Dave Tollner (Solomon, Country Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

My question is addressed to the Minister for Families, Community Services and Indigenous Affairs. On the eve of the 40th anniversary of the 1967 referendum, will the minister update the House on government initiatives to help improve the wellbeing of Australian Aborigines?

Mal Brough (Longman, Liberal Party, Minister Assisting the Prime Minister for Indigenous Affairs) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I thank the member for Solomon for his question and his genuine interest in Australia’s Indigenous population.

Ms Anna Burke (Chisholm, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

We all have a genuine interest.

Mal Brough (Longman, Liberal Party, Minister Assisting the Prime Minister for Indigenous Affairs) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The member opposite is correct: we all have a genuine interest in Australia’s Indigenous population. I believe that 40 years ago the aspiration of the Australian people that was reflected in the overwhelming yes vote was to see more opportunities and a better future for Australia’s Indigenous population. There have been many positives. Today we have an Australian Indigenous surgeon. I am sure that 40 years ago many people would have thought that was unachievable.

Since 1986 there has been a reduction in the unemployment rate for our Indigenous population from 35 per cent to 16 per cent. In 1972 to 1974, the appalling reality was that the infant mortality rate in Queensland and the Northern Territory for our Indigenous population was 78 out of every 1,000 births. Between 2003 and 2005 it was 11 in Queensland and 16 in the Northern Territory—still far too high of course, but a far cry from where it was. Between 1973 and 2002, the prenatal mortality rate decreased by 55 per cent in Queensland, the Northern Territory and South Australia. The causal mortality rates decreased by 16 per cent on all causal mortality between 1991 and 2003. The school retention rate through to year 12 has gone from 30 per cent to 40 per cent.

All of these things are positive, but I am sure that no-one in this House and no Australian believes that the aspirations of the Australian population in 1967 have been realised. We could stand here on the eve of the 40th anniversary and perhaps decree that we would somehow set an artificial target about increasing Indigenous life expectancy or further reducing mortality rates. Those things would be admirable, but would they be achievable and would we just be setting up a false horizon unless we actually deliver the things that are necessary? We all recall the promise that no child would be living in poverty by 1990—well meant but empty rhetoric. There is no point in empty rhetoric when it comes to the Indigenous population of this country. They have had too much empty rhetoric for far too long. The Howard government did not set a target of five per cent for unemployment. We had that as an aspiration and we have achieved it and exceeded it. We set about achieving things and realising real goals.

I was disappointed only last week to see what can happen when you set goals. The Queensland government signed a local Indigenous partnership agreement—an agreement between the people of Mornington Island and the Queensland government. In it they had an aspiration of having 75 per cent of children attending school. That meant that they felt that 25 per cent do not count—that is what it is saying to that community. The reality is that we should have an aspiration of 100 per cent of students attending school. We have to have that as an aspiration and then we have to deliver what it takes to make that happen.

The Howard government delivered $1.6 billion in the last budget to give a real go for real housing improvements in remote Australia—$1.6 billion to reduce overcrowding, to improve health circumstances and social living conditions and to give people the parameters they need. These are very practical measures.

The reality is that many of the things we have been talking about are now starting to come to fruition. Noel Pearson delivered a speech to his own community up in Hope Vale recently, which I had the great privilege to hear. I suggest to every member of parliament that they read it; it is one of the great speeches of our time. To confront your own people and say that you will no longer tolerate child neglect, that you will no longer accept alcohol abuse, drug abuse or gambling abuse, and to say that your own people, your own family, are a sad reflection upon the people who came before them—those were the sentiments that he expressed—shows enormous leadership. But the people of Hope Vale have now taken up the cudgels, and what they are demanding is a massive change in welfare reform, housing reform and land reform.

The sad reality is that a former minister for Indigenous affairs, Robert Tickner, slammed the Queensland government back in June 1991, when he said:

The legislation in Queensland as it stands will not help Aborigines when it talks about land tenure.

Sixteen years later, those same people are saying to me, ‘Please give us land tenure change so that we can have the right to own our own homes, so that we can aspire.’ That is what the Howard government is trying to deliver.

We have just signed a landmark agreement in the Northern Territory with Chief Minister Clare Martin, worth over $150 million, to deliver some of these things. I congratulate the Western Australian government, whose minister for Indigenous affairs is wanting to deliver a better future and is agreeing with the Commonwealth government’s programs.

I come back to aspirations. Unfortunately, in the last two months in Kalumburu in the East Kimberleys, in a community of about 450 people—about 190 adults—some 11 men have been charged with child sex offences, including the mayor or chairman, the deputy chair and other people of great authority—11 out of 190-odd adults. I ask all of us in this place: what chance have those children got of ever having an education when they are subjected to that sort of behaviour in a community? There was no police station in that community; there is today. As a result of our summit on sexual violence, we have now dedicated the money for a police station in Kalumburu. We have three more police stations going into remote Western Australia. But what should happen is not what happened in Mutitjulu when the Commonwealth government spent $1.9 million and the Northern Territory government did not man the police station. What a hoax and a fraud upon the people of Mutitjulu, and the children and the women who have to put up with those conditions.

The Tiwi Islands people have now signed a historic agreement to go to 99-year leases. They will have a new future for their people. The people of Galiwinku want to do the same. The people of Wadeye now have embraced change. This is because the Howard government will sit, listen and work with Indigenous Australians. We will not set artificial targets but we will deliver for Indigenous Australians, and we will reach the aspirations that we all so desperately looked for in 1967.