Rachel Siewert (WA, Australian Greens) Share this | Hansard source

As you know, the Greens are jointly moving this amendment. I commend it to the Senate and urge the Senate to support it. I would like to touch on the issue of consultation. It continues to amaze me that the government can claim that there has been consultation over these controversial changes that we are trying to split. It amazes me that they continue to run the line that there has been consultation.

Unfortunately, I was unable to make it to the Senate Community Affairs Legislation Committee inquiry hearings into the bill. However, I have read the Hansard and I have read the submissions. It is quite clear from those that the land councils do not support the changes we are talking about. They do support the amendments that the Australian Greens, the ALP and the Democrats are supporting on mining—that is true. There has been extensive consultation with the land councils and with the communities, but there has not been on these other changes. I would like to quote from the Hansard of the inquiry so that I can make it quite clear that the land councils do not support these amendments. The NLC do, in their evidence, support the mining changes. However, the NLC said:

... the NLC has very serious concerns regarding other amendments which (1) appear to breach or impliedly repeal the Racial Discrimination Act 1975 (2) appear directed at effectively implementing the 1998 Reeves report model by breaking up land councils and removing financial independence, and forcing them in effect to publicly disclose confidential minutes and to ‘delegate’ functions to small and unrepresentative corporations and (3) terminate non-contiguous land claims to the intertidal zone and rivers, and enable termination of claims to Northern Territory Land Corporation land. Some of these amendments have only recently been raised, have not been the subject of comprehensive consultation and do not have the consent of traditional owners as recommended by the ATSIA committee in 1999.

They went on to say:

The proposals that land councils be forced to delegate land use functions to small corporations and prioritise scarce resources to them are unworkable and inefficient and will promote dispute and jeopardise development outcomes.

Moving to the evidence of the Central Land Council—one of the other land councils that we are talking about—it was stated that, likewise, they:

... would like it noted on the public record that neither the land councils nor the traditional Aboriginal landowners have been consulted in respect of the whole-of-community leasing proposals nor the stripping of land council functions under the guise of delegation. The ... Land Council was briefed on these amendments and asked to provide comment on the workability of the package as a whole, but this is not consultation.

The Central Land Council, through their evidence and through their submissions to the committee, highlighted their very serious concerns and how they believe that the proposals are not workable. Let us put to bed this issue of whether land councils have been consulted over these amendments. Those are the words of the land councils. They have not been consulted and, to the very brief inquiry at which they were given a very short time frame in which to respond, they clearly articulated that not only have they not been consulted but they do not support the amendments, believe they are unworkable and will in fact undermine the very aims the government claims it is trying to achieve by promoting economic development.

I would like to reinforce the comments made by Senator Evans in terms of the voluntary nature of these proposals. It is not voluntary when funding will be provided by government contingent on them signing a headlease. That is coercion; it is not a voluntary agreement—and the sooner that issue is also put to bed, the better. I am tempted to believe that these controversial changes have been tacked on to this bill on purpose. The government went out and consulted very properly with land councils and communities on changes that were much needed. They did that over a long period of time. However, I believe that the government saw political advantage in tacking these amendments on to the bill in that they could then claim that there has been a lot of consultation over this bill. Quite clearly, the evidence indicates that there has not been appropriate consultation. There is not agreement from the land councils. The government can try and force these amendments through, but they cannot claim that they have community support.

We are very happy to support those elements of the bill which quite clearly have land council support, but we do not support the changes that will undermine the very aims that this government claims it is trying to achieve. I would be more than happy to support a package brought back by the government that indicates how it will deal with the issues that limit the economic development potential of regional and remote Aboriginal Australia—those things such as education and training, lack of employment opportunities and lack of infrastructure support. All those issues need to be addressed and are not addressed by the proposals in this legislation. In fact, the land councils, when given their very limited opportunity to comment, said that the proposals will undermine workability, will undermine good governance arrangements and are not practicable or workable. I very strongly encourage the Senate to support this motion to split the bill and to go back and rework those flawed elements of the proposal.