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

I move:

That the Senate take note of the answer given by the Minister for Indigenous Affairs (Senator Scullion) to a question without notice asked by Senator Siewert today relating to the National Congress of Australia’s First Peoples.

The minister at first said he understood the congress were staying in Redfern, and I am glad he came back and corrected the record to say that they were not. He also said he understands they are happy with their new accommodation. Let's put this in context: they are being kicked out of the ILC headquarters by 30 April. So, yes, they do have premises for the short term, 30 April, and, yes, they are 'happy', as I understand it, to be in Canberra in the premises they are being offered, because they have nowhere else to go. I will not say the minister misled the chamber, but, in fact, he did not fully indicate the context in which the happiness to be in the premises is expressed. It is expressed as, 'At least we'll have a place to operate from.' But, my understanding is that they very clearly want to stay in their current location in Redfern. They are not happy to be moving—can we first be clear about that?

The other issues I asked about related to cost. Why was congress being charged $24,000 a month when the new tenants are only being asked for $50,000 a year? When the minister corrected his answer, I think he said he would provide further information on that. That information should be very illuminating. Let us go back to the issue of congress's move. They cannot afford to move. They do not know how they are going to afford to pay to get their offices moved from Redfern to Canberra. It would be really good for them to know that. In fact, they may have to hire a truck and move themselves.

A really important issue is that congress refitted their current accommodation to the cost of about a million dollars, in order to make an empty floor usable space. That is $1 million to an organisation that has since had its funding cut. That is a lot of money. It does not know if it is going to get that money refunded or what is going to happen. That is another important point that needs to be looked at.

Another point I raised in my question to the minister is around the divestment application. As I understand it, congress made an application, an approach to ILC, a number of years ago to divest that floor, which ILC can do, to congress so that they would have permanent office space. I understand that they were asked to provide more information, and they did, but not a lot of action was taken on the divestment. Of course, the ILC then lost a significant amount of money when the government cut their funds. That was never progressed. The minister did not answer my question about what happened to the divestment application. He did not say whether he knew about it, so I will still pursue those questions. Why was that application to divest not progressed? If it had, they would not be in this situation now.

We have got to remember that the National Congress of Australia's First People is an elected representative body of our first peoples. They are being moved out of Redfern, effectively against their will. To have to relocate to Canberra away from their client base—and so not have ready access to their client base—seems to me to be an inappropriate way to treat the national congress that is the representative of Australia's first peoples. I look forward to hearing the minister's response to the questions that he did not answer during question time and to hearing him, perhaps, further correct the record that the congress is happy in the context of: 'At least they've got a roof over their heads.' They are not happy to be moved. That is my very clear understanding. I have checked that, subsequent to the minister coming in here to correct the record. I have checked that, yes, they are happy they will have a roof over their heads, but, no, they are not happy in any way that they have to move or that it looks like they will lose $1 million worth of fit-out for their current offices.

Question agreed to.