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

My question is to Senator Evans, the Minister representing the Minister for Families, Housing, Community Services and Indigenous Affairs. The Prime Minister’s historic statement of apology yesterday committed the nation to:

A future where we embrace the possibility of new solutions to enduring problems where old approaches have failed.

Is the government aware that income quarantining in the Northern Territory is viewed by the community as going back to ration days and is causing huge hardships in the NT? Is the government aware that this includes people being unable to pay fines and possibly being sent to jail, that quarantined money is being given to people in the form of gift cards, that aged pensioners—including a lady who has worked for 48 years, has been retired for 10 years and has raised 10 kids—are being subjected to quarantining and that parents are unable to send food money to children who are away attending college? How does the government see ration cards as a new beginning? Isn’t the Northern Territory intervention an example of an old approach which is clearly failing? Will the government commit to an immediate review of the NT intervention?