John Williams (NSW, National Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

My question is to the Minister for Indigenous Affairs, Senator Scullion. Will the minister advise how the government is supporting jobs for Indigenous Australians and how this contributes to the government's Closing The Gap agenda?

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

I would like to thank Senator Williams for his question and acknowledge his longstanding interest particularly in employment for Indigenous people in western New South Wales. I would like to also acknowledge this question on an important day, with the Prime Minister tabling the Closing the Gap statement in the other place. The Prime Minister spoke of the wonderful work we have been doing in employment programs, particularly with the 5,000 Indigenous jobseekers who have moved from welfare through the Vocational Training and Employment Centres, the VTEC program, into real jobs through that VTEC network. The most important thing to note is that these are not low-hanging fruit—75 per cent of the 5,000 people were what we refer to as stream C jobseekers, and they are the jobseekers with the greatest barriers to employment. The program was targeted not at the easy job seekers but the more difficult ones.

Take our Employment Parity Initiative. We are partnering with the largest employers—household names like Woolies, Accor, Crown Resorts, Transfield—and that new approach has seen us now employ 60 people of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander descent today and 60 people yesterday, and it will be 60 people tomorrow. Every single day, 60 jobs will be created for our first Australians. But to close the gap we are going to need an additional 188,000 Indigenous Australians in work by 2018. Employers and Indigenous job experts are who we need to speak to, and we have been speaking to an Indigenous Employment Forum with the Minister for Employment, Michaelia Cash, and people such as Jeremy Donovan and Laura Berry—absolute experts in Indigenous engagement and employment. Those are the sorts of people that are leading our policy to ensure that we close the gap in employment.

Stephen Parry (President) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Senator Williams, a supplementary question.

John Williams (NSW, National Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Can the minister explain how the government has supported Indigenous jobs through its Indigenous Procurement Policy?

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

We are pulling every lever in our control to get more Indigenous people to work. It is a fact that an Indigenous business is now 100 times more likely to employ an Indigenous person than a non-Indigenous business is. I can remember looking at Canada and the United States, when I was in opposition, and I knew that they had built a successful indigenous middle-class there, principally through the investments of government particularly around procurement. We were $6.2 million in 2012-13 and I said we wanted a simple target of three per cent, and we have now gone from $6.2 million, that those opposite were languishing on, to $284.2 million in 12 months. As I said today, Indigenous procurement is connecting Indigenous businesses, and we will be working with the states and territories on the private sector to extend these excellent policies. (Time expired)

John Williams (NSW, National Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Will the minister outline what other initiatives the government is delivering to support jobs for Indigenous Australians?

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

In remote Australia, where we have I think some of the biggest challenges, a community development program was developed by sitting down with communities and Indigenous leaders who told us principally that they were sick of people moving from the program to passive welfare and a lack of opportunities. Under the Remote Jobs and Communities Program 60 per cent of people left for passive welfare. We had to change that. We introduced CDP. We have had 12,400 people leave, but not to passive welfare—it has been to a real job. Between July and 31 September we placed 12,400 people into jobs, and 4,100 have now been in their job for over six months. It is not just a matter of placing them; it is making sure that they remain in those jobs. We are increasing engagement and building skills in community led activities by the community and for the community. We are working with these communities to ensure we get the very best employment outcomes. (Time expired)