Mr GILES - 2009-06-10
On 20 May, you announced a threadbare policy to create 20 service towns for Aboriginal Territorians living in remote areas. The only specified funding identified for the creation of these 20 remote towns is $160m over five years. That equates to $1.6m per year per town. To put that into context, the federal government is intending to spend $125m …
Dr BURNS: A point of order, Madam Speaker! This is an extraordinarily long question.
Madam SPEAKER: Resume your seat. Come to the point fairly quickly, member for Greatorex.
Mr GILES: To put that into context, the federal government is intending to spend $125m alone on normalising Alice Springs town camps. What will be the real cost of developing 20 growth towns, and when will the first township be proclaimed?
ANSWER
Madam Speaker, I welcome the question from the member for Braitling. Obviously, he was not listening in Question Time yesterday. He never listens in this House.
The total amount of funding that will be committed through the Commonwealth government to the Territory government for the reform of Indigenous communities in the remote parts of the Northern Territory over the next three financial years is $1.5bn. I repeat: $1.5bn. Compare that to the last election campaign in the Northern Territory where, in all of the CLP policies that were released, there was not one single dollar for remote communities – not one dollar, not one cent.
Our commitments are there. Through the Northern Territory Closing the Gap initiatives, over the next three years, there is an additional $213m. Our contribution to SIHIP is $100m. We are putting $100m into the housing program in the bush. When the CLP was in government, they did not build one house - not one house - with Northern Territory government money in 27 years.
Through the national partnership arrangement on the service delivery, and the emergency response, a commitment of $209m; Indigenous health, an additional $204m; low socioeconomic status schools, $43m; Indigenous early childhood development, $38m; this is partnership funding between the Territory government and the Commonwealth government under the new COAG agreement. That is what the member for Braitling does not understand. As I said yesterday, this is about a quality agenda providing quality services, in quality towns, creating economic opportunities to support the regions around those towns. There is $1.5bn committed to these projects over the next three years.
Dr BURNS: A point of order, Madam Speaker! This is an extraordinarily long question.
Madam SPEAKER: Resume your seat. Come to the point fairly quickly, member for Greatorex.
Mr GILES: To put that into context, the federal government is intending to spend $125m alone on normalising Alice Springs town camps. What will be the real cost of developing 20 growth towns, and when will the first township be proclaimed?
ANSWER
Madam Speaker, I welcome the question from the member for Braitling. Obviously, he was not listening in Question Time yesterday. He never listens in this House.
The total amount of funding that will be committed through the Commonwealth government to the Territory government for the reform of Indigenous communities in the remote parts of the Northern Territory over the next three financial years is $1.5bn. I repeat: $1.5bn. Compare that to the last election campaign in the Northern Territory where, in all of the CLP policies that were released, there was not one single dollar for remote communities – not one dollar, not one cent.
Our commitments are there. Through the Northern Territory Closing the Gap initiatives, over the next three years, there is an additional $213m. Our contribution to SIHIP is $100m. We are putting $100m into the housing program in the bush. When the CLP was in government, they did not build one house - not one house - with Northern Territory government money in 27 years.
Through the national partnership arrangement on the service delivery, and the emergency response, a commitment of $209m; Indigenous health, an additional $204m; low socioeconomic status schools, $43m; Indigenous early childhood development, $38m; this is partnership funding between the Territory government and the Commonwealth government under the new COAG agreement. That is what the member for Braitling does not understand. As I said yesterday, this is about a quality agenda providing quality services, in quality towns, creating economic opportunities to support the regions around those towns. There is $1.5bn committed to these projects over the next three years.
Last updated: 09 Aug 2016