Penny Wong (SA, Australian Labor Party, Minister for Foreign Affairs) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

On behalf of the Prime Minister, I table the annual report on Closing the Gap and accompanying ministerial statement, and I seek leave to make a very brief statement relating to the documents.

Leave granted.

I thank the Senate. I first acknowledge the traditional owners of the land on which we gather and pay my respects to elders past, present and emerging, and I pay tribute to the First Nations parliamentarians here in the chamber for their leadership and contribution. I will speak but briefly, as Senator Dodson and Senator McCarthy will speak for the government today because it is important that First Nations parliamentarians have their voice and perspective heard and that we all listen.

I want to make some brief points. Whilst the Closing the Gap report shows there has been some progress, on the majority of measures progress has been slow and even gone backwards. This government takes responsibility for where we go from here and for doing better. As the Prime Minister said today, so-called solutions conceived in Canberra and imposed on communities without consultation are more likely than not to end in expensive, ineffective, even counterproductive failure, but when First Nations people have a genuine say in policy design and an empowered role in service delivery, the results are remarkable.

The Albanese government is a government that listens to people with experience, with earned knowledge of kinship and country, of culture and community, and it is this which underlines our commitment to the full implementation of the Uluru Statement from the Heart, including a constitutionally enshrined Voice to Parliament to empower First Nations people to take control of their own lives, not have policies and laws dictated to them by politicians. The Voice is about enabling a better future, a future in which the lives of Indigenous people in the community are improved, to achieve better outcomes in health, in education, in housing and to close the gap. That is why we believe it is so important that the call from First Nations to be heard and to have a voice is answered by Australians.

Patrick Dodson (WA, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I move:

That the Senate take note of the document.

The Commonwealth government's first annual report under the National Agreement on Closing the Gap shows we have a lot of work to do. While has been some progress, the previous government's efforts over the last decade in government have been very ineffectual. Progress across most socioeconomic outcomes has stalled. While the national agreement and the partnership with the Coalition of Peaks provides a helpful architecture, the previous government's implementation leaves much to be desired.

Since coming into government just six months ago, our government has demonstrated our commitment to improving outcomes for First Nations peoples. In the October 2022 budget, we locked in significant investments across portfolios, seeking to address these disproportionate outcomes. We are investing in First Nations health workers, vital health infrastructure and community led justice reinvestment initiatives. In all of these commitments, we are working with First Nations peoples. This concept of working with First Nations peoples to make decisions about policies and programs so that they are more effective is not new. I and many other leaders have been talking about this for decades. It is grounded in the evidence: outcomes for our people are simply better when we have a say, have a choice and make decisions about our lives.

The national agreement provides one piece of architecture to improve outcomes, and my colleagues will work with this framework to continue important progress across the socioeconomic areas. But to achieve better outcomes, after a decade of stagnation, we must fundamentally change how governments work with First Nations peoples. We cannot allow these outcomes to continue in this way. That is only a shame on governments for failing to listen to First Nations communities.

To make meaningful and lasting change and progress requires systemic and structural transformation of how we are going to go about it on all sides of government. The Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Voice to the parliament and to the government will do exactly that. Our government is steadfast in the commitment to the full implementation of the Uluru Statement from the Heart because we know that it will lead to better outcomes for First Nations communities. That very statement calls for constitutional reform through a voice so that First Nations children can flourish. The Voice will give our people a real opportunity to advise the parliament and the government on how to do things for the better of our people. After 250 years, that's not such a bad idea.

The Voice to Parliament will be a significant shift for our nation, a structural change that will lead to better outcomes for our people and all Australians. To take the two concepts of closing the gap and the Voice to Parliament as mutually exclusive is flawed and misses the point.

Simon Birmingham (SA, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Foreign Affairs) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

BIRMINGHAM (—) (): As we do at the commencement of every day of sittings, I want to acknowledge the traditional owners of the land on which we meet and pay my respects to elders past, present and emerging as part of this recognition of the Closing the Gap statement.

The 2022 Closing the gap report is the first since the launch under the previous coalition government of the 2020 national agreement and the Closing the Gap implementation plan released just over 12 months ago. The new implementation plan provides new targets established in genuine partnership with First Nations peoples, including, notably, the Coalition of Peaks, who I again thank for their detailed work through that process. It also includes state and territory governments, who play a critical role in delivering outcomes in Indigenous communities right across Australia.

The intent of the changes that were made to the Closing the Gap targets and the process of measuring them was to ensure that enhanced granularity of programs and targets to close the gap across areas of health, education, life expectancy and the range of different measures applied were even more measurable, even more effectively verifiable, so that we are able to ensure better progress of policies against those targets. When the former Prime Minister released the plan last year, it included $1 billion in new measures across a range of Commonwealth programs and strategies to help to ensure the actions across all areas of national government work towards closing the gap and achieving what we all seek: to improve the lives and circumstances of our First Australians and to see young Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander children having the same health, education and employment opportunities as anyone else in Australia, so that they too can share the same hopes and the same aspirations for their own future and for that of their families.

I'm pleased that we see today the first Closing the gap report to measure against the new priorities and the new, more granular targets which reflect very genuinely the input from First Australians to establish those targets and priorities. Sadly, though, yet again we have to acknowledge that there is still much more to do. In too many areas we are still not making progress, or are even going backwards. School readiness, adult incarceration rates and suicide rates are all statistics that paint a bleak and continually concerning picture. They must provide a clarion call to all of us across the Australian parliament, and in state and territory parliaments, to redouble our collective efforts.

But we should not overlook improvement where it has been achieved. To actually highlight improvements is to try to enhance confidence in the processes and policies applied by governments to seek to close the gap. Healthier birth weights, more children enrolled in preschool, fewer young people in detention—these are important steps forward. We should celebrate those steps and seek to redouble progress on them, but make sure in doing so that we say to Australians, 'We can make a difference and we can make progress when we work together and apply those policies.'

In acknowledging those gains I pay tribute to those who work every day with individuals and across communities, from inner cities suburbs through to the remotest parts of our country, to deliver the outcomes that the policy actions of governments seek to achieve. I reaffirm to the Senate the commitment made by the Leader of the Opposition and shadow minister for Indigenous affairs in the House to work with the government on addressing the challenge to truly close the gap. Together we must continue to act to ensure specific and detailed policies are delivered to close the many gaps that continue to exist. That may mean, sometimes, difficult conversations. It may mean, sometimes, doing things that don't necessarily fit neatly into our own party's policy agendas. After many decades of effort by parties of both sides when in government, we know that closing the gap has no simple answer and no easy solutions. That is why we must persevere, persist and, where necessary, adapt policies to make sure that progress is made and improved.

If in the years to come we can stand here—but more importantly than standing here, stand alongside Indigenous Australians—and acknowledge a list of improvements against the Closing the Gap targets and, more importantly, a list of improvements in their lives and their children's and grandchildren's lives, then that will have been an effort well worthwhile.

Larissa Waters (Queensland, Australian Greens) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

As the Greens leader in the Senate I pay respects to the First Nations owners of this land, over which sovereignty was never ceded. So it is, it was and it will always be Aboriginal land. I acknowledge and pay respect to all First Nations members of this parliament.

I rise to take note of the deeply disappointing results of the annual Closing the gap report. We are not closing the gap anywhere near fast enough, and on many indicators have, shamefully, gone backwards. We know and acknowledge that the injustices we see documented in the Closing the gap report are symptoms of colonisation. First Nations people are wearing the consequences of racist decisions that successive governments in this country have made. It is on all Australians, but especially those of us in this chamber, to right the wrongs that started with invasion and the absence of treaty, and continue through child removal, incarceration and suicide. The rate of First Nations child removal is at an all-time high. Survivors of the Stolen Generations are now witnessing a new generation of First Nations children being stolen from their families and communities. The United Nations Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide defines forcibly transferring children of one group to another group as an act of genocide. Implementing the recommendations from the Bringing them home report will keep First Nations kids with First Nations families. These are self-determined solutions that successive governments have ignored for 25 years.

Aggressive policing results in too many Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people being locked up in prisons who do not have independent oversight to safeguard their human rights. Systemic racism in our policing and legal system is compounded by the low age of criminal responsibility, exposing kids as young as 10 to the trauma of prison and a criminal record. Sixty-five per cent of children in prison across Australia are First Nations kids. Our minimum age of criminal responsibility is out of line with international jurisdictions and out of line with our human rights obligations. We must urgently raise the age to at least 14 years.

Around 40 per cent of the recommendations of the Royal Commission into Aboriginal Deaths in Custody are about social factors—things like education, health and housing. Access to basic human rights will stop First Nations people from going to prison in the first place. Successive governments have ignored this advice for 31 years. If the Albanese government are committed to hearing and acting on advice from First Nations people they will implement all the recommendations from the Bringing them home report and the Royal Commission into Aboriginal Deaths in Custody and listen to calls from the UN Committee on the Rights of the Child to raise the age of criminal responsibility. This is urgent, and it's overdue.

First Nations people are resorting to self-harm, because they cannot see a future for themselves in this system. The continuing high rate of suicide shows that structural racism and the policies made for First Nations people but not by them is killing First Nations people. Often they don't have access to their land, water or sacred sites or even their own children. This is up to us to change. We've inherited a centuries-old regime written entirely by white men that has not undertaken any fundamental change since colonisation. We know the confronting truth: the basis of the Australian nation was terra nullius and the idea that First Nations people didn't need human rights or decision-making power because they were subhuman.

We have an opportunity to do things differently in this country. A national grassroots treaty process will close the gap by restoring First Nations people's rights to make decisions for themselves. We know that self-determined solutions work, because Aboriginal people know what's best for Aboriginal communities. Everyone thrives when they are free to set their own course. On this, there must be a standalone national plan to end violence against First Nations women and children that is developed, delivered and evaluated by First Nations women and community controlled organisations. I'm pleased that work on this has begun. Adequate funding must be allocated to get it done.

Despite ongoing injustice, First Nations people are strong and capable. A national treaty process puts First Nations people in the driver's seat when it comes to making decisions about their own country, community and culture. We are one of the only Commonwealth countries that doesn't have a treaty with First Nations people. It was promised by Bob Hawke's Labor government in the eighties. First Nations elders and activists have marched for it for decades. In this term of government the Greens will work for progress on truth, treaty and voice to meaningfully close the gap.

Bridget McKenzie (Victoria, National Party, Shadow Minister for Infrastructure, Transport and Regional Development) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise as Leader of the Nationals in the Senate to also take note of the Closing the Gap statement and to put our views on how that is proceeding—or how the report, currently as it has been tabled, isn't proceeding as quickly, as swiftly as we would like but, more importantly, as Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanders need to occur in this country. Today is a day when, as we do each time this report is tabled, we take stock as a collective group of national leaders of how we can better work together to improve the life outcomes of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people. It's underpinned by the belief that when Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people have a genuine say in the design and delivery of policies, programs and services that effect them then better life outcomes are achieved. All Australian governments are committed to working with Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people and their communities, organisations and businesses to help achieve better outcomes.

But today we have to acknowledge that four out of 18 means that 12 out of 18 aren't going in the right direction. So we all need to put our shoulder harder into that wheel to work better with state and territory governments, with local governments and with Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peak organisations so that the policies that are thought of and designed hit the ground in those communities and really change the dial. In terms of changes that we made whilst we were in government, we did take the practical step of creating the joint ministerial council, led by the national Coalition of Peaks, to inform the work with government and develop the evolving target areas, which was so critical to changing the way we looked at achieving the Closing the Gap targets. In order to maintain the momentum of the national agreement's transformative agenda, we've got to foster and enhance those partnership principles.

As the party of rural and regional Australia, if you look at the latest statistics from the ABS, the 20 electorates that have the most Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people in them as a proportion of population are all in rural and regional Australia, all 20 of them. Lingiari has 40 per cent. Parkes, represented by Mark Coulton in the other place, has 16 per cent. Mark Coulton, a National Party MP, represents more Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanders than he does farmers. So it's about making sure that we constructively work with whoever is in government and that we are in partnerships at the state government level. That is critical for changing the dial for the people that we represent as the party of rural and regional Australia.

We've got to look at the education piece. We've got to get kids into school. We've got to get great teachers into schools in remote areas to really back those young people's future opportunities.

We created Supply Nation, the procurement policy, while we were in government, with $5.3 billion that went into tens of thousands of contracts. Small businesses partnered with local Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanders in great jobs right across the country. That was a way to take a creative gambit, if you like, to change the dial, and it did. I would like to pay tribute to the former minister in this space Nigel Scullion and thank him for that work.

I look forward to working however we can with the current government constructively to close the gap over their time on the Treasury benches, and we have all got to do better. There is no other way to say it.

Pauline Hanson (Queensland, Pauline Hanson's One Nation Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise to respond to the Closing the Gap report. This is the first report since the establishment of the new National Agreement on Closing the Gap. Once again, it makes for disappointing and frustrating reading.

I acknowledge that some targets are on track: more babies born at a healthy weight, and more kids enrolled in preschool. This is very welcome news. However, many targets are not on track, and in some areas the gap has widened. These include incarceration rates, children in and out of home care, getting children school-ready and tragically, suicide rates.

One Nation supports the new approach in the National Agreement on Closing the Gap in principle, primarily because there was some focus on empowering Indigenous Australians to take equal responsibility for its outcomes. We have hope that this approach will chip away at the insidious culture of victimhood unjustly imposed on Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples. We concede that it is early days, but you will forgive my cynicism at the ultimate impact of this new approach, considering the uncounted billions of dollars thrown at these issues for many years, with little positive effect.

Regardless, closing the gaps is an urgent priority for this entire nation. It is appalling that any defined demographic of Australians is so obviously disadvantaged. One Nation looks forward to a future when this disadvantage has been overcome, when we are no longer divided or separated by race in any respect, and when every individual Australian's opportunities and prospects are no longer defined by race. We will never close the gaps as long as we continue to indulge in the identity politics of racial division and separatism.

This is why it is critical that all Australian people unite to stand against it, and they can do so by voting no in the coming referendum on the proposed Voice to Parliament. Given the urgency to close the gaps, it is only fair to question why the Albanese government is prioritising such an expensive and divisive proposal, especially considering there is absolutely no compelling evidence the Voice will help to close the gap. It is only fair to question if the Albanese government is ignoring a growing chorus of Australian voices, including prominent Indigenous voices, opposing the voice to parliament. It is only fair to question why the Prime Minister did not, apparently, seek legal advice before proposing his amendment to the Constitution. This draft amendment is of tremendous concern for the future governance of Australia, because it threatens to unleash a wave of repeated constitutional crises. Constitutional legal minds much finer than those of Anthony Albanese or Mark Dreyfus have, for months, been warning the Prime Minister's draft amendment is absolutely ripe for this potential.

As we have seen unfolding this week, this debate is not only causing further division between Indigenous and non-indigenous Australians it is dividing Indigenous Australia itself. Noel Pearson has been at the forefront of the yes cause, pedalling the transparent lie that the voice is necessary because Indigenous Australians are not recognised in their country. This week he has bullied and attacked Senator Price for her stance on the voice, accusing her of being used to punch down on other Aboriginals. I was disgusted, but not especially surprised, by this deeply personal and racist attack on a woman who has articulated practical and sensible concerns about the voice. Mr Pearson would do well to consider that Senator Price's election to the Senate shows our Constitution and system of government are no barriers to Indigenous representation. And the Prime Minister will do well to pay close attention to the fracturing of the Australian electorate and the deep divisions being created by this proposal to give greater political franchise to a minority of Australians based solely on race. One Nation proudly stands against enshrining racial exceptionalism in the founding document of Australia. We will be campaigning strongly for the no vote so that Australia can move forward together, united as one people and one nation under one flag.

Malarndirri McCarthy (NT, Australian Labor Party, Assistant Minister for Indigenous Australians) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise to speak to the report tabled today, in 2022. It's clearly deeply frustrating, as we've heard from Minister Burney and my colleague Senator Dodson. But I want to use this time to reach out those people across this country who do so much each and every single day in all of these areas that we have the targets for Closing the Gap.

Let's talk about our children. To the woman who intervened in the life of her own son and his five children and knew that if she didn't step in to take those children herself then they too would be removed into the care of the system that so many First Nations people dread, the system of welfare and the system that removes children, as we've seen with stolen generations—and redress now—the system that still drives a lot of fear in the hearts of many mothers. To the woman who stepped into that intervention and worked with her other son to take those five children and to try and care for them. She still struggles, and her story is emulated across the country, but she did it because she did not want her grandchildren to be part of these statistics.

To the grandmother who knew that her grandbabies were with foster carers and those foster carers, in the community, had raised those babies for about three or four years. The foster carers now, after nearly five years, want to return to where they come from, after living in the community and teaching in the community and caring for so many children there. They've asked to be able to take those children so that they can care for them interstate. So the grandmothers had a meeting and a gathering to talk about what this means for these children and the kinship care. How will they still understand culture? How will they still understand their language and know that they are so deeply loved but just cannot be cared for? That was an important step in the self-determination of those grandmothers, who had known that this was going to be the best way for their grandbabies, so that those children will come back and forwards knowing where they come from in an environment of love.

To those health workers, health practitioners right across Australia, to many of you whom I've met in my short time in the ministry as assistant minister in Indigenous health, we have a terrific opportunity to move even harder on improving these statistics. I am ever so conscious that this is the first time I'm speaking to this report from government. I am ever so conscious that I stand with my colleagues in government to try to improve the lives of First Nations people through the Closing the Gap report. I do thank the parliament of Australia for the many, many years that we have had Closing the Gap—not because I'm proud of any of the reports or the statistics, but because you continuously shine a light on what we know out there in our communities still desperately needs this parliament to never forget. That is to improve the lives of the most vulnerable. We fumble about it in our very imperfect ways, but I do believe there is a genuine desire to make sure these statistics get lower and lower each year.

As the minister for Indigenous health, I say to all those in the health sector out there, I am heartened by the fact that we can move now on the renal dialysis units; on the 500 health practitioners that we want to employ in these positions across the country; on the fact that we're going to focus on rheumatic heart disease and really try to eliminate this scourge. I do hope the next time I stand on my feet here I can have something really strong to say. Thank you.

Question agreed to.