. The Greens will be supporting this amendment and opposing this racially discriminatory legislation and this specific clause, clause 132.