Australia: Apology hollow without follow-up

Fri Feb 1 15:06:52 UTC 2008

Apology hollow without follow-up
By Larissa Behrendt

Posted Fri Feb 1, 2008 9:41am AEDT

Indigenous Australia is not assuming that the end of the Howard era is
automatically the beginning of a golden era for Aboriginal people.
(Getty Images: Simon Fergusson) Prime Minister Kevin Rudd in his
Australia Day speech this year encouraged Australians to be proud of
their past, but urged them to look forward. He listed as one of the
challenges achieving effective reconciliation, so that we can all move
forward together, Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal Australia. When the
curtain went down on the Howard years, it closed an era in which we
had a Prime Minister who did not believe in saying "sorry" to the
Stolen Generations, who had derailed the reconciliation process and
ostracised any Indigenous leader who did not agree with him.

He used the decision in the Wik case to fuel an anti-Aboriginal
election, he termed native title and the right to negotiate as
un-Australian, dismantled the national Indigenous representative body
and had repealed the application of the Racial Discrimination Act from
applying to Aboriginal people three times: during the Hindmarsh Island
bridge dispute, through the Native Title Amendment Act and in relation
to the Northern Territory intervention. Rudd's clear determination to
approach Indigenous affairs differently has created a sense of
optimism about new opportunities about the possibilities of a new era
where policy will be more effective and the reconciliation process is
renewed. His intention to apologise to the members of the Stolen
Generations is perhaps the starkest indication of the fundamental
shift.

While there is much optimism, Indigenous Australia is not assuming
that the end of the Howard era is automatically the beginning of a
golden era for Aboriginal people. Rudd in opposition supported,
without any amendment, Howard's intervention in the Northern Territory
including the aspects that repealed the Racial Discrimination Act, the
abolition of the permit system and the compulsory quarantining of all
welfare payments.

Ideology driven

The key problem under Howard was that throughout his time in office
his decisions about Indigenous policy were directed by ideology.
Whoever the Minister, whatever they called the policy, the direction
was defined by the ideologies of mainstreaming, assimilation, mutual
obligation, opening up access of Indigenous controlled land to
non-Indigenous interests and the philosophy that the "real" Aboriginal
people live in the north. Policy and resources were directed by these
ideals.

The frustrating thing is that these ideologies of "mainstreaming" and
"assimilation" have failed in the past to shift the poorer health,
education, housing and employment levels that Aboriginal communities
have experienced and have never offered ways to protect Aboriginal
cultural heritage, interest in land, or language. And they have not
offered a way in which we as Aboriginal people can play the central
role in making decisions that will impact on our families and
communities.

The focus on the ideological has blinded us to what we can learn from
the many successes that go unnoticed.

In the face of government neglect and failed policy, many Indigenous
communities and our community-built organisations continue to flourish
with our hard work, creating successful and viable institutions and
continuing to keep their cultural values strong and their children
safe. And we can look at our own experiences here in Australia and of
Indigenous people in North America as evidence that better
socio-economic outcomes are achieved when Indigenous people are
involved in the setting of priorities within their community, the
development of policy, the delivery of services and the implementation
of programs.

Welfare threats

One element of the intervention assists in making this point. The
intervention employed a mechanism that linked school attendance with
the quarantining of welfare payments. There is no evidence that the
use of welfare as a stick improves school attendance. In fact, all of
the research points to the fact that using welfare payments in this
way can add an additional stress factor into an already dysfunctional
situation.

What the research also shows us is that in the Northern Territory
there are not enough teachers and classrooms to accommodate all of the
Indigenous children who live there and for every dollar spent on the
education of non-Indigenous children only 47 cents are spent on the
education of an Indigenous child.

Involving members of the Indigenous community in schools through
elders programs or as Aboriginal teaching aides has been shown to
work. Breakfast and lunch programs work. And creating a curriculum
that is culturally focused to engage Indigenous children in the
learning process is another key factor. Not one of these types of
programs was funded as part of the intervention.

Jury's out on Rudd

Rudd's Indigenous Affairs Minister, Jenny Macklin, has already
continued the roll-out of this odious and racist policy of
quarantining welfare payments, making it even harder for Rudd to
dismiss the NT intervention - and its underlying ideologies - as the
failed policies of Howard. And that is a sign of the challenge ahead
with this new government.

It is encouraging that, generally, Rudd has said that he wants his
government to be guided by research-based policy but he has yet to
prove that this will be his approach to Indigenous issues
specifically.

I am heartened to hear that he is finally going to take a step forward
and make the long overdue apology to the Stolen Generations. I am,
however, extremely disappointed that his Government has ruled out
compensation.

This could be a taste of what is to come. Rudd will be able to do a
few symbolic things that Howard refused to - such as sign the UN's
Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples - but be vaguer about
the extent to which he is willing to commit to more substantive
reforms - such as how the declaration will be implemented into
Australian law.

It is true, however, that there is more opportunity to make a real
difference than before, and there is still much work to do.

In fact, we have the chance now to make changes that can sustain us
for the long-term and weather the next time that we are assaulted by
the narrow thinking that pervaded the Indigenous affairs portfolio
under Howard.

Larissa Behrendt is Professor of Law and and director of research at
the Jumbunna Indigenous House of Learning at the University of
Technology, Sydney.

 http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2008/02/01/2151864.htm

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