Tom Barnes writes that outrage is growing across the country in response to the federal government's takeover of remote Aboriginal communities in the NT—despite the shameful response of Labor leader Kevin Rudd and one-sided media coverage.

According to ACT Chief Minister John Stanhope, "I think by any definition of racism, this is racist.

"I know of no instance where by abusing…the human rights of a group within our society—by engaging in racist behaviour—that one can expect to engender long term change.

"I regret that it has been so willingly accepted or accepted without question by federal colleagues."

Greens Senator Rachel Siewart called the plan "selective, cynical and racist."

Under the government plan, alcohol and pornography is banned and police numbers have been increased. There will also be compulsory health checks for Aboriginal children.

It also plans to "quarantine" 50 per cent of all income support, family assistance payments and Community Development Employment Projects wages for 12 months. Centrelink will supposedly use the money to pay for food and rent in Aboriginal communities.

The government claims these measures are justified because the level of child sexual abuse in these communities is a "national emergency". Brough and Howard argue that the "old ways" have failed. They tell us they are concerned with "outcomes", not "doctrine" or "philosophy".

But according to Miles Franklin award-winning Aboriginal author Alexis Wright, there has been "a national emergency for many decades and governments haven't responded adequately to us."

Indigenous people have an average life expectancy 17 years less that non-Indigenous people.

Since coming to power a decade ago, the Howard government has done nothing to address the problem of poverty or lack of basic services.

Saving children?

Howard's plan follows the release last week of the "Little Children are Sacred" report on the abuse of Indigenous children in the NT.

Far from being above politics, Howard has selectively picked some of the report's findings to suit his ideological agenda—while ignoring most of its recommendations.

For example, the report argues that although "available statistics are imperfect, they are sufficient to demonstrate that the occurrence of violence in Indigenous communities and among Indigenous people is disproportionately high in comparison to the rates of the same types of violence in the Australian population as a whole…

It argues that the "combined effects of poor health, alcohol and drug abuse, unemployment, gambling, pornography, poor education and housing, and a general loss of identity and control have contributed to violence and to sexual abuse in many forms…

"Existing government programs to help Aboriginal people break the cycle of poverty and violence need to work better…

"Improvements in health and social services are desperately needed. Programs need to have enough funds and resources and be a long-term commitment."

According to report co-authors Rex Wild QC and Pat Anderson, "It is impossible to set communities on the path to recovery from the sexual abuse of children without dealing with the basic services and social ills."

They strongly emphasise the need for decent education, including smaller class sizes, teaching in Aboriginal history and culture, and a "universal meals program" for students.

They also emphasise "the fact that every community needs better housing urgently."

The report also points out the "critical importance of governments committing to genuine consultation with Aboriginal people in designing initiatives for Aboriginal communities."

The report favourably quotes an April 19 interview with Fred Chaney, formerly of the National Native Title Tribunal, who argued "you can't solve these things by centralised bureaucratic direction… "[Y]ou need locally based action, local resourcing, local control to really make changes.

"But I think governments persist in thinking you can direct from Canberra, you can direct from Perth or Sydney or Melbourne, that you can have programs that run out into communities that aren't owned by those communities, that aren't locally controlled and managed, and I think surely that is a thing we should know doesn't work.

"So I am very much in favour of a model which I suppose builds local control in communities as the best of those Native Title agreements do…"

Abolishing land rights

According to the NT Central Land Council's (CLC) David Ross the government's move is a cynical ploy to abolish hard won land rights: "Under the smokescreen of helping children, the federal government is taking the opportunity to impose its ideological agenda in relation to Aboriginal land."

The Liberals have unilaterally abolished the permit system, replacing it with five year government-controlled leases. They argue this is necessary to provide "access" so police can impose "law and order".

But, according to Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Social Justice Commissioner Tom Calma, "Permits have never prevented child care officers or police or any other government official from visiting Indigenous communities."

In fact, the "free movement of non-Indigenous people through these communities is likely to create a new raft of difficulties for Indigenous people.

"Permits have been a major tool in regulating access to communities—something that will be a key issue in preventing grog running with alcohol restrictions in place."

The permit system was a key recommendation of the 1972 Woodward Report into Aboriginal land rights and was later included in the first land rights legislation in 1976.

Woodward found that indigenous ownership of land would not be genuine unless indigenous people controlled access to it.

Abolishing the permit system is part of a long-standing agenda of the Liberal government to extinguish land rights.

Since 2005, Mal Brough has pushed to make basic social services contingent upon Indigenous communities signing over their land into 99-year leases. "In November last year it war reported that the government was withholding $10 million in public housing money for Wadeye [in the NT] until a 99-year lease was signed," leading Indigenous social researcher Nicole Watson told Socialist Worker in April.

"The government has said that it is not coercing people into these agreements in exchange for essential services.

"I don't see how you could call public housing in a poor community something other than an essential service.

"A similar thing happened in the Tiwi Islands. The government withheld $10 million for a new secondary school unless a lease was signed. How could any parent say that the education of their child is not an essential service…

"Could you ever imagine the Commonwealth saying to parents in a place like inner city Sydney or Brisbane: ‘If you don't grant us a 99-year lease over your family home, your children won't have a school to go to.' "There would be an absolute outrage."

Election campaign

The government's intervention is an attempt to return to the old racist ideology that Aboriginal people need "protecting" from themselves. It is also an example of the government attempting to divide and confuse opposition to its policies in the lead-up to the federal election.

Tragically, Kevin Rudd has swallowed Howard's argument. He says "we should be taking the party politics right out of it and just getting on with it, dealing with the problem."

He says a Labor government would increase the police presence in remote communities.

Incredibly, he argued that he has "no basis to doubt Mr Howard's intention on this, and I would rather work through it with Mr Howard on a positive bipartisan basis."

But Howard has told lies before each of the past four elections—over the GST, industrial relations, "children overboard", and the war in Iraq. Now we are supposed to believe that he has good intentions!

If the government was truly concerned with the high rates of child sexual abuse in Indigenous communities, it would have acted long ago. But, as the Greens' Rachel Siewert points out, Howard ignored a 1999 report of the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Women's Taskforce on Violence. She argues he has also ignored calls from community leaders:

"Mr Howard's plan to take over 60 remote centres of less than 100 people each involves less than 6000 people.

"Many of these centres are already ‘dry' [alcohol-free] because of Aboriginal action. But the ‘Little Children are Sacred' report shows the big centres [such as Alice Springs, Tennant Creek, Katherine and Elliot] are the major statistical problem places for child sexual abuse."

"Will [the government] tackle the 97 alcohol outlets, including Woolworths, in Alice Springs as Indigenous leaders have wanted for years?" "And where is the monetary allocation for detoxification and rehabilitation services essential to a good outcome?"

Instead, according to the CLC's David Ross, "The proposals seem to be a grab-bag of unrelated strategies aimed at a quick fix in a pre-election period."

Tom Barnes
Editor, Socialist Worker (Australia)

To view full report of the NT Inquiry into the Protection of Aboriginal Children from Sexual Abuse, visit www.nt.gov.au/dcm/inquirysaac/