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

I seek leave to move a motion in relation to the response by the Chief of Staff to the Minister for Families, Community Services and Indigenous Affairs to the motion on National Close the Gap Day.

Leave granted.

I move:

That the Senate take note of the document.

To remind the chamber, this was a motion that the chamber passed on 21 March that recognised that National Close the Gap Day and in particular made a firm commitment to the Closing the Gap campaign statement of intent as the blueprint of action to close the health equality gap. That statement, I will remind people, was signed in 2008 and committed Australians, both Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal, to work together to achieve equality in health status and life expectancy between Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples and non-Indigenous Australians by the year 2030. That commitment also shared a determination to close the fundamental divide between the health outcomes and life expectancy of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanders and non-Aboriginal people, which we know was around 17 years. In places around Australia that 17-year gap in life expectancy still exists, so we still have a long way to go. Unfortunately, the national partnership agreement on Indigenous health expires in about six weeks at the end of this financial year. We need to ensure that that is re-funded to ensure that these gaps in life expectancy and health outcomes for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanders are closed by the year 2030.

Unfortunately, we are still seeing many gaps in the delivery of appropriate health services to Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanders. I will go to a commitment that this government made a couple of years ago to work on dialysis. I have spoken in this place on the need to address end-stage kidney disease and the growing need for dialysis, particularly in Central Australia and the tri-state area between Western Australia, South Australia and the Northern Territory. I was over the moon when the government announced that they would commit $13 million to more accommodation and more support for dialysis in Central Australia. It seems to me in looking at the work that has been done on dialysis that it has been two steps forward and one step back. While we have had more chairs provided around Australia for dialysis, unfortunately when we looked at this in estimates we found that $3 million of that commitment of $13 million had already been returned unspent. So that money that was committed did not deliver the dialysis support, chairs and accommodation for those dialysis patients in Central Australia. There is a very real concern now hanging over the other $10 million and whether that is actually going to be delivered. That is what I mean about it sometimes being two steps forward and one step back. We need to be serious about addressing health outcomes, which is why we need a commitment from not only the Commonwealth but also state and territory governments.

We also heard in the past that there were agreements in the tri-state area between my home state of Western Australia, South Australia and the Northern Territory around how to deliver these services. We heard at estimates, that those agreements are falling apart. We have had two steps forward and one step back with them failing to reach an agreement about how those services will be delivered. So we will return to that farcical situation where Aboriginal people who are living in the north of Western Australia potentially will have to, for example, go to Perth and people in Central Australia and South Australia will have to go to Adelaide to receive services rather than the closer centre of, for example, Alice Springs. I was devastated when I was sitting in estimates and was told that the progress that had been made was stalling. I urge the government to address those really important issues.

One of the other issues that I have addressed strongly in this place is Aboriginal ear health and the issue around otitis media. Otitis media is in pandemic proportions in many Aboriginal communities. I have explained on many occasions the link between otitis media and poor hearing health for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples and the need to address that. There is a need to identify that hearing loss and to provide early intervention programs that enable children to catch up on the language skills that are needed to enable them to engage in school and the education system. The links have been clearly shown between poor hearing health and the number of people, Aboriginal people in particular, in our justice system, both in our adult justice system and in our juvenile justice system. The links are clearly there.

Of course, you can then draw a link to the social determinants of health, which is why under these programs we also need to be clearly addressing the social determinants of health. The Senate Community Affairs References Committee earlier this year tabled our report into the social determinants of health and implementation of those in Australia and made a series of recommendations. I am greatly looking forward to the government's response to that report because, if we are going to address Aboriginal health and life expectancy outcomes, it is essential that we are also addressing the social determinants of health.

As I conclude—because I know there are other people who want to speak on a large number of responses of the government to the motions that went through the chamber before the break—I want to say that we are looking for the government to be making more announcements today in the budget about how they are going to fulfil the commitments they have made to close the gap for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people in life expectancy and health outcomes. We know this is a long-term problem. We know we have to have sustained investment if we are going to achieve that objective by the year 2030. It is an objective that everybody shares. If we are going to do that, we need to make sure that we commit on an ongoing basis to these essential funding programs and not be funding them so that organisations are constantly wondering whether they are going to get re-funded. We also need to see that being delivered through the National Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Health Plan.

I am looking forward to at least a little bit of positive news in terms of being able to support these commitments, which have been made across the board. It can only be delivered if that funding is delivered to appropriate programs, which is largely through community-controlled health organisations.

I note that the response the chamber received from Minister Macklin's office said I needed to ask Warren Snowdon, as he is the Minister for Indigenous, Rural and Regional Health. I must admit I would have expected a bit better from Minister Macklin, given that she has ultimate responsibility for Indigenous affairs. I would have thought she would have been able to engage with this a bit more, particularly as it is essential that social determinants of health are addressed. It goes back to her portfolio. She cannot write it off by saying, 'This is actually the responsibility of the Minister for Indigenous, Rural and Regional Health,' when key parts of her portfolio are absolutely essentially to delivering Closing the Gap.

Question agreed to.