Shayne Neumann (Blair, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

On behalf of the Standing Committee on Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Affairs I present the committee's report entitled Our land, our languages: language learning in Indigenous communitiestogether with the minutes of proceedings and evidence received by the committee.

The Mabo decision of the High Court of Australia in June 1992 legally recognised Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples as having a special relationship to their land that existed prior to colonisation. The Mabo decision recognised the Terra Nullius, the concept that Australia was unoccupied at the time of colonisation, was a fiction. Similarly, the notion that Australia is a mono-lingual nation, and that only standard Australian English can benefit a person, is a fiction. Estimates indicate that, at the time of white settlement, there were 250 Australian Indigenous languages in use, and today there are only 18 languages, strong in the sense that they are spoken by significant numbers of people across all age groups.

The committee has made 30 comprehensive recommendations in this report in key areas including an acknowledgement of and focus on Indigenous languages into the Closing the Gap framework; expanding the Indigenous Languages Support program and prioritising the development of language nests, used so effectively overseas; and establishing a national Indigenous interpreting service, a recommendation of our previous report, Doing time—time for doing, a recommendation of this committee 20 years ago that was not acted upon. This committee recommends putting in place immediate measures to ensure competent interpreting services in the areas of the health and justice sectors, supporting constitutional change to include the recognition of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander languages; resourcing, adequately and well, bilingual school education programs for Indigenous communities where the child's first language is an Indigenous language; developing strategies for training Indigenous-language teachers to ensure improved access to full qualifications, accreditation and career pathways; compulsory English as an additional language or dialect training for all teaching degrees and mandatory EALD and cultural awareness training for teachers working in Indigenous communities; further improving community access to language materials through a dedicated Indigenous languages archive at AIATSIS; the sharing of resources with schools and educational institutions—and many more recommendations.

The committee received over 154 submissions and held 23 public hearings—not just in the capitals but in Halls Creek, Broome, Darwin, with many teleconferences across the length and breadth of the country. I thank the deputy chair, the Hon. Dr Sharman Stone, and the cooperation all committee members on both sides of politics for this bipartisan report. I thank the amazing Dr Anna Dacre, the committee secretary, the fabulous inquiry secretaries Ms Susan Cardell and Ms Rebecca Gordon, and the ever-erudite research officer Dr John White.

This is the first parliamentary inquiry to examine the direct contribution of learning Indigenous languages and what they can do to improve the educational, vocational and economic outcomes for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples. It comes out of previous report Doing time—time for doing. Indigenous language has been identified as an important component of cultural connection and strengthening intergenerational relationships and community building. It is important that we identify the importance of translator services for our hospitals, our schools, our prisons and our courts. For too long the situation has been dire and tragic in our country. We need to recognise the positive implications for capacity building in Indigenous communities and community involvement; employment in resource management, arts and tourism; as well as interpreting. We have been proud of speakers and singers and sportspeople—people like Harold Blair, after whom my electorate is named; Albert Namatjira, the great painter; and Cathy Freeman. Each week we celebrate AFL and NRL champions with an Indigenous background. We have even gone to see The Sapphires, a movie about Indigenous singers. But for a long time we have failed to recognise that these are our languages, that this is our land and our continent. They have been there for tens of thousands of years and they are important. We have a responsibility.

In this report we have recognised the importance of dual naming—here in Parliament House and of streets and places elsewhere. We have a responsibility as federal politicians. We have also recognised that we need an alternative diagnostic tool to NAPLAN in the early years of schooling. It is important that, at first, young people be taught in their native language.

This is an important report which has its basis in our previous report. There is much to do. But, if we want to celebrate and recognise our Indigenous languages, we must take action and we must take action now. For too long we have failed. It is tragic. It is dire. Action is required. I urge the government to take that action and I am pleased to support this report.

Sharman Stone (Murray, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

On indulgence, as deputy chair of the House of Representatives Standing Committee on Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Affairs, I agree with our chair, the previous speaker, that the inquiry into language learning in Indigenous communities was a most important inquiry. The Australian public has little understanding of the number, or the complexity, of Indigenous languages spoken at the time of British colonisation in 1788. All tribes and the Torres Straits Islanders were multilingual, typically speaking, as well as their own language, the languages of each of their neighbours. Australian Indigenous languages are recognised as amongst the most complex in the world in their structure and vocabulary.

The first settlement governor, Arthur Phillip, recognised that understanding the natives' languages was essential if the new settlers were to interact peacefully with the Indigenous people. On 30 October 1788, in his regular report to Lord Sydney back in London, Governor Phillip lamented:

I now doubt whether it will be possible to get any of these people to remain with us, in order to get their language, without using force; they see no advantage that can arise from us that may make amends for the loss of the part of the harbour in which we occasionally employ the boats in fishing.

Just two months later, Governor Phillip reported to Lord Sydney:

… one of the natives was seized for the purpose of learning the language and reconciling them to us.

However, by 1838, colonial attitudes about the usefulness of learning the Indigenous languages—and indeed about their complexity—had changed. In a lecture given in Hobart town, Captain Maconachie of the Royal Navy said:

I am … of opinion that, in attempts to civilise and convert native tribes, systematic efforts should be always made to teach them English; and that translations even of the Bible into their own language are of very doubtful utility … The object is to raise the native, not to descend to his level, or apparently even below it, by imperfect, and therefore necessarily in many cases ludicrous, efforts to use his jargon.

This view was formalised in government policy and missionary behaviour throughout the colonies.

Indigenous children in schools were not allowed to speak their Indigenous languages. In particular, children removed from their parents were not allowed to speak their own language. There was a concerted effort for some 150 years in Australia to prevent any language other than English being used in our courts, in our hospitals or in our schools.

This inquiry aimed to identify whether it is important to recognise and help to preserve traditional languages and, if so, to identify exactly what traditional language learning gives to its speakers. We also looked at how the continued preservation and use of one's home language—in this case, traditional Indigenous language—impacts on other learning by the children, in particular their learning of standard Australian English. We found overwhelming evidence that there was an enormous benefit when the people of any human society, including our Indigenous Australians, are able to speak, preserve and indeed restore their native languages. There are enormous benefits for their sense of wellbeing, their self-esteem and to their identity as having a unique and amazing Australian Aboriginal culture.

We found the most extraordinary efforts being made, often in struggling, very poorly resourced communities, to retain their language—to make teaching materials and to have their elders engage with their younger people. Even when there were just a few words remaining, the effort to put those words together to preserve them for future generations was profound. We walked away with an enormous sense of the effort being put into language preservation and recovery by Indigenous Australians. We commend them for that. We also found that there is a significant educational advantage when any child coming to school with a first language other than English is taught in that first language. There was so much evidence that Australian teachers are not equipped to teach multilingually in any language other than English, much less complex Indigenous Australian languages. We also took much evidence about the importance of the contact languages—typically called Kriol, but there are different names for different creoles in different parts of Australia—and we acknowledge in our report the importance of also teaching in Kriol if that is the home language of the child when they first engage with the formal education system. We found that NAPLAN was useless when it came to assessing young Indigenous children's progress in literacy and numeracy when they had a home language other than English and had not been taught bilingually. We also saw interpreting in Australia as not appropriately regulated or accredited and we recommended that that be addressed. (Time expired)

Ms Anna Burke (Chisholm, Deputy-Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The time allotted for statements on this report has expired. Does the member for Blair wish to move a motion in connection with the report to enable it to be debated on a later occasion?

Shayne Neumann (Blair, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I move:

That the House take note of the report.

Ms Anna Burke (Chisholm, Deputy-Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

In accordance with standing order 39, the debate is adjourned. The resumption of the debate will be made an order of the day for a later hour this day.