Dorinda Cox (WA, Australian Greens) Share this | Hansard source

I too want to make a contribution in relation to this disallowance motion moved by Senator Rice. I associate myself with the extensive commentary that Senator Rice has just made. I too have spoken on this particular issue many times in this chamber, and I express again the disappointment at the broken promises. Labor made very clear promises to people. We were all campaigning in the lead-up to the election last year, and Labor very clearly told people, 'We will end the BasicsCard as a compulsory scheme.' They were their words. In September 2022, just four months later, post election, Labor repealed the cashless debit card but did not abolish the BasicsCard, as they had said they would.

There are many pieces of commentary about the SmartCard or about the BasicsCard. It doesn't matter what you call it; it's still a compulsory income management regime. It is racist, as Senator Rice has already alluded to. It's basically discriminatory and racist. It comes from the Howard era, 2007. It's written in history in the Northern Territory intervention. They couldn't wait. They were wringing their hands together to expand this program to get a wider cohort of income support recipients.

As Senator Rice said, the majority of the recipients in the data from the Department of Social Services talk about those 24½ thousand people on the BasicsCard in Australia and the vast majority of those living in the Northern Territory being forcibly placed on the BasicsCard. I really like Senator Rice's example of planning a birthday party for a loved one and not being able to spend that money on what you need and being told that 50 to 70 per cent of your income will be quarantined. How, in 2023, is that being imposed on people?

I know the stories of my grandparents, who lived through the 1905 act of segregation and the regime of having to seek rations in this country, and yet we still have people who, by stealth, this policy still exists. Because Labor promised they would get rid of it. Since 4 September this year, they've been talking about improved technology of the SmartCard, where people can stay on the BasicsCard. That's like saying, 'Would you like to go to jail or would you like to live in a cage?' What sort of choice is that? Like, really? We're asking people who really don't have a choice to easily exit from income management altogether. We haven't given them a pathway.

Let's be real about that. We haven't set that up. There is no system. As Senator Rice has already said, there are no financial counselling services and no assistance with small businesses. People are running around talking about commercialisation and economic development in the Northern Territory. Are they talking to the black people? Probably not. They're talking to their mates in industry and big business. They're not worried about helping our people get off income support and giving them pathways to do that. If you haven't forgotten over there, Labor, it's one of your Closing the Gap targets, which is something you're not doing anything in.

These measures we are seeking to disallow enable the operation of what people call a vulnerable welfare payment recipient, a disengaged youth, a long-term welfare payment recipient, a child under the child protection system or supporting people at risk. Well, aren't they patronising terms? Where's the self-determination? Where is allowing us to be part of the decision-making? Where's the preservation and recognition of the trauma and loss that we've experienced in this country? There's none in any of that wording because all of these measures are already operational under that income management regime that Labor still continue to bandy around.

These measures also involve placing an income support recipient onto a SmartCard, and Senator Rice is right in saying that, if you live in a particular geographical location, you will be scooped up in the net. Right? It's a postcode lottery. That's what it is. What we know is that they've done this on purpose. There's the whole of the NT, the APY Lands, Playford in South Australia, Ngaanyatjarra Lands in my home state of Western Australia and the Kimberley, Logan, Rockhampton, Livingstone in Queensland and Bankstown in New South Wales—all low socioeconomic areas with a high population of Indigenous people.

By stealth, this government continues to roll out this regime. There have been numerous studies, but there is one from 2021 that talks about income management in the Northern Territory during the intervention and the ability for it to reduce children's school attendance during the first five months of its operation on an average of 4.7 per cent in remote communities. People come into this chamber and they are talking about the heightened emergency, just as Senator McKim was talking about, in the frame of migration. We are talking about the same thing being done to our people for generations in this country. We have to send the army into the Northern Territory to help these people! We have to send more police to help these people! That's the way people talk about us in this chamber. It's actually so patronising and disrespectful that we have no agency in that. We absolutely don't have any. Sometimes people need to check themselves because we don't need you to say that about us. We don't need you to do that to us in the way that you form your legislation and policies in this country. Countless reports show that income management doesn't help; it actually hinders. People being unable to get their kids to school is just one example, and I think it's significant. There is little evidence to support anything except abolishing this compulsory income management regime.

I want to share with you some very quick quotes in relation to First Nations people. As Senator Rice said, people right across this country people have given evidence, people like Megan Krakouer, from my home state of Western Australia, who runs First Nations trauma and suicide recovery and who works at the grassroots level with families and communities impacted by such traumatic life events. Whole families are affected by that. On top of that, to put an income support regime, putting management over income, means they are left living under the poverty line. As Senator Rice said, there are things that this government could do. The APO in the Northern Territory reminds the government of their support for the repeal of the Cashless Debit Card. While this has allowed some participants to exit income management or voluntarily opt out into income management, this isn't the case for the majority of people. That means that people don't want that. They want something different.

The NT participants who remain on compulsory income management have suffered, unfortunately, the longest under this regime, a regime this government continues to talk a big game about—now they're going to talk about consultation. They stated that their long-term aim is to have it on a voluntary basis, but that's not what they're doing. It's like saying, 'Look over here, people!' while legislating something completely different in stealth mode, giving powers for the extension of income management while some of the most vulnerable people in Australia are part of this regime. This bill continues that trend—there's no mistaking that. In particular, it becomes a permanent feature of the social services in Australia without adequate consultation—which this government said they would do and which they keep rolling out at each press release and press conference, telling people that they want to do. I don't know about you, but I feel like we're being gaslighted every time we read a new media release from ministers who continue to talk about what the legislative impacts of these bills are. They talk about the opposite of what they committed to when they were sitting across the other side in opposition in this place. In their pre-election statements, they said this should only occur on a voluntary basis.

The Central Land Council asked, 'How many times do we have to say it until the government listens to our voices?' The irony of that statement! Here we were on the back of a referendum where this government told everyone that they were listening to people's voices. Since income management was introduced in 2007, as part of the Commonwealth government's Intervention into the Northern Territory, we have said no. The people have said no. A different card, a different colour, but it's all for the same purpose: to control our lives. We are not guinea pigs. The Central Land Council calls for the government to end all forms of compulsory income management now.

The last quote that I'll share comes from the Arnhem Land Progress Association:

Compulsory income management was imposed on our member communities in 2007 as part of the NT Intervention—

as the emergency response was known—

When it was forced upon our members they were subject to the discriminatory and false assumption that they were all—

and this is the way they were talked about—

alcoholics, family violence offenders and problem gamblers.

ALPA's chair, Reverend Dr Gondarra OAM, has stated that the wellbeing of Indigenous Australians depends on them having self-agency, choice and control over their lives. ALPA's board believes that, regardless of what design a future income management program takes, participation in this program must be voluntary. That is a non-negotiable. It is a non-negotiable for black people in this country to not feel discriminated against—to have equality. We're a signatory. We've just had a whole conversation, a whole debate a few hours ago, about the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous People, yet self-determination; free, prior and informed consent; equality and non-discrimination; and being part of the decision-making is actually something that has not been committed to through this process, because no-one cares. Those people who are out in the bush—don't worry about them. Out of sight, out of mind. They're not going to be the people campaigning, sending letters to your offices by e-mail or calling your offices and demanding that you don't pass this. Do you know why? Because that's not who we are.

We have an expectation in our culture that you'll come and sit in dirt and talk to us about whatever you're crafting in your plan. But you don't do that, and that's disrespectful to us as the First Peoples of this country—and it is a constant thread in this place. It is so constant. People do not care about the impact. The impact will be not just in the here and now but for future generations of our people that are going to be impacted by this legislation. Since 2007, we've been fighting this fight. We, over here at the Greens, alongside Senator Rice, will keep fighting for change.