Sue Lines (WA, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

I too rise to speak on the motion to take note of answers to questions put by Senator Wong to Minister Scullion on funding cuts to the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander portfolio. Yesterday, in the chamber, I was really shocked to hear the government attack SNAICC, the umbrella group for budget based funded services, who are facing closures due to the cuts and changes that the government is making. The government attacked SNAICC's Deloitte report because it shows that children will suffer and that services will close.

I will echo the words of Dr Jackie Huggins. When she spoke about the closing the gap report, she said that the government needs to be respectful. She said that in her working life she had never seen Aboriginal affairs at such a low point. There is no engagement and no respect. She agrees with Patrick Dodson and Noel Pearson that we are in deep crisis. We saw that yesterday in the Dorothy Dixers put by the government to Minister Birmingham. There is a real issue with budget based funded services. The Deloitte report clearly sets it out.

Instead of respectful engagement, the heart of what Dr Huggins goes to, we just saw this sledging going on in the Senate yesterday against SNAICC. The government need to sit down, talk and actually listen respectively to what SNAICC are saying about the funding crisis that they are facing. It is real. The government came in here yesterday, they were not being respectful and they just started to sledge. We saw that from Senator Scullion again today. I was very shocked when I heard him, in response to a question about cuts, say there was nothing particularly exceptional about that. Ask an Aboriginal or Torres Strait Islander person who has lost funding as a result of that.

There is something exceptional going on here, and Aboriginal leaders across this country are saying there is no respect and the relationship with government has never ever been at such a low point. It is time the government listened respectfully and put in place solutions led by Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people, not white bureaucrats. That is what is happening here. The comments by Dr Jensen yesterday were a disgrace. (Time expired)

Question agreed to.