This is intended to be a general post on some of the response to Howard’s announcement on Thursday, but a sample of the sort of rhetoric that’s been employed can be found at Harry Clarke’s blog.
The current situation is horrendous, but it’s also something that’s been the subject of discussion and calls for action on LP since May last year, a long time before many of the shriller voices around the shop discovered there was a problem courtesy of the “national emergency”. I first became involved in Indigenous issues and campaigns in 1988. It was very clear then, as clear as it is now, that simplistic mantras and paternalist solutions are no solutions at all.
I am disturbed by the attitude of many that “whatever might work� is appropriate in the face of what are clearly, in many instances, very ill thought out and probably ineffective measures. There have been enough people pointing to the practical issues, both in the blogosphere and in the papers.
I’m disturbed by the fact that very few care a fig for any notion of self-determination and autonomy and are so willing to clap their hands at fundamentally illiberal and authoritarian measures.
I’m disappointed that people aren’t prepared to consider as an alternative the implementation of the Wild/Anderson report [pdf] – with the same sense of urgency.
Wild/Anderson believed that at least fifteen years might be needed for significant progress to be made. Suddenly, many seem to think that the Commonwealth, now that whitefellas are on the job, can wave a six month magic wand and make it all better. That won’t prove to be the case. Any solution which does not have the support and ownership of those affected will fail. And I think that ignoring this truth in favour of the attitude of “well it is an emergency, perhaps we should give all this stuff a go with no detail, no debate, no questioning, no consultation and no ownership by the people affected� is problematic.
As Malcolm Fraser and Lowitja O’Donoghue write:
These latest measures have been introduced without any overt sign that there has been consultation with Aboriginal leadership or with Aboriginal elders from different communities. Without respect, without discussion and agreement it is difficult to see any measures working as effectively as we would all want.
And I’m disturbed by the fact that major policy shifts, such as the effective abolition of land rights and collective land tenure in the Northern Territory, can escape debate by being implemented as part of this plan, despite the fact that there is very little discernible relationship between land tenure and child abuse.
I’m disturbed by the total lack of focus on the fact that much of the abuse is not perpetrated by Indigenous people, and that many Indigenous people, including Indigenous men, have been working hard to address the problems.
I’m disturbed by the lack of courage of the Labor leadership in signing up to this without any consideration of whether other approaches might be more effective, presumably because they want to avoid taking a stand which might have electoral implications for the ALP.
To pose the question in terms of a moral dichotomy, as Howard has done, and as others have as well, is just not good enough. Since when can major policy initiatives escape scrutiny and debate in a democracy? To claim that anyone who would criticise these measures, and support alternative ones, or who would discuss the politics in an election year, is somehow morally deficient is pathetic, and in many cases hypocritical given the fact that those making those claims have shown no awareness or concern about Indigenous issues in the past.
And as an update: One of the interesting things about debating these issues in the blogosphere is that you can read first hand critiques from people actually involved with the issues at hand, like this comment on the other active thread.
Elsewhere: More from Helen at Surfdom. For those of us using Firefox, who are frustrated by Surfdom’s fade to black, Helen’s post is much more readable at Cast Iron Balcony.
Go here for links to previous posts and comments threads on this issue at LP.
Monday morning update: [by Kim] An excellent post from David Tiley, and more from Surfdom. And this post, which has made up my mind as to my voting intentions this year.
Monday afternoon update: A strong column from Guy Rundle in Crikey and more thoughtful commentary from Andrew Bartlett.
Some more posts: [by Kim] Andrew Elder is scathing about the role of the press, observing:
Australians need redemption from the moral taint of how all that we have and are is built upon, or even stolen from, Aboriginal civilisation.
And writing of Peter Hartcher, he comments:
It will not ever be a plan for rebuilding deeply traumatised and dysfunctional families and communities, and nobody with any experience of this government has any right to expect that it might. Hartcher has no excuse for such wishful thinking, he is suspending the very critical analysis for which he is paid. Any opposition to a government policy is quibbling?
David Tiley examines the Liberal wet dream and wonders why we’ve become as weird as we have.
Cam at Polemica thinks Howard’s comparison to Hurricane Katrina is risible, and not in a good way.
And tigtog has more on Howard’s emergency measures.
Mark, I would like to address some of the points you make.
Firstly you link to a post by Kim in May ‘06 in which she attacks the Minister’s call for more police, at the same time offering this (in your own words) ’simplistic mantra’:
You say you are disturbed by the ‘whatever might work’ and ‘probably ineffectual’ measures. I say better what might work than what we know does not
You say you are disturbed by those ‘willing to clap their hands at fundamentally illiberal and authoritarian measures’. I say desperate times call for desperate measures.
(continued below)
Most people accept that if a person is mentally unhinged and a danger to themselves, the mental health authorities should have the power- as they currently do- to enforce a program of compulsory treatment.
I have travelled through the NT. Some of the Aboriginal communities there look like a cross between a Hieronymus Bosch painting and a B-Grade Zombie flick. I’m not exaggerating. It is heartbreaking to witness. Where a community is in such a state that dysfunctional and destructive norms prevail, I think intensive outside intervention is indicated. The fact that the communities in question are Aboriginal is incidental.
Mark
Oh dear. Quoting these two does your case no favours. They are hardly the sharpest tools in the toolbox.
Mark
Your case might advance its current position as ‘irrelevant’ if you, yourself, knew what you meant by these ‘notions.’
Tony and Melaleuca,
Nobody is arguing the need for significant intervention. Significant intervention is exactly what the 97 recommendations of the Wild/Anderson report advise.
What, if anything, makes the PM’s proposal superior to the Wild/Anderson recommendations, which emphasise consultative measures rather than authoritarian measures?
Where is your, or anybody’s, evidence that punitive authoritarian measures are the best answer?
How trite can you get. So ‘desperate times call for desperate’ measures, even if these measures are hasty, ill considered and likely to be counter productive, as in not solving the problem that they were ostensibly meant to solve.
The failure of political will in this country on a whole range of issues, but indigenous matters would be high on the list, is a national tragedy. That a ‘plan’ so obviously cobbled together at the last moment, so flawed, so authoritarian and ignorant of the people it claims to protect, can be applauded on the basis of ‘better than nothing’ shows the depth to which political debate in this country has sunk.
mark says:
Call me old-fashioned but Im not that fussed. Freedom should not be a fetish. (Although the way that Wets carry on you would think that the only reason for freedom is to get stoned, sleaze up or veg out.) Freedom evolved to facilitate civil progress, particularly of “the better angels of our nature”.
“Illiberal and authoritarian measures” are exactly what the doctor ordered to constrain rock-spiders, dole-bludgers and dead-beats. These “worser angels of our nature” lurk in everyone, black white or brindle. But the difficult environment and particular endowments of remote Aboriginal communities make the locals much more prone to fall victim to these vices.
When individual autonomy fails then institutional authority should step in. The fitter, smarter and well-connected can enjoy individual autonomy .
It is the less-fit, less-smart and dis-connected who need “the firm smack of government”, whether it be cultural paternalism or fiscal interventionsism. They need institutional authority.
“Self-determination” can cause self-harm when local authority figures are ineffective and there is a high-risk of addictive substance abuse, whether the substance be grog, porn or dope.
Thats why we give special powers and privileges to authoritarian offices: parents, officers, priests, doctors, jurists, cops. And that is why it is right and proper for national authority to step in to protect the weak, innocent and vulnerable from immediate damage.
THe “mummy party” free-for-alls and hand-out metality has failed remote indigenous people. Its time for the “Daddy party” to crack the whip and call the shots.
Mark – I think a knee jerk reaction is wrong for all sorts of reasons. Probably the most compelling is that we know it doesn’t work. There’s empirical evidence that community development approaches so work however.
Using a ’soft’ approach to link children and parents into support is successful in raising educational and health outcomes in communities of disadvantage. Tackling problems early and assisting parents, kids and communities to deal with issues themselves works much better than a heavy hand.
Spoken by Goosey Loosey. Authorised by Chicken Little, Parliament House, Canberra.
You are disappointed that people haven’t gone with the Wild/Anderson report, but go on to say that Wild/Anderson considered 15 years the required amount of time to make a difference. Is it any wonder then that the NT Chief Minister didn’t seem to recognise the urgency of this problem?
This situation won’t be rectified in six months, but the important thing is to get the process started. Immediately.
You lament the fact that ‘there is very little discernible relationship between land tenure and child abuse’, but you fail to recognise that opening these communities up to the outside world by abolishing the permit system not only eliminates safe haven for offenders, it throws the spotlight squarely on the problem.
You say that ‘much of the abuse is not perpetrated by Indigenous people’ but the very LP post you linked to earlier Kim says:
While I do recognise that there have been incidents of non-indigenous offenders, and one white offender is one too many, it is unhelpful to shift the blame by implying the problem does not lie mainly with indigenous men.
As to the Labor party’s response I am willing to believe both John Howard and Kevin Rudd are sincere on this issue. They could be proven wrong, but they will be sincerely wrong while taking action to achieve good.
As far as whether the issues should be debated; of course they should. Even the political implications. (In just the same way as, say, global warming should be a topic free from moral righteousness.)
Well Mark, what have YOU achieved in nearly 20 years? Do you think that Aboriginal children deserve yet another 20 years of procrastination just so that you can feel righteous about creating self-determination whilst you sit in comfortable surroundings feeling better about yourself?
Have you spent ANY time in the places that Pearson speaks of or do you support Aborigines from the safety of a pub in Brisbane?
Mark, do you have any reference/link which shows how much of the abuse is perpetrated by non-indigenous people rather than by indigenous people?
GregM, yes, the link in the post to the NT report.
Angharad, to save us from ploughing through the rather lengthy blurb you’ve linked to can you point to the (presumably independently verified) empirical evidence that it refers to/relies upon?
Ok kids, Textors out and write:
“This a Howard agit-prop election gimmick”, twenty times.
As the Margo Kingston blog asks, summing up the feelings and misgivings of the many alluded to in the lead in to this thread also,
“Are Aborigines Howard’s Tampa 2?”.
More shock-horror, more outrageous emotive gimmickry worthy of a young lib flying squad.
All the trademark deliberate insensitivity/ intellectual dishonesty characteristics are present along with that repulsive pandering to base sexual, racist and authoritarian instincts wehave all come to know and love as the abiding charateristic of tEh Howard government for the last decade and more.
…………………………..
Had Howard been serious, he would have reassured indigenes they had not been singled out for covert Klan-like racial vilification, by commencing his lunatic medical examination policy in the white leafy-green suburbs; say starting with Christopher Pyne’s or Jackie Kelly’s kids.
Of course this probably wold have been unnecessary since all furtive guilt-ridden nig-nogs know filthy behavior never happens on the North Shore or out in the Hansonist mortgage belt.
Still it would have been a nice idea, no doubt welcomed by the latter, to give reassurance to silly natives that no psychological harm and reimposed self-loathing would come of disempowerment “”Stepford” policies.
I would expect newspaper letters from Sophie Panaopolis’ and Dee-Anne Kelly appearing any moment, expressing how they would LOVE having social security goons infestering under THEIR roofs imdefinitely and leering MO’s poking around theirs and their little kids intimateparts on the basis of no better a justification for digital rape than, “guilty ’til proven innocent”.
The only thing I really want to know is what’s being hidden elsewhere, by this classic “kids overboard” smoke and mirrors stunt?
That’s fairly typical of the ad hominem stuff that we’re getting.
I’m not attempting to claim any moral high ground myself. My involvement was mainly in the Land Rights issue from 88 to 93. And, yes, I’ve been to the NT and seen some of the conditions. I’ve also been involved in working with companies on Indigenous employment strategies, a large part of which involved looking at the literature and evidence on what works and what doesn’t. And I continue to talk about the issues with Indigenous people.
Your comment really goes to the wilful misreading and dichotomisation that’s going on. I haven’t argued for more “years of procrastination” but for the implementation of the NT report with the same degree of urgency. The fact that the authors are realistic about how soon conditions will improve is to their credit.
Maugrim – one might ask the same of you.
Nearly 20 years ago I worked with Professor Judy Atkinson in ATSIC when she waged a lonely battle to get ATSIC and anyone else in government to acknowledge or talk about these issues. It’s been very hard to get political traction or a commitment to start moving towards long-term change. I’ve certainly been sticking my oar in when I’ve had, admittedly limited, influence.
Angharad says:
“Probably the most compelling is that we know it doesn’t work. There’s empirical evidence that community development approaches so work however.”
I agree. However my understanding is that the elders in some of the communities in question have kicked out international aid agencies that have tried to do community development work.
On the topic of self-detrmination, ABC Lateline last year also exposed the extreme corruption that prevails in some Aboriginal communities. Sadly, a fleet of flash 4WDs for the local Aboriginal power elite often takes priority over child health and welfare funding.
Sure Greg M – it’s a report of a 6 year community development project in Inala (an outer Brisbane with a high concentration of disadvantage). It has a crime prevention focus in design. It has been evaluated along the way by Prof Ross Homel from the Key Centre for Justice at Griffith University.
The project works by engaging parents and kids when the kids are little by bringing them into play groups and things. Then using that engagement to work softly to identify key stresses on that family and link them up with appropriate supports.
In Inala the community is Indigenous / Vietnamese and other groups. The evaluation showed considerable improvements in school engagement and literacy / numeracy over time.
Howard’s supporters on this serious issue endorse the “desperate times, desperate measures” slogan.
My questions:
1. How do you measure the magnitude of the problem to the proportionality of the proposed response?
2. What is the maximal response you’d accept before withdrawing your support from Howard?
3. What evidence will you accept that Howard’s approach has achieved its ostensible aims?
To avoid being mere Howard claqueurs you must demonstrate that you have qualified answers to all of these questions.
Katz
Q1.Although I have a reasonable grasp of English I’m not sure what your question is. If you mean is this an overreaction, the answer is no.
Q2.Again not sure what you mean but in light of the serious issues outlined in the NT report, the measures proposed seem appropriate and I support them. Any further announcements would need to be considered if and as they are made.
Q3.Evidence similar to that in the NT report which precipitated the proposed measures.
GregM, the report doesn’t offer a proportionate analysis of abuser ethnicity. It does however observe:
“While the incidence of sexual abuse of Aboriginal children
is a significant problem, it does not follow that all
Aboriginal males are offenders, or that Aboriginal males are
responsible for all offending against Aboriginal children. It is
the Inquiry’s experience that the sexual abuse of Aboriginal
children is being committed by a range of non-Aboriginal
and Aboriginal offenders – and these are a minority of the
overall Australian male population.
As would be expected in any community, most of the
Aboriginal men the Inquiry spoke with found the idea
of child sexual abuse abhorrent and advocated severe,
sometimes fatal, physical punishments for offenders.
The Inquiry recognises that Aboriginal communities, and
Aboriginal men, must be supported to better address the
abuse and violence in their communities, but remains
concerned that, at times, Aboriginal men have been
targeted as if they were the only perpetrators of child
sexual abuse in communities. This is inaccurate and
has resulted in unfair shaming, and consequent further
disempowerment, of Aboriginal men as a whole.”
It also observes:
“While media portrayal of the issue has predominantly
related to incidents of older Aboriginal men assaulting
young women and “paedophiles� operating in Aboriginal
communities, the reality of child sexual abuse is that it:
• involves both female and male victims – from the very
young to adulthood
• is committed by non-Aboriginal and Aboriginal males
of all ages – with a proportion of assaults being
committed by offenders who are themselves children
• has led to inter-generational cycles of offending –
such that victims have subsequently become
offenders and, in turn, created a further generation
of victims and offenders
• occurs across urban and remote communities and
in various circumstances (in the home, during social
occasions, in institutional settings). “
No, I’m not the one big-noting myself as to my credibility on this issue, nor am I the one criticising Howards’ actions without actually having a viable alternative solution in place other than ‘its all about rights’
Well, you’re the one who argues against straw people without reading the post and the thread, it would appear.
I’ve had a look at the report Mark and can’t find any figures that show a break-down between indigenous and non-indigenous offenders.
I can’t see why you should be disturbed by the total lack of focus on the fact that much of the abuse is not perpetrated by Indigenous people, since the focus should be on the abuse itself, rather than the ethnic background of the perpetrators. Abuse is abuse no matter who does it and it makes no difference, and should be treated no differently, whether the perpetrator is Aboriginal or non-Aboriginal.
GregM, please see the excerpt Geoff quoted.
Some of the measures proposed arguably will make it easier for non-Indigenous people to commit offences (as well as being a negation of property rights) – for instance, the abolition of the permit system, as Ken Parish has suggested.
And since it’s being presented as an “Indigenous emergency” and Howard has specifically ruled out applying these measures to towns and cities but only to “prescribed” Indigenous communities, very clearly there is a focus on race.
“No” is not an appropriate answer to this question.
The question I posed isn’t “Has Howard overreacted?” The question I posed is “How do you decide whether or not Howard has overreacted?”
Again, not an appropriate response. The question asks you to decide precisely at which point you would decide that Howard’s approach was disproprtionate.
A reasonable response.
The excerpt Geoff quotes does NOT quantify the extent of sexual abuse committed by white outsiders.
Mark says the abolition of the permit system will “arguably” lead to more white outsider abuse. If Mark’s thesis is correct, then we should all be living in gated communities. But of course it isn’t correct: an end to the permit system will bring greater transparency to these communities. Transparency is a wonderful thing, and a prophylactic against many vices.
Of course there is a focus on race. The very report to which you refer is called ‘Report of the Board of iInquiry Into the Protection of Aboriginal Children from Sexual Abuse’.
Katz
If you want to play word games how about Scrabble?
I was responding to GregM’s point, Tony.
Melaleuca, it’s very difficult to quantify the extent of child abuse anywhere in any community and to profile the offenders because much of it goes unreported. Clearly, the report drew on the experiences of many who’ve had much to do with the justice system as well as other responses to the issue in NT.
And how long will “transparency” exist when the tv cameras leave? Removing the permit system would also remove the ability of police to stop people entering those communities unless there’s actual evidence of intent to commit an offence.
Stroppy:
Here’s to a return to slavery!
If I may Mark, the very fact that outsiders are allowed to pass through these communities will ensure some degree of transparency.
Thanks for your further comment and to Geoff for his references from the report. I feel a lot of disquiet about how this initiative is unfolding as it seems to have been brought together in a rush and it’s been my experience that an ounce of planning is worth a ton of implementation. This thing, however well-intentioned, could go off the rails easily and become just one more of a list of lost and wasted opportunities.
Well, yes. I do agree with GregM. I support the principal of outside intervention but not the detail of the current Howard program. Hopefully the program will be amended during its implementation.
It is also worth noting that the NT is full of political correctness. Until I see hard evidence that Aboriginal kids in the NT are more at risk from white predators than their own kith and kin, I’ll assume that the pattern of abuse in our indigenous communities fits the pattern found in communities elsewhere.
I remarked on another blog, Howard sniffed a vote out of this, no more no less.
Insiders today had a very good coverage of this issue, including interviews with Mal Brough and Clare Martin.
Martin says she had an advance copy of the report, which her officials studied for six weeks, not eight as reported. As soon as the report was released by the writers, she sent a copy to Canberra and dispatched officials to have discussions with the Feds. She pointed out that the timing of the release was not up to her.
Brough says they got the report off the net on Tuesday. It is clear that he only consulted Sue Gordon from the Aboriginal leadership. Pearson apparently was phoned 15 minutes before the policy response was issued.
Martin got a phone call an hour before it was released. She didn’t return the call because the PM’s office refused to tell her what the call was about.
It seems clear to me that Brough wanted to pre-empt input from the NT and show them up in the worst possible light. From his comments it seems clear that petty political payback was involved for what he perceives as Martin’s lack of co-operation in the past.
I’m willing to grant Brough that he wants the best for Aboriginal children. But it is a bit rich to say that the Commonwealth response is above politics or apolitical. And a response conceived in two days flat cries out for critical analysis.
A few interesting points came out of the program.
Martin says 90% of the NT communities are officially dry.
Brough says the permit system had to go because there was fear and intimidation being exerted on people who were entitled to be there.
Brough says the medical examinations are going to be total examinations, a kind of health audit of all kids.
Fran Kelly said that if the Feds are serious the assistance required is going to go well beyond the $10 billion water plan.
Meanwhile no-one has asked Brough why he has to take over the land.
And I heard on the news a few minutes ago that while Brough was working flat out with officials in Canberra on implementation plans extra police and the Army were already arriving in Darwin.
Okay, so not only Indigenous people abuse Indigenous kids. But from the mouth of Mal Brough:
Can you tell me they are ‘normal’ statistics for child sex offences for the general Austalian community? Can we at least agree that the situation in some of these isolated communities – with the fact that there are huge problems with alcohol, sit-down money, lack of policing, lack of health services and general despondency – are leading to terrible outcomes for children, including an increased risk of physical and sexual abuse?
And yes, I have worked with children from Aboriginal communities, including from Noel Pearson’s home community of Hopevale. And I have lived in the NT, and worked (on the periphery) of programs involved in early intervention in Indigenous education and wellbeing. No, I am not an expert, but to make statements such as removing the permit system will make things worse, with implications that these communities will be flooded with white abusers, is just ignoring the situation on the ground. Let’s move away from the noble savage idea and look at what is really happening – Aborigines are abusing Aborigines. And at awful, above ‘normal’ rates.
“This thing, however well-intentioned, could go off the rails easily and become just one more of a list of lost and wasted opportunities.”
I am also quite concerned about the intentions. Given that the plans seem to have the potential to make the situation worse for all, NT, aboriginals.
All families are to be treated, the same, whether they are involved in what is considered bad behaviour or not. There are no rewards, but punishment in the form of suspended welfare payments and various other increased living expenses. No funding for improved education or health. Just the threat of medical examinations for all youngsters regardless of their or parents wishes.
To top it off, they lose control over who may enter their lands. Can you imagine how pastoralists and miners would like their rights of control prohibited? The intention I believe is less about allowing “transparency” but more about providing a good excuse to open up areas for tourism and mining development for white carpetbaggars.
GregM, I gather that there is going to be an administrator for every community. These are the people that Fred Chaney said the other day are going to have the wisdom of Job.
And everybody, including Mal Brough, seems to agree that the show will go nowhere without the co-operation of local community leaders.
I have severe doubts whether the requisite personnel can be found in the short term. Much of the Wild/Anderson recommendation seemed to focus on building up these support structures over time.
Yes, Scrabble is a word game.
Your point being … ?
“Much of the Wild/Anderson recommendation seemed to focus on building up these support structures over time.”
How do you look children in the eye who are predestined to squalor, sexual and physical abuse, poor mental health and a short life expectancy that they will have to wait another 15 years, as per the Wild/Anderson report, for change? I’m sorry, but I could never do that.
If i’m right, essentially, it seems most of us have problems with (after the intitial reactions), is:
1. Why Howard has cherry picked some bits and pieces, and not just resolved to fully implememnt the Wild Anderson report.
2. Why the emphasis on abolishing the land permit system needed to be emeshed with this strategy.
3. The centralised top down approach, and lack of collaboration at this stage.
After having a comprehensive reading of the full report, however, i still dont think we should be sceptical of Howards timing. THe report calls for an urgent national response and pleads for an end to the ongoing cycle of extended consultation and reports, without strong and necessarily controversial leadership where required. Ive also noticed that some of the accusations of paternalism i’ve read , i.e. provision of comprehensive meals at school, but paid for by the parents, as opposed to the current free system, are actually specific recommendations giving in the WIld Anderson report.
I guess i would be more angry if Howard or whoever the PM was, didn’t finally convert this report into some serious action, though i’d be lying if i didnt feel a level of anxiety about the potential for the Feds to f..k things up.
This week will be interesting.
Sublime Cowgirl – I think you do a good summary of the points
Can someone please elaborate on the Army claim in this? There is already a large number of serving members in Darwin – IF (and it’s a big if) the Army is going to be involved, who are they bringing, from where, and why?
There is some really offensive people here,letting go with opinions,about people they dont know,and it appears wouldnt want to know..but gee,it is somehow reasonable to have such opinions as that, according to the offensive who have these opinions! I might also add out of respect for arithmetic rather than anything else,if a clinical psychologist had to work on a one client alone basis,at optimal therapeutic interchange..how long would it take for a Aboriginal molester,a white educated molestor,and associated drunks,and levels of education!? Then ,one can take the Justice road with say thirteen suspects at least,court cases internment etc. how many years and costs in comparison to other approaches or with these approaches!? Because it doesnt appear to me to have had a post, here, by a practicising clinical pyschologist working on…. perpetrators alone. It also appears most opinion here is flaccid to say the least, and non numerical in relationship to a theoretical outcome that isnt easily defineable except as a Justice and Law enforcement process,where there is some objection to Northern Territorean Police,like they dont know what they are doing,and then any other practising services up there. This is the Howard government at its worse,even with aboriginal defence people,to be wholly instructed through Howards government to do civil work is a bloody nonsense..the Aboriginal enlisted in the NT. would know the Police formally and informally fairly well….what is this all about. The nub of the problem wasnt found in Canberra when the wheel fell off.
“After having a comprehensive reading of the full report, however, i still dont think we should be sceptical of Howards timing.”
Please, sc, though I agree , generally, your summary is a good one, this comment is a bit too hard to take. Over 10 years in power, to do something in this area, and NT comes up with a report. In an election year, Howard and co grab it and call a State of Emergency. Skeptical I remain.
what an indictment on this divisive mans time in office when the first thing we think of after an announcement like this is,whats in it for him.
howard also mentioned quarantining welfare payments to others without being specific.are we about to see single mothers sacrificed to the liberal party re-election effort?
Howard’s government has, like so many before, failed to address & indeed has further contributed to the social & economic problems besetting Indigenous Australians. As has been pointed out elsewhere, we have failed again and again to provide the level of health & social services white Australians take for granted. In some communities, this can mean no clean running water, no sanitation. Government agencies dispense funding not to the people most in need or even projects developed & run by Aborigines but back within their own bureaucratic structures.
No self-determination, no control, powerlessness, racism, prejudice, white man ignorance, poor educational access – and Howard will solve it all – whatever that ALL- may be – be sending in the army. Tomorrow.
Doing nothing is worse – but doing everything to compound this horror is still worse again. Somehow I highly doubt that Aust Army personnel have the skills to deal with civilian policing matters, especially child & sex abuse.
& at the risk of being accused of defending or trivialising the matter, an earlier comment as to the “high rate” of kith & kin offending against children – the accepted stats on child abuse in most western democracies is that the offender is known to the victim in 90% of cases & is from within the family. Sexual abuse within the family is under-reported, under-detected in ost societies. And there’s something chillingly cynical & self-serving about Howard’s response to an already disempowered and marginalised group. We’re sending in the army – %#%ck.
On the timing, I’m with urgent action if as Brough claims there is irrefutable evidence of paedophile rings in at least 45 communities. However, I think a week or two extra would have been sensible. Officials in the NT considered an advance copy of the report for 6 weeks, then Brough could not wait 24 hours to see what they had made of it. I don’t think you can say he’s entirely fair dinkum under those circumstances.
Megami, on the Army, I can’t add to what I said. It was a very brief mention in the news.
melaleuca, I didn’t read the Wild/Anderson report as saying nothing would happen for 15 years. They were just being realistic. You’ve got adult abusers who were abused themselves as children. It’s going to take more than half a generation to get things to a situation that can be considered ‘normal’. I think that is what they are saying.
I saw footage of Howard in parliament make that suggestion uncle bob.
Mighty was his smirk… ‘Look at how clever I am…. I’ve already thought of that..no I’m not racist, I will treat ALL people in poverty, regardless of colour, in the same mean spirited manner’.
Some questions for Larva Prodders about Howard’s cultural policy for remote Aboriginal communities and comparably disordered white communities:
1. Do you disagree with restrictions on access to grog and porn?
2. Do you disagree with pro-active medical examinations to determine if systematic child abuse is occurring?
3. Do you disagree with tougher policing and penalising measures to crack down on rock-spiders in and around in the community?
4. Do you disagree with conditional child care to force dead-beat parents to look after their childrens nutrition, health and education?
5. Do you disagree with conditional welfare in order to force the sit-down money class off their backsides?
6. Do you disagree with the rescision of local control of these communities and assumption of national control?
For one minute, forget the politics and address the policy. Set aside issues of ecnoomic interventions and consultative process. Ask yourselves if it was your child would you be content to let the locals do as they please whilst the nationals foot the bill?
I put it to you that no sane, decent and right-thinking person could possibly have any objection to any of these measures. Children are at risk and whatever needs to be done should be done to protect them.
Of course all these national statist measures are diametrically opposed to the liberal-Left policies of the past generation.
So what road are you going to follow: child-protecting decency or Howard-hating Lefty?
Podcast of Noel Pearson on Big Ideas Here
The Social Justice Commissioner, Tom Calma, released a report a week ago. It has got buried. Calma shows, I think convincingly, that the Howard government’s attempt to revamp how Indigenous affairs is managed in the bureaucracy has failed. A major failing of this revamp has been rushing into restructuring and policy changes without thinking through the consequences, or seeking advice about the likely consequences.
This latest proposal looks like more of the same. What are the soldiers and the one extra police officer per community actually going to DO? I reckon they will march around, pick up rubbish, maybe fix some dripping taps, maybe fix a few broken walls. I just can’t see how they will clean up sexual abuse and domestic violence. There’s no reference to employing interpreters to explain to the new police what people are saying… so I doubt many Aboriginal women and children will rush up to soldiers and dob in sexual abusers.
There isn’t a huge amount of other obvious crime on most Aboriginal communities – most of which are dry – a bit of breaking and entering and grog-running, and embezzlement by mostly non-Indigenous staff.
Watch out Katz: all the hard men of blogging have arrived, possessors all of steely eyed determination to right wrongs, well-filled flight suits, and a weakness for 3 paragraph solutions for problems that have defeated far better people than they.
Therefore they have no time for any question more difficult then they’ve successfully attempted to answer while watching “The Rich List”.
“Can someone please elaborate on the Army claim in this?”
Megami, when you declare Teh “National Emergency”, you need soldiers.
Hell, you just “need them”.
This is the new “War on Black Paedophile Rings”.
Navy would be involved but some uncertainty as to the depth of Todd River.
Brough, busy checking.
Spotto Fallacy of the Excluded Middle!
My God Howard must be wetting himself with glee.
After Howard wins the election,and make no mistake he is on a winner here, it will be as far as the Aboriginal population is concerned, business as usual.
The very fact that he has the left getting their knickers in a twist over this bollicks,is, Howard knows after the election when he renigs on all this out pouring of social conscience,this problem will have served its purpose,embarrass the N.T. & QLD governments.
It will then,just like Pearson, fade away into obscurity.
And all this self serving “What a good and caring Government we have” well all that media coverage for F.A.better than a Sinclaire Ad blitz.
Paul Walter
No need. I am an “indigene” and need nor reassuring.
Says it all really – Stuff the States, I’m doing what I Want – if you oppose me you are a pedo lover.
Megami, as I understand it, the ADF is being used to provide transport and logistics support only.
I think that if this is seen as a staged response, it might make more sense. So, upfront you have the major circuit breaker involved in “national emergency” and the rapid intervention aimed at protecting kids and introducing the fundamentals for building civil society in communities where it has collapsed. Then you have a potentially much more challenging task: to sustain and build upon the gain. To be fair to Brough, he hasn’t claimed to be able to solve “the problem” in 6 months. On the contrary, he’s pointed out that the immediate priority is to stabilise the situation sufficiently so that a longer term response can happen.
As sublime cowgirl points out, the Report pleads for swift and decisive action on child abuse and urges the NT government not to see it as “just another Report.” The Report also notes that the obvious: that sustainable improvement in Aboriginal health and welfare will take much longer and will rely on an holistic, consultative approach.
So, yep, a great deal of the criticism is valid, detail is in alarmingly short supply and we obviously need much more information. I also think that you’d have to be Pollyanna on Prozac not to accept that the political wind has been sniffed but so what if this has some benefit? In lieu of any other ideas for some immediate break in the cycle it’s surely worth a shot.
In order to implement these proposals hundreds of personnel are required. The States and Federal Police have few if any police available at short notice. The Federal Government has at its disposal a large number of Army soldiers who can be quickly deployed to the area to carry out many practical and logistical tasks. They will be followed by additional police within 10 days.
Thanks for a sane comment Geoff, and yours too, SC.
Tony, who do you think these “hundreds of personnel” are and what exactly are they going to do next week?
jack strocchi, can you stop this stupid LP stereotyping please? I hardly ever agree totally with anyone and I perceive most commenters to be the same. Also by commenting here you become a Larva Prodder so you might answer the questions yourself.
Perhaps not on second thoughts, because you are more predictable than the average LP commenter.
Mr Brough says he wants a dramatic boost in police numbers and he is prepared to have the Army help.
“We are prepared to stand by and have the military forces of this country be able to provide their logistics, their vehicles, their communications and their language skills of members of the Indigenous parts of our defence forces support the men and women of the Australian police forces in their duty,” he said.
Thanks, Tony.
I See Toupee Ray Martin is in on the act as well – coincidence or not ?
http://sixtyminutes.ninemsn.com.au/article.aspx?id=274740
“In lieu of any other ideas for some immediate break in the cycle it’s surely worth a shot.”
So Geoff are seriously suggesting that these plans may not , in fact, make the situation worse? That shot may well backfire…baby out with the bathwater etc…
“So Geoff are seriously suggesting that these plans may not , in fact, make the situation worse? That shot may well backfire…baby out with the bathwater etc”
I’m absolutely sure that doing nothing, joe2, will definitely make the situation worse. The Report is pretty compelling about the level of abuse and societal collapse in many communities and the need for an immediate response to it. I don’t for one moment think that the Brough Plan is the ‘whole solution,’ but it could provide the sort of stabilising moment that will be essential if longterm, sustainable recovery is to take place.
So is the idea to bring in the troops and police so that the whole 97 recommendations can be implemented in full?
Jack Strocchi:
Yes I do. Such examinations are intrusive and can be highly distressing to children aside from often being quite inconclusive. They should only be carried out when there is good cause to do so and by professionals who are qualified to carry them out and to properly interpret them.
On the other hand I would not disagree with a pro-active general medical examination to look for general health indicators such as weight for height, nutrition deficiency, worm infestation, parasites, middle ear infections, respiratory problems, trachoma etc. so that a strategy could be implemented to improve the child’s health and well-being where necessary. If that involved a blood or urine test which, inter alia, looked for signs of venereal diseases I would not disagree with that provided that it was just one element of an examination focused on the overall health and well-being of the child and not exclusively on whether they have been sexually abused.
I think Brian has made the most sensible comments so far.
For me, I am just a bit too cynical about the timing and (some of the) motives behind this. It is a classic Howard wedge manoeuver. He can’t possible say that he didn’t know about these problems years ago, so why now is it suddenly a major national emergency, just a few months before a tough election? How convenient.
And how convenient to extend it to all ‘welfare’ recipients. Will that include those with incomes in the top 60-70 percent, and who also receive baby bonuses, etc, otherwise known as middle class welfare?
Welcome to the conservative version of the nanny state.
Tony, that news item you linked to also said this:
He then defended the NT government from Howard’s criticism.
I like Geoff Honnor’s notion of a staged response. My worry is that the second and consequent phases either will not happen or will be under-resourced.
I worry that if they go at it like a bull at a gate in the first phase they will compromise cooperation down the track. Inga Clendinnen said the other day that people of “force, hope and energy” exist in these communities. She doesn’t know how, but they do. She and many others who would know emphasise that gaining the cooperation of such people in the communities is not an option, it is a necessary condition for success.
Those are my words, but I think they conform with her intent. Warren Mundine worries about the quality of the people used at the coal-face in this exercise. So do I.
I am concerned that the land tenure thing is going to have consequences that don’t meet the aspirations of the people.
I am concerned about these medical examinations. OK, Brough says they will be a total examination, not just as jack said, “to determine if systematic child abuse is occurring.”
I don’t think any medical examination should be compulsory, let alone vaginal and anal examinations. As to the latter, I think the consent of the child should be required, plus, separately, the consent of the parents or legal guardians. If these examinations are to be compulsory, I’m inclined to think they simply won’t happen. When it comes to it the children simply won’t be found. What then?
Compelling kids to go to school sounds like a great idea, but I promise you it won’t guarantee that kids learn. In fact it can make the classroom climate less productive for learning.
I’m on board with the sense of urgency in phase one of this thing, but I’d have to say that the present Government has an attitude whereby they are happy to ‘co-operate’ as long as they are calling the shots and everyone else falls into line. That’s not the way to get results, short-term or long-term.
Speaking of Military Intervention in things Sexual, one hopes We don’t hear about the following:
Without necessarily taking a strong stance either way on “Howard’s way” though I think most of the reservations expressed at this site are valid, I just can’t help but wonder about the detail.
What is sustainable about this “emergency response”? Where will all the extra police / army being drafted in stay? Are they just going to be rolling out their swags for 6 months then pissing off again? How many police are going to put their hands up for this? – it’s a struggle as it is to get police to stay in these communites.
Are they going to be rounding up all the males over 16 and asking them if they have committed indecent acts with children? How will any evidence be tested? Will the word of a neighbour with a grudge be enough?
How will all these city slicker coppers communicate with people who speak no english or pidgin english at best?
Is this a ’surge’ to clean up the bad apples and then all the extra coppers can go home, confident that their job is done and that they leave behind happy little communities with no other issues? How will they stop grog getting into the communities when all the extra police have gone? Or are they there for as long as it takes? Years? What will they do to make life in these communities worth living (aside from the removing the negatives I mean)?
Will they be able to prevent all other types of drugs / inhalants from getting into the community (ice/dope/aerosol inhalants/glue/petrol)?
The whole solution smacks of lack of thought – I really hope I’m wrong though and this isn’t the dogs breakfast that it sounds (remembering that this is from the same government that brought you the war against Iraq).
Oh and by the way Megami – it is ‘Kalumburu’ not ‘Kalambura’.
Rudd re-booted the Iraq issue today. I daresay within a couple of days he’ll hammer the line ‘If there’s a national emergency in remote communities requiring troops, why on earth are we in Iraq?’ Two can play the parochial flute.
The better analogy, as P.Shrike and others have pointed out, is directly between the cobbled together Indigenous communities plan and the Iraq invasion. Humanitarian invasions liable to go wrong, in breach of any conservative instinct against grand acts of societal engineering.
Frank you unstoppable genius, why should Howard discuss this through COAG? So the Labor premiers can line up to give him a belting? A great use of everyone’s time, that. Hey, why not ask the Moreland city council, too? You’ll recall of course that the policies apply only to Aboriginal communities in the Northern Territory…
It’s not ’stuff you States’, more ‘your proposal for an irrelevant talkfest is cheerfully rejected.’
BBB
rf, thanks for the correct spelling of Kalumburu. The incorrect one came from the transcript of the ‘Insiders’ where they type what they hear. The ABC even does it that way for some programs which are scripted for some wierd reason.
What GregM said about medical examinations.
When Howard said a couple of weeks ago that he “didn’t have any rabbits to pull out of his hat” he was actually saying he had some (given that mainstream politicians rarely tell the truth).
This is one of them. After years of Federal government inaction on we now have the “war on ….” to address what is obviously a major problem, and one that the Howard government is equally to blame for. Of course, Howard just sheets 100% of the blame to Labor State/Territory goverments.
Will this rabbit be effective in swing support towards Howard? Perhaps not. But the wedge is already showing some signs of succeeding with Rudd now under pressure to moderate his support for Howards “crackdown on Aboriginal communities”.
It is obviously political when all Howard’s focus is on law & order and protecting the children from harm (with a strong inference that all Aboriginal children are at risk), and their is no mention of causes of the situation like:
* No Australian government apology for the stolen generation
* Mabo & native title being gutted so that it is far too hard for indigenous Australians to get control over their traditional lands
* The nasty white guys who run in the grog and give away the petrol.
No mention either of the number of aboriginal communities who have declared themselves dry.
This is just the last in a long line of interventionist measures that have all failed. I think this one will too for the same reasons. It is critical that Aboriginal leaders work together on the solutions, rather than another round being imposed by Canberra.
Urgent action is obviously required on this issue, but turning it into an election stunt is reprehensible.
Still amazed that a report that supposedly outlines the problem so starkly has all its recommendations ignored.
It is obviously political when all Howard’s focus is on law & order and protecting the children from harm (with a strong inference that all Aboriginal children are at risk), and their is no mention of causes of the situation like:
* No Australian government apology for the stolen generation
This causes people to sexually abuse children? How?
And as an update: One of the interesting things about debating these issues in the blogosphere is that you can read first hand critiques from people actually involved with the issues at hand, like this comment on the other active thread.
Elsewhere: More from Helen at Surfdom.
Frank Calabrese on 24 June 2007 at 10:10 pm
Further into the story it is revealed that the military does want to adjudicate on “things sexual”. Not hard to figure out, given the head line is “US wants to deal with accused sailor”:
“The US military is asking for jurisdiction in this case, but they will investigate the matter and take appropriate action,” said US military spokesman Lieutenant Chris Maddison from the US embassy.
I guess the fact that the civil police were onto it from the get-go, and now military police, before any physical offence was committed would make no difference to someone with your pathologically twisted mind-set.
With such virulent strains of Howard-hatred abroad at epidemic levels the govt should consider putting drug treatments on the PBS schedule. Larva-Prodders should get “special needs” discounts.
To me this sounds like outright Totalitarianism w/ a privitisation bent. Also election year stormtrooping & FEAR tactics…dressed up to look like compassion. We’re getting used to these kind of election-based tactics from the Howard Government & their media Enablers. Eleven long years of this kinda stuff has taught all voters to gaze upon any Coalition policy w/ suspicion.
John Howard’s Government, is the very same one that locked up children in detention centres & lied about ‘children overboard’…& looked the other way when nigh on 300 million dollars got into the hands of Saddam’s supporters by way of the Australian Wheat Board (Who knows how many children have died because of that money being available to buy weapons?)…& now this same Government is telling us they CARE about Australian Children.
Gimme a break!
Imho, they are lackeys for major corporations that fill the heads of Australia’s children w/ poisonous advertising everyday, addicting them to cheap, sexist, environmentally damaging toys…& fast foods that destroy their health & contribute to obesity. Up here in Queensland the State Government has taken the bold initiative to introduce a ‘Healthy School’s Program’ that attempts to eliminate junk food sold & distributed in public schools. Whilst Tony Abbott has resisted banning junk food ads during children’s TV timeslots (I imagine he doesn’t want to offend the supporters & lobbyists of his Party).
As for the QLD State Government’s move…now that’s CARING…& not waiting until the issue reaches way beyond CRISIS point…it’s PREVENTATIVE action by a Labor government. Exactly what we can expect from a Rudd/Gillard led government.
We’ve learnt thru various media sources that John Howard knew about these problems in the Aboriginal communities for years. Requests were made to him & Tony Abbott on numerous occasions to do more, including altering the types of petrol that were getting into the hands of the youth for sniffing purposes. As usual the Coalition cabinet dithered & brought about policy change at a CRAWL’S pace…
& one must ask WHY?
The Coalition Government certainly didn’t waste time introducing the GST…& IR reforms (Workchoices)…or doing a U-Turn when the polls told them WORKCHOICES was unpalatable to the majority of the voting public. No hesitation in getting involved in America’s resource wars either.
So why so slow on the Aboriginal situation?
‘Intentional Negligence’ perhaps in order to allow a situation to reach crisis point, allow their media mates to cover the sordid details in every distorted & stereo-typed fashion possible, ensure that they could look like a bold & decisive Government a few mths out from the election they & their Corporate mates must not lose?
Remind you of any other Party? That’s right. The Republicans under G.W. Bush.
Helping children in desperate need is one thing. A very important thing. A top priority.
BUT…
Playing out the ’stolen generation’ policies, using ‘jackboot’, military & police state style approaches…& crushing the Rights of the citizenry in ham-fisted, totalitarian fashion…& by the backdoor, attempting to rob the First people of their Land…& introducing Prohibition & Welfare reform for the entire population (they will)…by way of a BIG BROTHER campaign, is another.
You don’t fool me Mr. Howard. You could have started CARING a long time ago. But you didn’t.
Time’s up!
(sorry for cross-posting but some are having trouble reading RTS)
Nasking, check out this interview with Pearson from Friday night where he pats Qld on the back for its Child Protection initiatives and then slaps them in the face and threatens to get Howard to roll over the top of them.
Ffound it interesting that the very page of his report which revealed the $3 000 000 Pricetag for his report reveals how closely he is working with the Queensland Government. Now the boot is being put in by Howard the tune has changed.
Anyway the quip about the early intervention programs being lacking is just not true as he mentions them right throughout his report.
For those of us using Firefox, who are frustrated by Surfdom’s fade to black, Helen’s post is much more readable at Cast Iron Balcony.
Frank
Any thoughts on this Frank, (or anyone?),
I must say i began to give Pearsons perspectives another look in last year, after hearing a speech by Julie Macrossan about the situation in some of the communities in the NT , where she strongly endorsed his leadership and many of his concepts. Being a long time Life Matters tragic, i was persuaded to take another look at his perspective from that point.
By the way, I found a list of resources – both volunteer and tangible that they are needing up there, for anyone interested…...
Monday morning update: An excellent post from David Tiley, and more from Surfdom. And this post, which has made up my mind as to my voting intentions this year.
Howards little foray in to the north is looking more Mugabe-esque as the implications accumulate.
It is clear that aboriginal welfare has very little to do with this whole affair. Firstly, this appears to be an exercise in talking tough about aboriginal affairs, a safe vote grabber with the white north whose votes Howard desparately needs to prune back Rudd’s Queensland following. Secondly, the attack on aboriginal property appears to be a sop to Howard’s mining friends, laying the ground work for more open access to aboriginal lands. Thirdly, talk of confiscating aboriginal income is a classic Howard manouvre, making the victim pay the costs of the action so that there is no risk to the budget surplus. Forthly, proposing the use of military makes it easier to gloss over legal risk in the action.
This all sounds startlingly similar to Zimbabwean slum dwellers moved to make land available for the leader’s friends. Yes, Robert Mugabe will be well pleased with his friend and peer, John Howard.
Hey Gaz, what you said at 8:26 was so much more accurate than anything said before or after.
Sorry to go a bit OT, but no, the Army does not have a large number of soldiers hanging about that can be quickly deployed. And anyone who tells you otherwise is lying.
Thanks to all of you who gave the heads-up on where the Army line was coming from. Still seems very vague, we shall see what details emerge this week.
Bingo!
No It won’t extend to the deserving middle class, although the scrounging and morally compromised white working class, particularly women who have failed to find a (male) partner to support their claim for various tax benefits will of course, continue to be held to account, and in the interests of ‘treating everyone the same’ (ring any bells?)the feckless, reckless and careless white working(sometimes)class will also be subjected to the ‘food stamps for good behaviour’ regime.
We can be equally sure that the ’suspension’ of Indigenous property rights that is being undertaken, will, unlike the emergency measures, be permanent. After all, it would be a pity to waste all that good will on a purely political dividend, as it were.
I look forward to the comprehensive report that will be tabled in Parliament in the next session, which will outline, what has been done ,what has been achieved, and how the ‘progress’ if any, is to be maintained. I trust the coalition electoral officers’ posting here will be ready and waiting for the detailed and comprehensive accounting for the efficacy of the ‘War on pedos’?
Can someone please tell me, has a single journalist, anywhere, taken up the property rights issue?
No, why would they? To do so would be unseemly in this time of national ‘pulling together’ for the abused kiddies. Besides, everyone knows that ‘real’ property rights are individual rights, constituted by Parliamentary representatives elected for precisely that purpose. In the case of our dusky indiginees, the collective is the problem, not the solution. Those very rational and clever economists have told us what the problem is. It’s the inability to trade and truckle.
sshh – its about saving children. Don’t frighten the horses.
The National Indigenous Times ran a story on Friday….
Thanks Casey . Link to National Indigenous Times here.
“Hey Gaz, what you said at 8:26 was so much more accurate than anything said before or after.”
Well thanks, after seeing what has happened to the Aboriginals in my life time,you don’t have to be a genius to work out what is going on here.Of course all these lovely people who post on this site with a degree in Philosophy, and other such higher education, think they have what’s going on, sussed. However J.H.knows better, and has exactly the re-action he expected. All this navel-gazing by the intellectual left is par for the course on matter of Aboriginal affairs.
But hey,the right have had their Philanthropists,indeed many Aboriginals have met them as they arrived at their homes,sorry I meant as they arrived at their six sheets of corragated iron they called a home, to steal their children.But the the real givers were the whites who tried to get the young Aboriginal girls pissed so they could have sex with them,or was that make love? how I forget.We taught them well,because now it’s their own doing it.
This is political opportunism of the highest order,some thank God can see it for what it is,the others well that’s why it’s odds on J.H. is gonna get re-elected.The left are as dumb as a bag of hammers,they have swallowed this crap hook,line,sinker,and the jetty they were fishing on.
I wonder if the Constitution allows it though.
But here is the Emotional Blackmail bit
I heard Rudd poke his head above the parapets and call for more detail. He pointed out that 60 extra coppers was approximately one per community. But I guess if they blow in in an army vehicle it should put the miscreants to flight.
Rudd has also said he wants to know what the provisions are for the long term, which was the important thing.
Howard said he found Labor’s response “puzzling”.
First, Shock and Awe:
“Police and the military have begun arriving in the NT for the first stage of a radical Govt takeover of Indigenous communities. (ABC TV)”
Then, Reality.
“PM pleads for time on Indigenous plan results” (ABC Homepage)
Goodness me! No Exit Strategy? Well, not until Law and Order are restored says Ratty. Which may take some time. Oh dear, havn’t we been here before recently? And where are the Doctors coming from?
Fred Hollows and Archie Kalokerinos did a great deal for Indidenous people’s health and welfare. They managed it all without resorting to the Military Option. Mind you, Fred and Archie didn’t have elections to win. They gained the goodwill and support of communities by way of their humanity.
As Daffy Duck, one of Warner Bros. finest, would have animatedly put it:
“Fear not!! Generalissmo El Rodente braceth for The Surge.”
Strong column from Guy Rundle today:
http://www.crikey.com.au/Politics/20070625-Howards-NT-plan-is-a-new-apartheid.html
Oh Dear, it seems the WA LIbs aren’t siniging from the same Song Sheet as Ratty over saving the kiddies.
“It’s a bit over the top, them coming in and taking control,” Dr Hames said.
“I would rather, if I was the minister for aboriginal affairs, say ‘Come on, let’s get in there, let’s do this together’.
“But at the end of the day anything that reduces the incidents of sexual abuse in Aboriginal communities is worth it.”
AAP np/maur/de
More thoughtful commentary from Andrew Bartlett.
Compliments to Mark for his hunting down of the real issues involved.
News from the front.
It’s rather ironic that they’re the first community to be Targetted, because of the story Lateline ran last year, which sparked the NT Report whch Ratty has decided to act on – in his own style of course.
Will the Crack Forces be accompnied by an ABC Lateline Crew to get “Exclusive Footage” ?
The west toughens up and tells Howard to bring the Police back from overseas.
Guy Rundle’s article was by far the best analysis of this issue that I’ve read. The last paragraph sums up the sad and sorry state of affairs in which we find ourselves:
Why is it so easy for Howard and his poor excuse for a government to con the Australian people time and time again?
Quite easy when you have a compliant media to help sell the message, along with a large portion of the electorate who have sub-concious racist tendencies which are re-inforced by the same media via sensationalist articles focussing on crime and dysfunction, yet ignore all the feel good stories – except when they involve indiginious footballers.
In terms of a wedge, however, will this policy-on-the-run have any great effect? We have six months to dwell on this, and see the first stages of the ’shock and awe’ approach to indigenous issues. Rudd will back the ‘we need to do something’ message, without offering a drastically different approach – won’t he?
Will this give traction to Howard?
After Howard’s announcement of no exit strategy and he found Labor’s response “puzzling” for daring to hold the government to account on this and produce quantifiable results in their strategic planning, Abbott can out with this, I’m paraphrasing:
“We expect the doctors to help us in this matter. Doctors have been heroic in this area for many years and we now ask more doctors to volunteer and give vocational aid to the need of the Aboriginal communities.”
The government, apart from the policing and taking their land, have no intention of paying for any infrastructure, support programs and institutions, doctor and nurses and their needed surgeries/clinics or anything else that might help them withdraw from their addictions or anger at being yet again oppressed by a white government. They are holding the States and needed professionals to ransom to supply all this out of their own pockets under the threat of being outed as child abusers if they don’t acquiesce.
Btw Howard in his attack on Labor on this (and it was an attack even though Labor has been bipartisan) stated that the current situation has absolutely nothing to do with 10 years of failed policy on his behalf, it is completely the fault of the States and their failure to implement strong law and order in these communities. He ended that by saying this emergency situation is purely a law and order problem.
Also, it must be noted that this was announced just as Parliament was rising for the Winter Break, and thus avoiding any scrutiny in the Chamber by those pesky Green Senators and that Boong Loving Garrett (who I’ve noticed has been silent on this – probably for good reason).
I Thought I’d find a release from him on his werbsite, but alas, the mnost recent release on himn re Indiginous matters was this.
http://www.petergarrett.com.au/c.asp?id=381
Sue Gordon says that they will be paying workers in the indigenous communities full wages, including any local aboriginals employed (i.e. they will not receive only CDEP payments for their contributions).
This shows a great deal more seriousness about the proposals than earlier suggestions that people should just volunteer. The budget will have to end up being more than just tens of millions though.
Going back to looking at fundamentals, some perspective in this article from Nigeria about rape and sexual abuse of children in overcrowded housing:
Children growing up in overcrowded houses spend a lot of time outside, just to have space to play and not get underfoot inside the house. Anyone who’s grown up in an Australian country town with a large indigenous population will have seen how that plays into older men, both indigenous and non-indigenous, getting young indigenous girls drunk in order to have sex with them.
The fine details of plans to improve the quality and amount of housing in indigenous communities will be crucial in ensuring the long-term success of this intervention.
Adrian
Why do you think this is so brilliant?
I am white. I do not have a shred of “guilt and shame.” I can’t reall think of any white People I know who would. Do you know any of these white people?
Hmm The Wheels of the Bus are appearing to be Wobbling somewhat.
So much for the Rows of under 16 kiidies in line being prodded and probed.
It’s always all about you, isn’t it, John?
Frank, I was impressed by Carpenter on the 7 30 Report tonight.
So far, the Brough approach has been to tie any funding for housing to welfare sticks and land tenure grabs, tigtog.
Damn Two Hour Time delay – Yeah, Carps is good value, but unfortunately here in WA he has to deal with a hostile WA Media, especially from the West Australian who are so anti Labor it’s not funny, but Carpenter has made some very good comments on this, but unfortunately they aren’t getting the coverage they need.
“I am white. I do not have a shred of “guilt and shame.â€? I can’t reall think of any white People I know who would. Do you know any of these white people?”
Hey John I do.I also share the guilt,not for participating in treating them like animals, but for not saying F.A. at the time.
Most people (and for obvious reasons and no fault of their own)would’t have a clue what was visited on Aboriginals by whites and no not circa 1788 Im talking in my period fifty’s and sixty’s.
I mean Jesus wept what is going on here?more Police and possibly the Army to sort this mess out.It is the State Apperatus partly to blame for the mess we are already in.
The ghettos these poor wretches have been thrown into over the years in the outback, was to get rid of the problem,out of sight out of mind.When they moved into the tourist areas like the Alice they had a transport system that was the envy of the world “Paddy Wagons”
This attempt to get re-elected by J.H. on the backs of the plight of Aboriginals is a scandal.11 yrs of doing nothing!try 200 yrs.
Exactly, Mark. A fundamental problem which ought to be addressed as the first priority with no ties to it whatever (if ameliorating child sexual abuse is indeed the real goal) has been entangled with ideological gotchas instead. The Brough love torpedoing of the only way for housing improvements intervention to have a longterm positive effect simply isn’t getting a run in the media.
Tigtog, Pearson certainly is a big critic of CDEP and wants to abolish it for anybody under twenty-one. I think that paying workers a full wage is the only way to go but I don’t like the sound of volunteers being called to help the Government out. If people are going to work pay them the proper rates.
Howard’s Plan seems to have developed a bad case of the collywobbles as the day wore on. Brough has spent the day bitching about Beattie being more interested in talking to the butcher than the block. Abbott has backed off a bit on the statutory rape of under sixteen year olds.
Howard and co were struggling to find five soldiers to send to Dafur last week, this week they seem to be able to muster twenty state police to work as Federal police when it was only Friday we were being quoted sixty police.
I still have heard of nothing to suggest that Howard or Brough have read the 97 recommendations of the report yet, or made any comment on them.
What Ratty doesn’t say is that Bush did next to nothing to help the blacks in New Orleans.
Bloody Hypocrite
Howard’s certainly thumping this issue and his snake-oil solution to it, for all he’s worth.
He’s gonna look bloody stupid when his wonderful “Aboriginal Child Protection Great Leap Forward” falls flat on it’s paternalistic face.
I reckon it will take about a week before it becomes obvious that his send-the-Army you-beaut plan just won’t work.
There’s at least another 4 months to go before the election, so he probably hopes we’ll all have forgotten about the whole thing by the time it rolls around.
By then he’ll also have returned to his main themes: Union Bosses and Union Bosses.
Shades of The Stolen Generation anyone ??
From the closed thread:
What’s Australian for carpet bagger?
You can see it now. Some time in October, Howard visits Mutitjulu, declares, with a satisfied smirk, victory in our time, exits stage right – back to
the LodgeKirribili for another three years.As the camera crews pack up and head back to the Big Smoke, enter stage left the mining companies (along with all the low life who kept a low profile during the ‘emergency’)
That’s Carpenter. I expect it is because they won’t give up their collective land tenure.
Steve, WA and SA have refused to send police. Beattie won’t until Howard calls a COAG meeting. Not sure about Tasmania, but the 20 must be Vic and NSW. I heard they are going mainly into places that don’t have any.
The Mutitjulu mothers heading for the sandhills was also on the TV news. It’s what I was thinking about when I said that compulsory medical checks as originally conceived simply won’t happen.
Rundle was good, Bartlett also, but if you haven’t read David Tiley’s cries and dreams on the desert wind, do yourself a favour. He says the Howard
I’d add to that the powerlessness of power to achieve change that really matters.
Although I’m withholding my cynicism and reserving my opinion on the National Emergency – I think Pearson makes some good points – I’m pretty impressed with Carpenter, particularly his comments about the seeming contradiction of the current policy stance compared to the commonwealth withdrawing funding from programmes in WA over the past decade. Had to be said.
Having said that, if they can establish some sort of sustainable police presence in tandem with sustainable long-term housing and health programs then all well and good.
It is looking all a bit back of the envelope at the moment, though.
As i understand it, THe Australian Indigenous Doctors Association has not been invited by the Feds to consult around their medical health implementation strategies.
This legitimately concerning as this is a very significant level of cultural and medical experience and expertise that has so far been overlooked or ignored, something i believe Rudd is concerned about.
From their website
Guy Rundle’s article verges on the hysterical.
Rundle urges the afflicted to pull themselves up by their own bootstraps. Throw off the colonialist shackles, etc. Yeah, right. Impossible.
And even if this utopian dreaming was possible in the very long-term – there are issues which governments must address in the meanwhile. It is far too urgent to wait more decades. You do not sacrifice people in the name of a cause. Iraq can be quoted with more than one rhetorical use in mind.
They. Us. Talk about apartheid.
And the emotional blackmailing continues.
“There was a report here in New South Wales that did analyse this issue,” he said.
“It did produce an analysis roughly equivalent to the analysis that came out of the Northern Territory report and it didn’t seem to me that the response to that problem got much of a mention in the recent state Budget.”
Wow, he’s certainly going the hard-sell.
You don’t think that imposing a policy on one section of the community (and let’s face it, the people affected weren’t the Pearsons who got phone calls) might lead that part of the community to see things in terms of “them” and us”, wbb?
Some more posts: Andrew Elder is scathing about the role of the press, observing:
And writing of Peter Hartcher, he comments:
David Tiley examines the Liberal wet dream and wonders why we’ve become as weird as we have.
Cam at Polemica thinks Howard’s comparison to Hurricane Katrina is risible, and not in a good way.
And tigtog has more on Howard’s emergency measures.
BTW thanks Casey and Steve for the link to the National Indigenous Times. The open letter to the National Indigenous Council packed a punch. I think they and Sue Gordon in particular will bear a heavy responsibility if this thing goes bad. In particular, the land tenure issue should be important enough for them to consider resignation.
Radio National had quite a bit of stuff today. First there was Associate Professor Helen Milroy, Director of the Centre for Aboriginal Medical and Dental Health at the University of Western Australia presently attending a conference on rebuilding social norms in indigenous communities. (She is at the beginning of the audio download.) Milroy’s specialty seemed to be psychiatry and in particular, trauma. What she had to say was an extreme caution about the notion of blundering in.
There were five items on AM including a serve from Malcom Fraser.
On ‘The World Today’ there was an interview with The President of the Australian Indigenous Doctors Association, Dr Mark Wenitong.
He also said it is not a GP function, you need specialists. Furthermore, Aboriginal children are three times more likely to die than other Australian children, which should attract some priority.
Fred Chaney was also interviewed and it’s worth a look. The shorter Chaney is that he supports the initiative, but there is too much haste and they are going to need very high quality personnel. He also says you need specialists to check child abuse.
PM also had four segments. The interviews with Mike Rann and John Wenitong who coordinates the Cape York Higher Expectations Scholarship Program are worth a look.
Sid Spindler (remember him?) said in a letter to the AFR today that how we handle this issue will define us as a nation.
I don’t believe anybody can afford to think in terms of them and us. I don’t see that proper levels of law enforcement being established in remote communities as creating a them and an us. I believe that adequate policing is required everywhere. It has normally been provided in all places in Australia. Shamefully, however, Australian governments (and none more so than the current Fed and NT governments) have failed these remote communities. Shamefully Australian voters have not cared enough about that. I hope that Brough will follow through on recent rhetoric and will act to remove the them and us distinction in this regard. I hope that Rudd if he gains power will nuance and continue with these reforms.
I know how quickly my particular neighborhood would degenerate into terrible disorder if the police station were suddenly de-staffed. I have no inclination to believe the result would be different anywhere else. “Them and us” are no different in very fundamental ways. All societies require certain basic functions to be performed.
It is distressing to think that the army needs (apparently) to be deployed – but that only illustrates government unpreparedness and the extent of past neglect.
One Word Ratty, Diddums
“I think the ideological debate about this sort of intervention has been won, it’s over,” Dr Gallop said. “When people are in crisis you’ve got to act.
“But that doesn’t mean everybody has to agree with everything John Howard says and does. People are saying keep politics out of it, but this is a political issue. Kevin Rudd should be scrutinising everything the Government does on this, making sure they’re committed to long-term solutions.”
Good comments from Geoff Gallop.
Typical Twaddle from the Govt Gazette.
Well, it’s nice to know that the Gazette and Howard’s office are sharing talking points. I wonder who wrote that one?
Oh, and of course this has nothing to do with politics. Howard announced it on the last sitting day of parliament because he obviously wanted debate.
From Peter Botsman who was the co-author with Mark Latham and Noel Pearson of the 2001 Third Way political tome The Enabling State: People Before Bureaucracy (Yes, I did pinch that bit from the article)
“Howard is planning his attack across 60 communities in the Northern Territory using bureaucrats predominantly from Canberra, and without co-operation from the local leadership. What angers me is that whatever good has been done by the Pearsons (Noel and brother Gerhardt) at Cape York will be lost and become even harder to translate across the country.”
In backing Mr Pearson – who proposed Aboriginal families be stripped of welfare payments if their children were abused or missed school, or if public housing was damaged or rent not paid, or family violence offences were committed – Mr Botsman worried that the Left of politics would shun his approach.
“The best way forward is to get the progressives who worry about the civil rights of all this to get on board. We need the Left to embrace the Pearson welfare proposals, but the Howard intervention will mean this won’t happen, and the agenda has been derailed,” he said.
But Mr Botsman denied Labor leader Kevin Rudd had been successfully wedged by Mr Howard on the issue.
“Howard hasn’t sucked him in. Rudd has called for the detail and that is exactly the right approach to take.
“Meanwhile, the state premiers can be the ones who have the political argument.”
The question I asked you, wbb, was how you thought people in those communities would experience militiary and police presence.
it would be nice to know how many of the posters here have ever been to utopia, yuendumu, or similar places. or spent a little time in the long-grass or the todd river bed. the combination of grog, government funds misappropriated by some community elders, stone age job opportunities & sit-down money has created a disaster. pearson is no coconut. he is a realist. so are the women on the wa reserves who have banned alcohol & beat with sticks any man who shows up drunk & violent. it’s not pleasant, but it saves the kids from broken bones. go & stay in one of these communities for a week & then come back here saying drastic measures aren’t needed. improving health services, housing & education is imperative, but this can’t be done while drunks & petrol sniffers destroy their families as well as trashing housing & other community assets.
Thanks for those links Brian.
The interview with the head of the NT police union, Vince Kelly, was interesting, it seems that they haven’t really been that well briefed about what is to happen. He seemed quite sceptical as to the motives of the plan:
[link]
Gerard Henderson has put in a piece in today’s SMH heaping praise on Howard’s plan and his unconventional approach to federalism. [link]
He also takes some cheap shots at the critics of Howard’s plan. He has the hide to suggest that Malcolm Fraser’s tendancy to “focus on process” (I guess this is code for “not making policy on a whim”) meant that he never achieved much. It seems that this is a tacit admission that Howard’s policy was made on the fly, at the very least he seems to be setting up a defence against such an attack (which we haven’t seen coming from Labor yet).
Somewhat more ludicrously he takes a swipe and ACT’s chief minister Jon Stanhope, and Crikey writer Guy Rundle:
I’m sorry Gerard, but I didn’t realize that either of these guys (especially Rundle) have had the same level of policy advice that the PM has on this issue.
Interesting article shedding light on why Clare Martin seemd to accept Howards ‘plan’ without much protest….
The article contends she had proposed similar strategies in writing to Howard last year.
From ninemsm
Apply Occam’s razor WBB.
If Howard and Brough were interested in doing what you say, and only what you say, i.e., establishing “proper” levels of law enforcement, then they could have done that without harsh intrusions on personal liberty in a certain places and they could have done it without undermining property rights.
But Howard and Brough are doing much, much more. Why?
There are no clear answers, but Howard’s past record points to two strong possibilities:
1. Howard hates native title. This is his way of portraying native title as evil. It’s a typical Howard wedge.
2. Howard wants a khaki campaign. The Iraq and Afghanistan branches of this campaigns haven’t been going well, so open a new front.
At least Howard is correct about this being his Hurricane Katrina. It’ll be a monumental foul-up where black people get shafted and lose their homes and communities.
Coming in the wake of the attempt to remove NT town camps from indigenous control, you would have to say that the property aspect is a specific and quite separate aim of the Howard gov.
Forget the 97 recommendations of the report, Sport is the answer apparently.
There is nothing wrong with a bit of back of the envelope reckoning, CK – see Merkel’ post about Fermi’s guesswork on piano tuners in
ChicagoMelbourne.Mark: “ill thought out and probably ineffective measures” (emphasis added).
What if they do some good?
This goes against every anarchist instinct in my being, but there have been myriad of “solutions” that have not worked.
Worse than the sexual predation of children is the wholesale cretinisation of a generation of Aboriginal people through malnutrition. This in turn is caused by the killing fields of grog.
Visiting Halls Creek in WA is a revelation as the sun hits the ground there, it is like a some space telescope mirror surface, the bright light coming from the ground from the hundreds of thousands of flattened cans.
Something has to be done by a government because it has the power and the means. Sure there have been individuals who have gone to aboriginal settlements in the outback on a private individual basis, trying to do something. They have been, overwhelmingly, medical practitioners, who have been going there as individuals, Fred Hollows being probably the most high profile (now) among them. Peter Macdonald, currently the mayor of Manly and a one-time state MP in the NSW parliament, made numerous visits there not as politician but as a general practitioner. But such visits are there as a desperate last-minute fix. The diseases rampant in outback aboriginal communities are medieval – malnutrition, ricketts, TB, and what have you. What is that life expectancy again? What is the infant mortality again?
Howard’s “initiative” reeking of self-serving political survival plus the authoritarian approach, may, just may do something. Bringing in coppers and the army – note this, in the form of Norforce aboriginals – may help to disperse the criminal gangs that run riot, literally, and rule remote communities without any intervention from either traditional law, or a contemporary one.
It remains to be seen if the intervention achieves anything like Howard is advertising it will. But if it improves school attendance, reduces somewhat the endemic alcohol-to-the-max abuse and improves the nutrition of kids, never mind the high profile STD examinations or pron then what is so bad about that?
Squawking about it in outraged tones on blogs will in itself do nothing, except perhaps alienate some ALP supporters into voting informal.
PS. I do not think that Ratty is doing it primarily as a wedge. This is more about looking to “posterity”. He wants to leave a tangible mark of himself in history. They all think alike. So there you have it.
Katz – but see, I reckon you’re taking the edge off poor old Occam’s shaving gear yerself there!
To me it’s simpler to imagine that Sergeant-Major Brough only knows one way to get things done – ie boots and all. It may be ham-fisted – but I don’t think I’m duped taking it at face-value.
But I agree that Howard is instinctively up-selling this thing to line his electoral prospects – but that’s the price we all pay for having left it to him. We can’t expect, having squibbed this issue, to now expect him to deliver our dream policy.
That’s for Rudd to attempt next year.
and what Lazarus said.
“2. Howard wants a khaki campaign. The Iraq and Afghanistan branches of this campaigns haven’t been going well, so open a new front.”
… says Katz.
Do not be surprised to see another National Emergency called just around APEC summit proceedings.
Lockdown, dangerous protesters, extra police , troops needed and our Johny in khaki. This is a man desperate to hold onto power and there is very little he will not do to maintain it.
Programs designed to protect Indigenous children, address domestic violence and deal with alcoholism are under threat throughout WA as a result of the Howard Government’s decision to abolish the Community Development Employment Projects (CDEP) programs in urban areas and regional centres.
The Commonwealth funding ends this Saturday.
Mr Carpenter said John Howard’s changes contradicted the Prime Minister’s recent move to ban alcohol and pornography in Northern Territory Aboriginal communities.
“It also highlights the hypocrisy of Mr Howard’s sudden interest in indigenous affairs so close to a Federal election,� Mr Carpenter said.
“For the last five years, John Howard has ignored the pleas of the Western Australian Government to help protect local indigenous children.
“Now, with an election only months away, he has announced a short term political measure to ban alcohol and pornography in the Northern Territory’s Aboriginal communities.
“While I welcome John Howard’s new found interest in the Northern Territory, in WA his funding cuts will jeopardise a number of programs aimed at protecting Aboriginal children.�
Federal Labor please take note.
What does Brough know about Native Title? How did that get into Operation Desert Insertion?
All Brough is providing is the whitewash to paint the Devil’s Marbles a hue suitable for an army parade ground.
Brough is just the monkey.
No prizes for guessing who is the organ grinder.
Whoever is “we” in this context? Is this the Howard line, wbb, that it’s all TEH FAULT OF TEH LEFT?
Bureaucratic, military-inspired solutions imposed on real live human beings with very little to lose is perhaps just the circuit breaker that has been needed. Howard, I now believe you are toast.
As the best military strategists know you don’t reduce the enemy to absolute desperation, since this only makes them stronger. Howard has offered no escape routes to Aboriginal communities, members of which are understandably now talking about fleeing with their children in fear of their lives. Howard’s grandstanding will give impetus and focus to Aboriginal land councils and other community organisations, and their supporters, and open the way to a realignment of political forces and of relative power.
The idea that police could ever be the front line people who would “rescue” Aboriginal children and women was never going to be received by the communities themselves as other than a grotesque and terrifying prospect – for all the long historic reasons they have reason to repudiate such a strategy. How many more Aboriginal deaths in police custody can anyone stomach? No more. The lines are being drawn. I feel more hopeful now.
“The idea that police could ever be the front line people who would “rescueâ€? Aboriginal children and women was never going to be received by the communities themselves as other than a grotesque and terrifying prospect -”
So bloody true.This is exactly what J.H. wants,nice media coverage of Police and possibly Soldiers,doing battle on the front lines with those lawless Abos.
And after they have been possibly on the wagon for a few days well!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!.
The land the mining company’s want to exploit will soon be theirs,all else is bollicks.
Once, our Brough, has done his best, “in securing the ground”, at Mititjulu, embedded journalists Piers and Bolt will likely, move through, in humble Toyota 4 wheel drives, to safer ground….
http://www.ayersrockresort.com.au/sails/
…for a briefing, by our glorious leader.
Once, our Brough, has done his best, “in securing the ground�, at Mititjulu, embedded journalists Piers and Bolt will likely, move through, in humble Toyota 4 wheel drives, to safer ground….
[link]
There they will learn first hand from the Aboriginal guests who have been staying at the hotel for some months, planning the strategy, what has been learnt from the exercise yada, yada, yada.
Oh Dear, Col Klink is upset with Col Hogan aka Allan Carpenter.
“I think Alan Carpenter has been bloody-minded towards his neighbour,� Mr Brough said.
“We will re-look at our relationship with Western Australia if they can’t help their neighbours,â€? he said.
Apparently the “constructive talks” with Beattie resulted in the Feds agreeing to pay Queensland some millions of dollars towards police housing in outback Queensland (no link – I heard this on ABC TV news).
Wasn’t it Paul Keating who said “never get between a Premier and a pile of money”?
It is sickening to read people who are talking about poltics, almost as if willing failure on the first actual attempt to combat widespread child molestation in aboriginal communities.
Many of the posters here are perhaps not people of action, having only ever talked about things, are accustomed to long periods of carefuly consulation & reflection before anything is done, where failure is wiped away by having a story ready to explain “unforseen outcomes”.
Failure to act in this case has real, horrific, physical consequences for children. It is likely that those who oppose this initiative are ones whose contribution to society does not extend to the tangible, and whose removal from our country would not cause hardship for society.
I see you’re taking your talking points from Noel Pearson this week, steve.
You volunteering to go off to Mutitjulu, steve?
Or are you saving kids by typing words into lefty blogs to make a political point? “Talking about things”?
Maybe if you are contemplating doing the former, you’d be interested in reading what people in that community think:
http://www.crikey.com.au/Politics/20070626-Mutitjulu-leaders-please-listen-to-us.html
I’d be interested to know if Steve’s pub is part of the problem.
“Failure to act in this case has real, horrific, physical consequences for children. It is likely that those who oppose this initiative are ones whose contribution to society does not extend to the tangible, and whose removal from our country would not cause hardship for society.”
You Sir have more front than a block of flats.As a hotel keeper, who are you to be passing any moral judgement on anyone?Ive got a little secret for you, alcohol is the one common feature in all of the problems of Aboriginal people.And it has been for 200 yrs.
It is a documented fact,that Liberal Party aparachics used grog to obtain the votes of Aboriginals in the Pilbara approx 25 yrs ago.(Anyone remember?)
There is not one person on this blog who does not understand the problems of the Aboriginal race,most apart from their vote, are in no position to do anything about it.However having said that, this sudden moral rectitude by the Howard government this close to an election, is what is at question here.
And only a 22 carat naive moron can’t see it.
This is a policing problem nothing more,nothing less,all the rest is side dressing.
Christine you stole my thunder.
Mal Brough explains his plan.
That’s if Brendon Nelson hasn’t stolen the honey pot!
But today nearly a hundred organisations have signed a letter expressing strong objections to Mr Howard’s plan.
I think most people in Australia don’t trust this Government any more.
In the past few days I’ve heard so many new articulate Aboriginal voices.
One Labor member, Warren Snowdon says his constituents “are worried about the link to their land tenure and he has indicated he might not support the change when Parliament is recalled. “
It’s the fault of a great many governments at different times and of different hues.
I give Howard close to zero credit here. It’s scandalous the lack of progress his ten yr reign has had in this area. But now that, for whatever motive, he’s moving, it is futile to parse his policy for error to such a degree that the final analysis is that it’s all a naked grab for land to enrich the Morgans and Fortescues of this country.
If Howard was dictator I’m sure he’d have the children from these towns boarded out in starched shirts at C of E hostels and the former lands excavated for minerals, but luckily he’s merely a soon to be ex-PM.
The bluster of his policy might be aggravating in certain quarters. It’s meant to be. Nevertheless, I believe the left should grasp this unusual opportunity, and turn a sow’s ear into a silk purse.
Brian, I find it so difficult to reconcile the idea that problems must be addressed on the basis of community consultation with the idea that people like Gregory Phillips – someone who is not from the community at hand – says things like:
I agree that the government agencies need to work with and empower local bodies and individuals. I do not see that Gregory Phillips – anymore than say Noel Pearson – have a special claim to be amongst those whom the government consults.
I support local cooperation, but it needs to be local.
The message that is being put about that the government is on the wrong track is very confused when it is left to the likes of a Gregory Phillips. (Who am I sure is sincerely motivated.) His claims of expertise aside.
Noel Pearson on Lateline Complaining about the reaction to the Great Invasion of the NT.
He’s making my Blood Boil – sounding Shrill and sounding more and more like Howard.
No Doubt Transcript will be up later.
Video of Pearson Interview already up
Nice one, Frank.
Mark over on TigTog’s blog sums up how I felt about Noel Pearson’s appearance on Lateline .
Moralistic and Evangelical, just like those Missionaries who ran Noel’s Community on Cape York back in the 50’s and 60’s – a perfect companion to Howard’s Nostalgic views of the same period.
“I think that is a terrible indulgence (that) when our children sleep safely at night we seek to put road blocks in the way, and we wish failure upon, any decisive action that is going to deliver some relief to vulnerable children.�
Mr Pearson is notable as the most senior and outspoken indigenous figure to support the Howard Governments plans, as outlined last week, to send in police and troops in response to a report which highlighted wide-spread abuse of children in indigenous communities
From the Govt Gazette
OF all the criticisms levelled at John Howard for his call to action to break the cycle of sexual violence in Northern Territory Aboriginal communities, the most intriguing is the petulant stand taken by West Australian Premier Alan Carpenter.
While other state premiers have agreed to second police officers to the NT effort, Mr Carpenter continues to refuse. He says WA does not have any spare officers and if it did, they would be used to protect West Australians. His admission that WA was, for the first time, building police stations in some remote communities is merely an admission of long-term neglect.
Queensland, which at first refused, will now contribute police, along with NSW and Victoria. The mean spirit being exhibited towards the federal Government’s plan by some state leaders in part reflects the difficulty that other jurisdictions have had in coping with the same problems. Mr Howard’s plan is at sharp odds to the welfare and rights-based approach favoured by state bureaucracies. While new measures are being trialled in WA and Queensland, the fruits of non-intervention were on display yesterday in the results of an audit of Queensland’s 32 indigenous councils, which revealed more than $5 million of “unrecoverable” debt, including loans to council members and their families. On the scale of horrors, missing money cannot be compared to the sexual abuse of minors. But the audit demonstrates how a culture free of responsibility and discipline has failed. Mr Howard’s big advantage is the recognition that the status quo is broken. State premiers should snap out of it and follow the federal Government’s lead.
I suspect some of Pearson’s apparent manichaenism, as well as the drive which has resulted in his justifiably praiseworthy achievements, does come from his upbringing by Lutheran missionaries, Frank.
Nevertheless, I found his dichotomised view of things quite depressing, as I said at Hoyden:
Yep Mark, I also felt the same way while listening it to the interview, he was very dismissive of any justifiable criticisim of the current plan and basically accused them of “abandoning the kids”, and he was using the same emotive language as Howard & Brougfh.
And I’m disappointed that besides Pearson & Sue Gordon, there has been hardly any other decent interview on Lateline with other indiginous leaders, or or other experts in the field.
“I’d be interested to know if Steve’s pub is part of the problem.”
Child rape is not on the menu here Christine.
Your comment is stupid, sour, and if you said it here, despite my best efforts to keep you safe, you’d be at risk of being deservedly flattened.
You are a VERY sick puppy.
Ah-ah, Steve at the pub.
You know full well Christine’s comment encapsulates the long history of the connection between alcohol and violence.
Some one else reckoned you are a publican. Even if if you are just a toper, you indicted serious sacrifice is necessary to “save the little children”.
Christine’s question was quite obvious.
Does “anything” extend to shutting down pubs across the country?
How much do you REALLY care, in other words and what would YOU give up, as you sit on your barstool complacently watching life passing by, preparing for your judgement
—
The lady is no “sick puppy”.
If medical testing was introduced, starting where it should be started with white communities, can you imagine the amount of underhand abuse they’d find?
How much of that would be related to alcohol abuse?
So this is not a racial issue except in the scapegoating of a disadvantaged community, actually many communities, ill-prepared to defend themselves against the subceptional spin of slimebucket tabloid politicians and spindoctors.
PS, any of you catch Spooner’s cartoon the other day of a grim-faced Howard in a dinghy in the swamps pulling a child away from the pornography, alcoholism and other “crocodiles” there. Well at least we presume he was pulling the kid away….
Kids overboard, indeed!
Paul Walter, are you one of those whom Noel Pearson referred to tonight as “nay-sayers whose children are safe”?
IS your problem with alcohol a real one, or a smart-alec attempt to have a shot at my profession? There is no intrinsic problem with alcohol, it is with the “breed of the brutes”. That is, most people I have to physically evict I can pick by their eyes on the way in, BEFORE they have touched a drop.
Kim, not often I am accused of singing from the same song sheet as Noel Pearson, hehe. Though we have many things in common, our opinions have always been fundamentally at odds.
If I sat on barstool watching life pass by, sport, I wouldn’t be in the position I am today. Though I suspect from the commentary above, that there are many who contribute little more than that to the progress of this country.
Steve, as for myself I hope Howard’s plan works, and were I in a position to do so I’d be the first to stick my hand up to volunteer to assist. However, not being a doctor, nurse, teacher, child protection worker or law enforcement officer I think I’d only be getting in the way.
Having said that you seem to be of the view that because something must be done, and this is something, it deserves unfettered and uncritical support. Yet it has become increasingly clear after a few short days that Howard and Brough don’t have any plan as such, but are simply making it up as they go along.
And really, given the form of this government and six months out from an election you could hardly blame people for thinking ‘hang on a minute’. Still, much good may come from it as the government is now in a position where it has to commit large amounts of money to the problem, and it has really focussed people’s minds on what is without question a national scandal.
It’s called politics.
Although I’m sure you run a very fine establishment which doesn’t profit from and contribute to the misery of indigenous communities, there seem to be a few retailers and individuals who are quite happy to do so.
I’m sure I’d be happy to drink there were it not for your propensity to threaten to knock people’s blocks off every time they disagreed with you, a tendency you seem willing to demonstrate time and time again.
Get a grip.
WBB, I appreciate your concern about the need for local consultation and the role of people such as Greg Phillips.
My view is that consultation is needed at all levels. Brough seems to have only consulted Sue Gordon of the National Indigenous Council amongst Aborigines. Brough has had a range of interactions since he took over the portfolio, but going on what he says, seems to have been very impressed by the experience of one community where they put in coppers and one woman consequently came forward. As a result a group of 13 men was identified who were having excess influence in the community and using threats and power to gain access to young people for sex. He has stated that organised paedophile rings exist in 45 communities. There may be some issues of definition, but Wild/Anderson found no evidence of any.
Sue Gordon’s role has been challenged by Larissa Behrendt, and particularly her willingness to overlook Brough’s obsession with taking over Aboriginal land. On ‘Australia Talks’ the other night he said that they’d had to take over half of the Northern Territory.
Phillips is not speaking on his own behalf, but was one of nearly a hundred peak organisations which met and sent a letter to Brough about their concerns. One of their central concerns was the land issue which Brough has not explained properly, or at all, and which is justifiably a source of suspicion and mistrust.
Phillips himself was stressing the need for communities themselves to reset social norms and rebuild from within, calling on outside services for help as required.
There’s the rub, I think. Wild/Anderson talk about the breakdown of social norms, in some communities to the extent that incest, which violates the Aboriginal ’skin system’ and would typically be punished by death, happens and seemingly can’t be stopped.
Putting police in communities won’t stop it either. Police may do something here and there to suppress overt violence and other adverse patterns of destructive behaviour. But often it will just push them further underground.
The real difficulty, it seems to me, is that some communities, given the power relations within, are unable to rebuild viable social norms.
Which leads me to think that a circuit breaker from outside is in order. It does seem that Brough is going to send in people for community consultations before sending in the cops. But the rhetoric has been wrong, as has the approach of applying standard solutions which seem very punitive and are likely to produce great resentment. Wild/Anderson say the every case of child abuse is different. The issue is so sensitive that reporting doesn’t even happen to people who are non-threatening and culturally sensitive.
So a differentiated approach at community level and within communities seems essential.
My daughter, who works with adult survivors of sexual abuse, tells me that anyone can be a social worker and this is a problem. There is a growing opinion amongst the profession that dealing with sexual abuse is a highly specialised field, and personal maturity is an essential prerequisite.
Which brings me back to Fred Chaney’s notion that this thing will stand or fall on the quality of the personnel they put in the front line. Wild/Anderson emphasise emphasise building the necessary skills and structures over time.
Brough’s big bang approach has given the issue the necessary profile to loosen the treasury purse strings to a degree that might be somewhere near what’s required for the first time in our history. But the break-neck pace is incompatible with quality and the need to release and build positive power within the communities.
Sadly, my view is that it’s going to fail, but it will take time to become obvious. But look, I’m not close enough to know really, so don’t take any notice of me.
Sorry for a post-length response. I had been thinking of a post on the ultimate powerless of external power to effect social change within communities, but I don’t have time.
Absolutely true and this is complicated further by the language barrier and trust issues between white workers and their potential clients. The best I can see coming from this approach is a 6 month lull where abuse is pushed underground. If there are a lot (it will take a massive funding increase) of programmes put in place to deal with offenders and victims, and to address all of the social factors such as substance and alcohol abuse then there will be actual change.
Leigh Sales on Lateline perpetuated the myth that “nothing else has worked”. Programmes already exist, with proven results, developed by and for indigenous people- they simply have not been funded and rolled out to all communities.
Like you say Brian, the precipitate fed govt action has brought the whole issue into focus and public debate.
Howard was getting mangled in the WorkChoices grinder and was desperate for a rabbit out of a hat -he needed an issue that he could initiate that would see him as a protagonist on the pre-election stage.
I think with the NT intervention he got it. Certainly, this is now getting plenty of traction with plenty of lather in the meeja, especially of the basketweaving kind.
But this is a Good Thing. It has raised the profile of this ongoing abomination of a slow genocide to what ad people call top-of-mind awareness. For a time, anyway.
The worst thing that will happen is that Johnny Howard’s short attention span will focus on soemething else and the media caravan will move on.
I do not believe Howard about it all being a long-term policy. That is because he himself knows he will not be around long-term to see it through.
The timing of the report militates against the Howard agenda of a wedge in time for the election. While he had to move in concert with the release of the report it was too early, and he shot his bolt, so to speak. This issue will work itself out and be spent to be useful for him.
However, if it all pearshaped then the rabbit out of the hat will become the Killer Rabbit of Caerbannog.
And that is not unlikely.
In the end, out there on the street where Steve at the Pub lives, it does not matter that much anyway. It never has before, why should it now?
CRIMES ACT 1914 – SECT 23YUF
Application of this Division
(1) This Division applies in relation to the following incidents:
(a) the bombings that occurred in Bali, Indonesia on 12 October 2002 (local time);
(b) any incident that the Minister determines, in writing, to be an incident in relation to which this Division applies.
(2) Before making a determination under paragraph (1)(b), the Minister must be satisfied that:
(a) if the determination would relate to an incident occurring wholly outside Australia and Norfolk Island–one or more Australian citizens or Australian residents have died in or as a result of the incident; and
(b) it is appropriate in the circumstances for this Division to apply in relation to the incident.
(2A) The Minister must not make a determination under paragraph (1)(b) relating to an incident occurring wholly within Australia or Norfolk Island unless:
(a) the Minister suspects on reasonable grounds that the incident involves the commission of:
(i) an offence against a law of the Commonwealth; or
(ii) a State offence that has a federal aspect; or
(iii) an offence against a law of a Territory; or
(b) the Minister suspects on reasonable grounds that victims of the incident are persons of a kind with respect to whom the Commonwealth Parliament has power to make laws; or
(c) the Minister is satisfied that the incident is or has created a national emergency.
_____________________________________
The term “national emergency” has been used by Brough and Howard in relation to their intervention in NT. This is a precise term. Yet there has been little discussion of its legal standing. Indeed, as far as I can tell neither Brough nor Howard have explained what they mean by it.
The above section of the Cwth Crimes Act appears to be the only relevant use of the term in Cwth legislation.
As should be clear, this section serves as a fairly faithful template for what Brough has indeed done in relation to the NT exercise.
I have highlighted the relevant clause. It is clear from that clause that the minister cannot declare a “national emergency” unless he suspects “on reasonable grounds” that there has been an offence against the law of the Territory.
There are at least three observations that can be made:
1. It would appear that the Federal government would have difficulty doing the same thing in a state.
2. So far as I know, the minister has not revealed the particular incident or incidents that constitute an offence.
3. The declaration of a national emergency necessarily entails the expectation of criminal prosecution and punishment.
So who does Brough expect to prosecute and to punish? And why hasn’t he told us?
I’m sure there is an explanation Katz and I sure as hell would love to hear what it is.
Yes Steve,
And I believe it may not be impossible that an injunction would halt the mobilisation until Brough did the following:
It is not unlikely that someone with legal resources may care to require Brough to act legally.
Interesting to note that Police are already acting in NT communities in charging sex offenders, and this is before the Troops have arrived.
He has been charged with assaulting a person indecently, attempting sexual intercourse with a child under 16 years, attempting to procure a child under 16 years and indecently assaulting a child under 16 years.
Earlier this week, three teenagers from Maningrida were committed to stand trial over the alleged rape of a 12-year-old boy over five months at the community.
Brian, I share your view to the extent that all problems will not be solved in the life of the current government. However I see it is a potentially fruitful circuit-breaker.
Howard has put his hand up to own this problem. That is a precedent we haven’t seen before. If the expectations arising from such can be firmly nailed to someone’s hide in Canberra and the other capitals then we may see some improvements.
Brough has been freely promising that money is no issue. Only Minchin so far has been left with furrowed brow. Australia may at last own up to its responsibilities here.
If it is true, as you fear, that governments are impotent in cases such as these then it’s still worth a shot – in case you’re wrong. We are only spending Minchin’s money.
I do not believe that the public servants and volunteers (black and white) who will be on the ground – who will be the ablest and best motivated of their cohorts will do harm. They may do good. (And all these experts who claim to have been marginalised by Brough, will very soon find themselves more than welcome to participate, I’m sure.)