Claire Moore (Queensland, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Women) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

My question is to the Minister for Indigenous Affairs, Senator Scullion. Can the minister confirm that over 5,000 funding applications were submitted under the government's Indigenous Advancement Strategy? What front-line services will Indigenous communities miss out on as a result of the government's decision to cut over $500 million from Indigenous affairs and consolidate all existing programs?

Nigel Scullion (NT, Country Liberal Party, Minister for Indigenous Affairs) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Yes, and none.

Claire Moore (Queensland, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Women) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I thank the minister for his detailed response! Mr President, I ask a supplementary question. Now I refer to the peak Indigenous body, the National Congress of Australia's First Peoples, which has sought assurances that 'there will not be a loss of vital services at the end of the minister's last-minute extension to the funding round'. Can the minister provide that assurance in possibly more than one word?

Nigel Scullion (NT, Country Liberal Party, Minister for Indigenous Affairs) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I thank the senator for the question. As I have indicated in earlier answers today, we are delaying the outcomes of the rounds so that we can move in, consult and lift capacity for those small Indigenous businesses which clearly are having some difficulty—and which I want to get the job—and speak carefully with the 75 providers to provide front-line service that currently do not have an application in because they have put a joint application in under either another name or another entity. To ensure that we provide the capacity for those front-line services to be delivered by organisations that employ Aboriginal people or, in fact, are Indigenous organisations themselves is absolutely important. That is exactly the reason that we are doing this. The congress write me letters all the time—I do not have one on this particular issue, but I am more than happy to assure them, as I have assured this place, that this will have a positive impact on front-line services.

Claire Moore (Queensland, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Women) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Mr President, I ask a further supplementary question. How is forcing Indigenous organisations to live in limbo awaiting news of funding cuts, including those to which the minister referred before, while the minister sorts out his mess, consistent with the Prime Minister's promise that he would be 'a Prime Minister for Indigenous affairs'?

Nigel Scullion (NT, Country Liberal Party, Minister for Indigenous Affairs) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I can confirm that he is a fantastic Prime Minister for Indigenous affairs. It is terrific to work with him. The answer to the first part of the question—if the question was: why is it that people are somehow left in limbo?—is that we do not want to tell them that they have not got the job. That is the idea. We want to lean in and make sure that they have the capacity to have a valid application. So it cannot be late—and a large number were late and therefore noncompliant. We have gone back and ensured that they are compliant because we want those Aboriginal organisations and those organisations that have a demonstrated history of employing Aboriginal people to get the job. We know from the sins of the past that those very large NGOs who have crept into this space are not delivering in the same way that locally-based Aboriginal organisations can deliver.