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

I am not going to go over all the issues that the Greens oppose because by now people are very clear about our deep concerns with this legislation. I want to reiterate what Senator Brown and I have said on a number of occasions. We think that government intervention and government interest in the issues of child abuse, violence and disadvantage in the Northern Territory is absolutely essential. We disagree fundamentally with the way the government is going about it. We do not believe that the government is implementing the findings of the Little children are sacred report and, as became clear here, it does not intend to implement the findings and recommendations of the report. However, I will go over recommendation 1:

That Aboriginal child sexual abuse in the Northern Territory be designated as an issue of urgent national significance—

‘urgent national significance’, not emergency response; in my opinion, they are two very different things—

and both governments immediately establish a collaborative partnership with a Memorandum of Understanding to specifically address the protection of Aboriginal children from sexual abuse. It is critical that both governments commit to genuine consultation with Aboriginal people in designing initiatives for Aboriginal communities.

The No. 1 recommendation does not say ‘emergency response’; it says ‘urgent national significance’. If you are following that recommendation, follow all of it and implement the whole thing.

It is specifically important, when you talk about the nature of the intervention that is occurring, that it is exempting itself from the Racial Discrimination Act, and that the specific understanding of what ‘special measures’ are requires consultation—and you can do that in emergency situations. As I said, the Greens welcome, finally, the government’s interest and involvement in the Northern Territory, as do many people. The government is right when it said that there has been an overwhelming response from the community, because there has been. Every email I have had says, ‘It’s fantastic the government’s getting involved, but we have deep concerns.’

When I first heard it reported in the West that Fred Chaney was supportive of the government’s initiative, I was thinking, ‘I find that a little bit strange,’ because I think there are some real issues with the nature of the intervention. But I think he was expressing the concern and the support that most Australians were feeling—that is, yes, it is really good the government has finally taken this on board. I would like to quote an excerpt—I do not have time to quote the whole thing—from the Vincent Lingiari lecture that Fred Chaney gave:

As one who has in the past asked for a comprehensive national response to the evils of child abuse, and who strongly supports urgent intervention, I am giving this lecture with the living hope that there is a moral compass giving direction to the federal intervention here in the Northern Territory.

I am making what might be seen as heroic assumptions about the goodwill and bona fides of the Government and the Opposition in what they are respectively doing and supporting. I realise many Aboriginal people and many in this audience will find it difficult, if not impossible, to make that same assumption.

But let me make my own feelings on the matter clear. I am shocked at the extent to which the legislation, rushed through the Parliament this week, is contemptuous of Aboriginal property rights and of the principle of non-discrimination; authorises an absurd and unattainable level of micro-management of Aboriginal lives far beyond the capacity of the federal bureaucracy that would permit the notorious protector, Mr Neville, to ride again; provides for desert dwellers to be forced into towns, as they were once emptied out of the cattle stations in the 1960s with devastating social effects; and could see successful communities and families returned to dependence, crushing the engagement that is essential to making progress.

He further talks through his concerns. He says:

Everything I say tonight is predicated on my hope that, away from the hysteria of the election campaign, in a calmer post-election atmosphere, whoever is in government will not use this legislation to create a new regime of injustice and inevitable failure. The legislation would allow that to happen. It must not happen.

I agree with Mr Chaney’s comments. That should not be allowed to happen. In the debate that we have had over the last couple of days we have been talking about five bills that give the government and in particular the minister extraordinary powers. Mr Chaney compares those bills to the notorious Mr Neville of Western Australia. It is undoubted that they represent extraordinary powers. Because of the complexity and detail of the legislation, I believe we still have not gone through all of the detail, but the legislation does give the government extraordinary powers. Some of those powers became evident in discussion that we had; for example, there is the ability of the government to acquire assets from community service entities that provide services in the Northern Territory.

I think the non-government organisations and Aboriginal organisations are actually becoming quite distressed and alerted to the fact that this legislation provides the government with what I think would be unprecedented powers. It gives them power to put observers—some people call them spies—onto the boards of these organisations that provide services. It gives them power to give those observers every right of a board member except to vote; in other words, they can talk at and participate in the meetings and they are entitled to get all the papers. This is most extraordinary when you are talking about non-government organisations. They can also effectively seize their assets and direct them to be used in the provision of services. It is the same with the infrastructure. Despite the government assuring us that businesses and entities that a community does not want in there will not be allowed in there, throughout our discussion yesterday it became evident that they will in fact be allowed to come into those areas.

The welfare changes are not able to be adequately justified. There is not the evidence that indicates that they will provide the outcomes that government is talking about. We have not been provided with the amount of resources that are going to be used for the rollout of the welfare reforms, particularly outside the Northern Territory. We do not know how much it is going to cost, we do not know how it is going to happen and we do not know who is going to do it. These are all issues that we believe are absolutely essential and that we should have known about, and they only add to our very deep concern about this legislation. We do not think it is going to provide and result in the outcomes the government wants. I think what is going to happen is that it will further disempower communities; it will lead to more people coming off income support and having no income support. It will not lead to the engagement of Aboriginal people.

I am desperately hoping that there will be a continuation of the roll-in of funds to start addressing some of these issues and that the government will engage with organisations like the Northern Territory combined Aboriginal organisations, who have some very clearly worked out plans about where we can go in the future to address child abuse. So, as Senator Brown has said, the Greens will continue to monitor this legislation very closely and will engage with communities to see how it is rolling out.

Just before finishing, I would like to express my thanks to the minister. We have asked some very difficult questions, but we have managed to keep a civil dialogue virtually throughout the whole debate. I appreciate the minister taking the time to answer the questions that we put to him. I think it helped the debate progress significantly. It does not get me over the fact that I do not like the legislation. But the answers did help us to drill down into some of it, which is what I think the role of committees is. If we had had a longer committee inquiry, I think we would have been able to do some of this then but, because of the complexity of the legislation, we were not able to do that.

The Greens cannot support this legislation. The information that we have found through this process makes us even more sceptical about it producing the outcomes that I think the government genuinely wants. I know the government wants to address these issues. The Greens are fundamentally disagreeing with the way it is going about trying to get these outcomes.