Andrew Laming (Bowman, Liberal Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Regional Health Services and Indigenous Health) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Tonight, Vision 2020, the national body working in partnership with a range of other bodies to reduce avoidable blindness and address vision care, brought together professionals and a large number of people from this House to talk about both the importance of vision loss in Indigenous Australia and the work that is being done through national disability initiatives to ensure that disabled Australians who have lost their vision are not forgotten in the enterprises ahead towards a national scheme.

Speakers included Robyn Gaile, Executive Officer of Blind Citizens Australia, which is one of the peak bodies, and Justin Mohamed, who is the newly elected chair of NACCHO. Each of their speeches reminded us just how important vision is as a component in both combating the lack of services in disability and finding a solution.

We also had a number of stars there. There was Brien Holden, who gave a stimulating speech about the international opportunities to reduce vision loss. He pointed out that, around the globe, $269 billion is paid as the price for failing to address vision loss—75 per cent of which is avoidable—and that an adequate response to something as simple as correctable vision loss could cost as little as 10 per cent of the price that is paid globally every year. While Hugh Taylor was not here on this occasion, we also heard from Andrew Harris from the Optometrists Association Australia and Dr Iain Dunlop from the Royal Australian and New Zealand College of Ophthalmologists.

What came out very clearly today is that we need to ensure that the partnership documents which have been put forward to government by these groups find their way to be funded, that there are no further delays and that we work with all these groups to make sure that they are part of the solution as we come towards a national disability arrangement.

On another and even more urgent note, last Friday on the ABC's PM there was a report by Nicola Gage of ABC Port Augusta that the Mai Wiru Regional Stores Council is to have its funding cut at the end of this financial year at very short notice and with very little evidence of what will replace it. Mai Wiru has a sensational 10-year history of having worked with a range of extremely dispersed and tiny communities in the APY lands to deliver the most effective, efficient, sustainable and healthy stores to these communities. They have worked very, very hard to take individual Indigenous leadership onto their board—12 of the 15 are in fact store managers themselves. They are all Indigenous, and they comprise members of the NPY Women's Council, the APY Council and Nganapma Health.

Mai Wiru is one of the few success stories in one of the most challenging areas of Indigenous policy in Australia, and it is a real shame that its funding is about to be cut—and for no other reason, it would appear, than that there is no other way to get Outback Stores money into South Australia. We all know that, from 2005, $48.1 million was invested in Outback Stores to improve the infrastructure, sustainability and quality of stores in remote communities, most of which are in the Northern Territory.

Outback Stores were meant to be introduced in communities through mutual agreement—by negotiation—but unfortunately they have had only about 21 conversions out of the 100 potential community stores around the Northern Territory. That means that there is a lot of money which has not been spent, and most of it remains within the borders of the Northern Territory. It is a problem of government's making that the second tranche of money, which is under the same conditions, cannot be shared with other exceptional organisations that have the runs on the board in both remote Western Australia and the APY lands.

It is a shame that a great group like Mai Wiru has to be put to the sword and liquidated within two weeks simply because a government does not have the wit to find another way that this money, which currently resides with Outback Stores, can reinforce equally good, efficient and impressive models. Do not forget: Mai Wiru has offered its books to the federal government to say, 'Examine us for our effectiveness and our efficiency; if you have any doubts, let's make it an open tender and see which model works.' Anungal senior man Frank Young says:

We live here, we eat our food from our shop and we run it as Aboriginal people and we are really proud of what we're doing to ourselves.

They say that they do not want to sign up to the new model for the simple reason that, if they join the government, it will not be them and it will not be their store. Those of us who live in urban Australia tend to forget that, in a remote place like the APY lands, a community store is an essential service. It is not only a focal point for the community to meet; it is something that absolutely sustains the community. This part of Australia has borne of its own people the governance to run its stores; it is something we tamper with with great caution. I urge the government in the next two weeks to have another look at the great achievements of Mai Wiru.