Marion Scrymgour (Lingiari, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

I rise today with a sense of long overdue relief that a legislated, independent and empowered national commission for Aboriginal and Torres Islander children and young people is being established. I want to acknowledge both commissioners—National Commissioner for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Children and Young People Sue-Anne Hunter and Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Social Justice Commissioner Katie Kiss—who are here. Like many Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people, I have waited a long, long time to see this legislation.

I want to take the chamber back to 2007, when, in this chamber, the former prime minister John Howard launched a savage attack on the Northern Territory remote communities. I want to convey the feeling at that time, as an Aboriginal person and a minister in the Northern Territory government. I had previously served for six years as the Northern Territory Minister for Child Protection. I was, and still am, well aware of the challenges and threats facing young people in our communities.

The historical context and the story that has led to this legislation is really important. In fact, it cannot be separated from the previous, punitive policies pursued by former governments. When the Howard government launched the Northern Territory Emergency Response—or the intervention, as we know it—they did it under the manufactured guise of Little children are sacred. The Little children are sacred report was a report that listed many issues facing children in remote communities. Many of the issues raised were valid and needed a comprehensive response. Such a response was not provided. The Howard government was not looking for long-term systemic action. They were looking for a quick political hit. The Howard government needed a political win, and Aboriginal people in the Northern Territory paid for it. It was felt most strongly by our young people, our families and particularly our men in our remote communities. Howard and his government used graphic language of mass sexual abuse and paedophile rings, none of which were ever substantiated. They demonised Aboriginal men and indeed our communities. The intervention stripped elders and traditional owners of their power. It undermined land rights, and it disempowered Aboriginal communities. The intervention did not make our children safer, and, in fact, I would argue it made our children unsafe.

In this demonisation and disempowerment, the intervention laid the foundations for the crisis we see today for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander young people. Let me be clear: there are very real issues with sexual abuse across this country. We cannot hide from this fact. There are a number of intractable, complex social challenges faced by our remote communities that feed into this. It is also clear that we have unacceptable rates of youth crime. I don't need anyone in this parliament to tell me about this. I'm living in Alice Springs. I've lived in Katherine, I've lived in Darwin, and I've also lived for a long time in my home of the Tiwi Islands. I know that some of the behaviour of young people is not acceptable, but we have to ask ourselves seriously, what are the factors driving this? Like many members in this House, I have raised children and grandchildren, and now I have great-grandchildren. I can tell you with authority that ten-year-olds do not belong in jail. I would challenge anyone to look into the eyes of a ten-year-old and tell me that they are inherently criminal. I think about the conditions many of our young people, particularly in remote areas, face every single day—overcrowded houses, intergenerational unemployment, lack of opportunity and things to do and a disrespect of their cultural heritage. These are structural failures and conversations that Aboriginal people themselves have every single day. It is no wonder we see high rates of disenfranchisement of young people.

These conditions are not unique to the Northern Territory but exist all across the country. This is not an inherent failing of youth. It is the failing in the structures that are meant to protect them and support them. What these structural failures have resulted in are record levels of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander children living in out-of-home care. It has resulted in abuse. It has resulted in young people turning to crime. It has resulted in alcoholism and has weakened family structures. In the Northern Territory, we are seeing a vicious and punitive Country Liberal government hellbent on locking up as many young people as possible. The problem with this is that they are just perpetuating and extending the crisis. People who break the law should face consequences. And, make no mistake, our communities and people living in them deserve to feel safe. Violent crime and property crime are terrifying for victims and are unacceptable. However, young people deserve to be supported to become strong members of our community.

All of these things can exist at the same time, and we must aspire to this for our communities. In order to address the structural nature of the challenges young people face, which are causing so much harm, we have to improve those systems. We need independent, honest, transparent advice. This legislation will work towards this by establishing a strong body which has the autonomy and the focus needed to address some of the challenges facing our young people. A key principle of the work this government is doing is working alongside communities we believe in—nothing about us without us. This is not just ideological; it is practical. The only way to create long-lasting, sustainable solutions is to work with local communities.

Governments come and go, but it is the community which endures. It is our community which has the solutions to the problems we face. We must keep focused on strengthening families and strengthening communities, and we must work in genuine partnership with communities to deliver real outcomes for our young people. This is the essence of this legislation. The National Commission on Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Children and Young People will sit as a statutory agency within the government, but it will have the freedom, the power and the independence to provide the frank and fearless advice that we need to government.

Having seen the work of commissioner Sue-Anne Hunter, I am confident that the commission will be frank with our government about the difficulties and the difficult things it may not want to hear but needs to act upon. This is essential. I come back to the context of the intervention in an era of politicisation around Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander young people. We must have the advice to government, grounded in policy knowledge and deeply connected to the experience of community. I want to congratulate Commissioner Hunter on her work to date and encourage her to do this work, particularly in the Northern Territory. I look forward to working with her to improve the lives of our young people in the NT. Aunty Violet said this morning that, for real change to happen, our voices from the community must be heard clearly. Commissioner Hunter has a lot of experience in this, and she will not mince her words, I'm hoping. I am excited to hear what she has to say.

This morning, I attended the launch of 'Our Ways—Strong Ways—Our Voices: National Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Plan to End Family, Domestic and Sexual Violence 2026-2036'. If we are to improve the lives of our young people, we must also improve the lives of our women. Women are the bedrock of our communities; they keep our families strong and keep our communities functioning. We must expend every effort to keep our women safe, keep them healthy and ensure that they are strong. This is the only way we can get better outcomes for our young people.

All of the legislation and policy work is, of course, in line with our Closing the Gap initiatives. Closing the Gap has had many challenges over the almost two decades it's been operating. As our Prime Minister has said, we all must do more. While it's sometimes challenging, it is also a critical part of our concerted effort to ensure that our mob get the opportunities, attention, care and support that they deserve. I hear a lot of people coming up to me and saying: 'Why do Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people get so much attention? Why do they get so much money?' The predominantly clear answer is that they are the most in need of support. This is meant to be a country of justice, of equality and of equity. It is meant to be the land of a fair go, of mateship and of looking after one another.

We cannot just say these things as some sort of cultural beacon. We must mean them. There are many people in this chamber who preach about our national values and what it means to be Australian. To me, being Australian is looking after people in need. This legislation aims to do that. It is about elevating the voices of people so often marginalised by the structure of government. If you look at any one of the targets under Closing the Gap and any of the statistics that underpin them, there is a lot of work to do. The legislation is just one step in that work. I hope those opposite, who speak so often about Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people and young people find it within themselves to support this legislation. As in the time of the intervention, our people are being politicised. We must stop. We must take concrete steps together as a parliament, as a country, towards a fairer place and a better outcome for those in need. This is what this legislation does.

I want to acknowledge Assistant Minister Ged Kearney, who did a lot of work leading up to this. I also want to acknowledge Minister Amanda Rishworth and all the work that she did leading up to this, and Minister Plibersek, who now has the work of carrying this forward. Minister Katy Gallagher, who is over in the Senate, has a long-term commitment in terms of women and the rights of women. I think it is a proud moment for all of those ministers and assistant ministers. I want to acknowledge Charlee-Sue, who is with Minister Plibersek. I want to acknowledge the work that Charlee-Sue and a lot of the advisers have done. Often, as politicians, we will stand up here and pat ourselves on the back, but it's often the people behind the scenes who are doing a lot of the grunt work. And I do want to acknowledge Charlee-Sue and all of the people involved in social services who have worked towards this.

I've mentioned our two commissioners. It was fantastic to be at the launch today because it was like being taken back to the old days of advocacy, seeing the women and the men—it was great to see the men there because we often say that to get the solutions here we need to have our men as part of that solution. I think that for our families and for the future of our families, our men need to be front and centre as part of that solution.

This is an important, overdue piece of legislation. I think of SNAICC, with Catherine Liddle and Aunty Muriel Bamblett and the work that they did back in 2001 with the State of denial report in the Northern Territory, when they talked about the state of the child protection system and just how bad and broken it was in the Northern Territory. Things have improved and you can have legislation and structures—there was contemporary legislation brought into the Northern Territory—but it needs people. It needs all of us to work together to make this happen.

I stand here today to say to Commissioner Hunter, our social justice commissioner; and to Minister Malarndirri McCarthy, who is our national minister: I look forward to working—as the local member in Lingiari, which is nearly the whole of the Northern Territory—with everybody to try and turn this around, or to at least to make this better. But I take my hat off to Minister Plibersek for the work she has done. She has brought this piece of really important, groundbreaking legislation. I think only a Labor government will do some of the big reforms, and I'm proud to be a part of it.

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