Andrew Bartlett (Queensland, Australian Democrats) Share this | Hansard source

I seek leave to move a motion in relation to the response by the Premier of Western Australia that has just been tabled.

Leave granted.

I move:

That the Senate take note of the document.

As you have outlined, Mr Acting Deputy President, this is a response from the Premier of Western Australia to a resolution of the Senate on 21 June this year which related to the report of the Senate Standing Committee on Legal and Constitutional Affairs entitled Unfinished business: Indigenous stolen wages. I moved that resolution of the Senate and it was, as far as I am aware, adopted by the Senate without dissent. The report was tabled by the committee in December of last year by the then chair, Senator Payne. The report of that committee was also unanimous from all senators across all parties in this place. It contained just six recommendations. The resolution of June this year that the Western Australian Premier has responded to basically requested that the relevant state governments and the federal government respond to the recommendations of the Senate committee report regarding Indigenous stolen wages as promptly as possible and ideally by 7 August.

I thank the Western Australian Premier for providing a response to the resolution of the Senate, albeit not as quickly as I would have liked. I note that the federal government is still yet to respond to this resolution of the Senate, and that is something I find very unfortunate and, frankly, totally unacceptable. The recommendations of the Senate committee were tabled, as I said, in December last year. There are only six recommendations and some of them do not even relate to the federal government; they relate specifically to state governments.

I remind the Senate, as I repeatedly do, that it is an existing standing order that governments should respond to Senate committee reports and their recommendations within three months. If it is a very detailed report with a bevy of recommendations numbering in the hundreds then perhaps a longer response time might be justified. But when there are only six recommendations—some of which do not even apply to the federal government—and nine months later we still have no response, that indicates to me not just a contempt for the Senate and the Senate committee but also a contempt for the Indigenous Australians who are directly affected by the injustice identified in the report and who are extremely anxious, upset, distressed and hurt by the continuing failure of governments, particularly at a state level, to respond. And when the federal government joins in failing to respond it compounds that injustice and that hurt. It is very disappointing and I frankly do not understand it. It is not that hard.

The recommendations are not that complex. They are not asking for billions of dollars from the federal government. The committee recommended that the Commonwealth government facilitate unhindered access to their archives for Indigenous people and their representatives for the purpose of finding out about the extent of Indigenous stolen wages and that the Commonwealth government provide funding to the Australian Institute of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Studies to conduct a national oral history and archival project with regard to Indigenous stolen wages. The committee also recommended that the Commonwealth government, in regard to the Northern Territory and the Australian Capital Territory, urgently consult with Indigenous people and conduct some preliminary research of their archival material. It is not that complex.

I do not know why it should take nine months to respond, even if the response is ‘No’. No response at all is contemptuous, particularly given that the committee itself emphasised that this is an urgent matter—not that the federal government or state government need to be told this because they already know it. Many of the people who were victims of this injustice are very old and they and, of course, their descendants want justice and recognition in relation to this issue. It is totally unacceptable for the federal government to have failed to respond. They have failed to respond to that Senate resolution—which was as polite as it could be. The resolution was in June, six months after the report was tabled. The federal government should already have responded.

The Senate specifically passed a resolution requesting that the government table a response by 7 August. I know the government have a lot of things on their minds with regard to the Northern Territory, but how this could not have been done at the same time is beyond me. It is not that complex, and it really signals to me a show of bad faith. It is a show of bad faith in an area where, frankly, the vast majority of blame in this area is on the state governments. In the current context where we are seeing the federal government grasping any opportunity to point out failures of the state governments you would think that the government would be onto it. But it seems that any issues regarding Indigenous people where it is matter of recognising clear-cut, undisputed injustices of the past which clearly have a link to the poverty and dysfunction of the present—I am not saying it is the sole reason, but there is a clearly a link there—do not fit the mantra, so there is no response. It is hard for me to come to any other conclusion. I am extremely disappointed that the federal government is yet to respond on such an important issue. It was a unanimous Senate committee report. They are not complex recommendations. There is a clearly identified injustice and a clearly identified expression of the fact that it is an urgent issue.

I welcome the Western Australian government’s response. It notes that the Western Australian government has made a commitment to examine the stolen wages issue and to determine its position by 30 June next year. It is a bit unfortunate that it will not be sooner, but at least it has made that commitment, and I accept that it does require an examination of the archives. That is time consuming and it is painstaking to look at the full extent of the evidence that is there. From the evidence that was provided to the Senate committee inquiry regarding government and commercial entities and other institutions in Western Australia, there seemed to be prima facie evidence that it was very likely that similar practices regarding stolen wages had been acknowledged as having occurred in Queensland and Western Australia. It is good that the Western Australia government has made a commitment to examine the issue. I think it is testimony to the Senate committee’s process and to the report that they helped provide that catalyst—and I am pleased about that.

I note the response to the recommendation about the ministerial council on Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander affairs to agree on joint funding arrangements for preliminary legal research. I think they have written to the Senate committee, but I will not comment on that ministerial council as I do not think it has been made public yet. The Western Australia Premier has reflected the view that each jurisdiction should undertake their own education and awareness campaign. That is fair enough as far as it goes, but I do believe there was a role for the ministerial council to take that leadership position and recognise this as a national issue, rather than have people having to fight the battle over and over again under each state jurisdiction. I think it is unfortunate that that recommendation has not been fully implemented. At least we are getting some response from the Western Australian government, even if not from the government at the federal level, on whether the recommendation was considered. It has been put on the agenda and has been flagged with the relevant state ministers. It is a welcome response from Western Australia and it is now a matter of continuing to monitor that process to see what happens. The one thing I would emphasise and urge the Western Australia government to do when they are examining the issue is to make sure that, whatever evidence they find, there is a comprehensive response so that we do not have the abysmal, insulting response that we had from the Queensland government.

I draw the Senate’s attention to the Hard labour, stolen wages report that was released by Dr Ros Kidd last week with the assistance of ANTaR, Australians for Native Title and Reconciliation, which details the situation and collates some of the evidence, including evidence that was provided to the Senate committee inquiry, which outlines the facts. It is very stark and very clear that there is more detail in some states than in others, and that is why more work needs to be done in going into the archives, but there is a clear case in most states of the gross injustice done.

To return to Queensland: for the state government to still pretend that offering four thousand bucks—maybe a bit more depending on what they decide to do with the leftover—offering just $50 million as a ‘gesture of reconciliation’, to use their words, as compensation for a lifetime of withheld earnings is an insult; it is not satisfactory. We all know that today Premier Peter Beattie announced that he is retiring. This is a key opportunity for the new premier, who I assume will be Anna Bligh, to make a difference and go that extra step to remedy the failure of the state government in Queensland to address this clear injustice, to make a proper redress and proper reparation. As part of that, I repeat my urging to all other state governments to respond to the Senate resolution and particularly urge the federal government to show some basic respect if nothing else. (Time expired)