2001-10-24
Madam Speaker Braham took the Chair at 10 am.
VISITORS
Madam SPEAKER: Honourable members, I advise of the presence in the gallery of students from Casuarina Senior College accompanied by Carolyn Wines; the Northern Territory University literacy and numeracy adult students accompanied by Lorraine Sushames; the Northern Territory University bridging course students accompanied by Catherine Brewster; and the Northern Territory University Faculty of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander students accompanied by Scott Cooper. On behalf of honourable members I extend a warm welcome to all our visitors.
Members: Hear, hear!
Ms MARTIN (Chief Minister): Madam Speaker, I want today to update the House on how this government is moving quickly to implement yet another important component of our economic development strategy for the Territory. That is, the establishment of an Office of Territory Development, and the appointment of Bob Collins as Investment Ambassador.
The Office of Territory Development will be a key ingredient in this government’s strategic development of the Territory economy. As such, it will form a cornerstone of Labor’s objectives to improve job creation and job security in the Territory. Since forming government, we have moved quickly to establish the appropriate structures and objectives of the office so that it can work effectively within the existing frameworks of government. I am pleased to advise today that I can provide some further detail about how this will be achieved.
We envisage the Office of Territory Development playing three key roles in driving economic development in the Territory:
The Territory is unique in its state of development and the promise that it offers is its natural advantages. Unlike southern jurisdictions the Territory does not have a highly developed or diverse economic base. We are playing catch up. The advantage of this is that we are in a position to build an industry base that plays to our strengths and is suited to modern economic conditions. What we do have are the ingredients that will drive the rapid development of our economy - a vibrant, diverse and energetic population, a strong supply of natural resources relevant to the modern world, and a strategic location that places us as the intermediary between Asia and the rest of Australia.
What is needed in the current climate is for government to be proactive about securing growth. Government must set an overall direction for economic development. We must chase investment capital that accords with that direction and, in partnership with the private sector, we must facilitate projects that are fundamental to our development where government involvement is required to make them happen. The office will comprise a proactive group who will represent a concentration of scarce resources in government with complementary expertise to attract investment and facilitate projects with a public/private partnership approach. Their skills will be well complemented by Bob Collins, who I have already announced will be the Territory’s Investment Ambassador.
I would now like to briefly discuss how the office will approach each of these functions. First, the strategic direction. At its most fundamental, the key role for the office will be to develop a high level strategic direction for the development of the Territory economy. This work will, of its nature, require close collaboration with Territory industry. Initiatives such as the Economic Development Summit are evidence of this government’s desire to work collaboratively with the business community. It will also require close collaboration with existing agencies within government because there is a wealth of knowledge and experience within the ranks of our public service which needs to be recognised and utilised. The guiding principles of any strategic framework for the Territory economy must encompass two things: it must seek to diversify and grow our economic base so that we are less vulnerable to external shocks such as the recent crisis in the domestic and international aviation industries, and it must seek to provide overall growth in jobs and in job security.
The second aspect of the office is investment attraction. A key function of the office will be the role of investment attraction. This is a multi-faceted task. It will involve undertaking extensive research and analysis to identify particular industry sectors that fit within the overall strategic framework. It will involve creating the environment to allow the private sector to pursue opportunities within the Territory. It will involve attracting particular industry participants in strategic industries to locate within the Territory.
Our strategic framework will identify industries that are a close fit with our natural advantages. If these industries are to be sustainable in the long term, then it makes more sense to target our endeavours to make the Territory an attractive place to invest in the long term. Accordingly, the office will have to be innovative in how it attracts industry to the Territory. This could include providing infrastructure in lieu of financial support, or it could involve providing marketing assistance or accessing Commonwealth government investment attraction funds through Invest Australia. The role of the Investment Ambassador, Bob Collins, in this function will be crucial to the success of the office. With the resources of the office at his disposal he will utilise his vast experience and contacts within and outside the Territory, to act as a conduit between industry and government.
The third major area of activity of the office will be to facilitate specific major projects that are critical to the future growth of the Territory’s economic base. These projects will, by their nature, have benefits that are wider than the strict financial returns to the private investors. Accordingly, many may require a partnership between government and the private sector to allow appropriate risk sharing and to ensure that the wider government objectives are being realised.
Through the railway project the government has developed an expertise in delivering projects in partnership with the private sector. It is envisaged that the office will become a repository of that knowledge so that it can be utilised in future projects that are important to the overall strategic framework and that require close collaboration with the private sector. There are many opportunities for government where this collaborative approach could be used immediately to our benefit. These include:
These are some of the specific projects that would be suitable for the Office of Territory Development to have carriage of.
Having outlined the key functions of the office, I finally want to touch on the structure of the office. The office itself will be located within my department to ensure that it receives the central focus necessary. The Investment Ambassador will report personally to me. He will be an incredible asset to government to drive the overall strategic framework and to pursue specific investment attraction opportunities. Bob Collins has already commenced work and, as you know, he is also the Co-Chair of the forthcoming Economic Development Summit.
My government is genuinely excited about the focus and vision that the new Office of Territory Development will help foster for Territory business, and the opportunities for economic and employment growth that will flow from the projects that it sponsors. I look forward to providing further updates to the House on this matter in the future.
Ms MARTIN (Young Territorians): Madam Speaker, I am pleased to inform the House that 15 Territory organisations have been funded a total of $25 000 this week to conduct activities for young people during the holiday period of December and January.
Recipients of funding from the Office of Youth Affairs Youth Grants Program will conduct a range of activities including: an open air movie night; a youth expo; a night showcasing local bands; leadership development activities; holiday programs; and arts and multicultural events. The quality of the applications for funding was outstanding and reflects the initiative and energy of the Territory’s youth organisations.
The Youth Grants Program has three categories in which organisations can apply for funding – drug and alcohol-free entertainment; youth development and leadership programs; and National Youth Week events, programs or activities. Two types of grants are available under each category. The first is mini-youth grants for funding up to $500, and young people can be directly funded through this grant. The second is major youth grants for funding from $501 to $4000, and young people or organisations applying for this grant must be incorporated or have a sponsoring body that is incorporated. Twenty-nine applications were received for the existing round from Alice Springs, Angurugu, Daguragu, Darwin, Elliott, Katherine, Nhulunbuy and Palmerston, with 15 approved. The selection process is designed to ensure an equitable spread of funding right across the Territory. I would like to tell the House what projects have been funded.
In Alice Springs, the Department of Promotions will host various local bands in the town to showcase their talent and give youth an opportunity to enjoy live music. Alice Springs Youth Centre will hold an open-air movie night with basketball and volleyball games, as well as a barbecue, prior to the movie screening. The Kaltukatjara Community Council will hold a Youth Day at Docker River. Activities will include traditional dancing with the elders, a barbecue, Carols by Candlelight and a Blue Light Disco. The Arltarlpitta community will provide recreational activities for young people. The activities will provide opportunities for elders to pass on cultural and artistic skills. Workshops will include jewellery making, clap stick and boomerang making, and canvas painting. The Angurugu Community Government Council will hold a workshop for young women focusing on the development of communication and interpersonal skills, and healthy and active lifestyles.
The Indian Cultural Society will hold a Youth Development and Leadership Workshop focusing on drug and alcohol issues and fostering leadership skills. The Multicultural Society of the Northern Territory will hold a Youth Expo featuring guest speakers, stalls, competitions, fashion parades and displays. Anglicare Top End will hold a series of workshops for newly-arrived young refugees to help them participate in the local community and form support networks. Nightcliff and Palmerston Lions Clubs will organise a leadership training course for the clubs’ Leos. There is sponsorship for Sid Vemuri to attend The Hague International Model United Nations Conference. Sid will represent the Territory in debating resolutions on contemporary international issues.
CREATE Foundation will hold a workshop to strengthen relationships between young people in care and their caseworkers. This activity will also provide a forum to discuss and experience creative approaches to problem solving and overcoming challenges. There is sponsorship for Damien Moriarty who will travel on the Ship for World Youth, a program involving youth from around the world that fosters an understanding between nations.
Elliott District Government Council will provide a drug and alcohol-free disco night for the youth of Elliott. Arafura Dance Association will provide an opportunity for the youth of Nhulunbuy to express themselves through dance, including funky jazz, over the school holidays – and I am sure the local member will join in. The YMCA Palmerston will conduct the Y-Dream 2001 Holiday Program featuring arts and crafts, live music, discos and competition.
My government will continue to support the young people of the Territory, and I certainly commend our youth organisations for their efforts.
Dr TOYNE (Central Australia): Madam Speaker, the disposal of treated effluent in Alice Springs is a long-standing problem, which is currently being addressed by my colleague, the Minister for Essential Services, as a high priority. For many years, the previous government permitted treated effluent to periodically overflow into the Ilparpa claypan and effectively created a swamp. The primary objective for future management of treated effluent in Alice Springs is, first and foremost, to prevent overflows into what is now the Ilparpa Swamp.
Discharge into the Ilparpa Swamp must cease in order to address the health and environmental consequences that are known to be associated with the continuation of that overflow. There is some media speculation that the government’s preferred option to prevent such overflows is to extend the current evaporation ponds at the Alice Springs waste water treatment facility. The options for future development of effluent and potential uses from recycled water in Alice Springs have not, at this stage, been considered by this government. The government’s baseline is that overflows to the Ilparpa Swamp will not be permitted under any future management arrangement.
As a benchmark, the Power and Water Authority Board currently considers that the least cost option to address the requirements is through an extension of the evaporation pondage system, possibly supplemented by further irrigation of trees in the Ilparpa area. However, the board will continue to examine alternative schemes, such as the use of treated effluent through supply to horticultural and other irrigation uses.
No decision has been made by the Power and Water Authority Board as to its final preferred option. Further studies on other options are underway in conjunction with other agencies such as the Department of Lands, Planning and Environment and the Department of Primary Industry and Fisheries. None of these options have been presented to government, nor have they been considered by government at this stage. Depending on the marketing analysis of the potential to supply the recycled water to commercial and other uses, some of the options for reuse may require government to consider provision of a community service obligation payment to the Power and Water Authority.
I reiterate the government’s policy, which is that overflows to the Ilparpa Swamp must cease. The government is open to consideration of all options to address this objective, including the full range of options to use recycled water in irrigation and other uses. The views of the community will continue to be listened to in this regard. These options will come forward to government in the near future for consideration. The government is committed to addressing the problem, along with many others left neglected by its predecessor.
Mr AH KIT (Transport and Infrastructure Development): Madam Speaker, driver fatigue is an important safety issue for the road transport industry worldwide. In 1997, the Australian Transport Minister’s Council agreed that national truck and bus driving hour regulations, that mandated the use of driver log books, were inappropriate for the Northern Territory and Western Australia. In agreeing to this exemption, ministers recognised the different operating environment in remote areas, and accepted that the heavy vehicle transport industry in the Northern Territory had, and still has, a good safety record. While our record to date has been good, the risks of a major accident occurring cannot be underestimated and therefore needs to be addressed. The Northern Territory code of practice for fatigue management takes an alternative approach to regulated hours, where prescriptive hours and log books are used.
Following extensive consultation, both the Northern Territory and Western Australian governments have developed codes of practice for fatigue management under occupational health and safety legislation. This makes the issue a joint responsibility - an employer and employee responsibility. The Northern Territory Road Transport Fatigue Management Code of Practice was gazetted under the Northern Territory Work Health Act in September 1998. Implementation of the code of practice is voluntary. However, the requirement for operators to practically demonstrate that they have put in place systems that meet the safety outcomes required under the Work Health Act is mandatory.
The code was developed jointly by the Department of Transport and Works, the Department of Industries and Business, and the Australian Trucking Association Northern Territory. The code of practice provides operators with a set of key principles for the management of driver fatigue in the workplace. The principles have been developed on the basis of the practical experience of Northern Territory operators.
In October last year, operators were surveyed to assess the extent of industry implementation of the code. Although awareness of the need to manage driver fatigue was very high, operators indicated that they needed assistance with the development of fatigue management systems in their workplaces. The Department of Transport and Works, together with the Department of Industries and Business, Work Health and the Australian Trucking Association NT have worked collaboratively to develop the package of materials that I am releasing today. It is pleasing to note that sectors of the tourism industry have also participated in the development of this package of resources that will assist operators to meet their obligations under the code. The resources have been trialed and finetuned through use by a number of operators in the heavy vehicle and tourism sectors of the road transport industry.
I know industry is looking forward to the release of the package. This will allow them to incorporate it into their business systems, and assist in the provision of a safe working environment for their staff. The package provides the capacity for businesses to apply the principles in a manner that will best suit their individual needs. In addition to a mail-out to all operators, the package will be made available on the Department of Transport and Works’ Internet site. This will allow operators to download and adapt specific systems to suit their own requirements. Driver fatigue management has also been included in the accreditation process for tourist operators under the Northern Territory tourism accreditation program. Tourist operators are keen to receive assistance that will enable them to secure the appropriate accreditation.
I take this opportunity to congratulate all those involved in the development of this innovative package: members of the Australian Trucking Association NT, for your active and collaborative involvement; the dedicated staff of the Work Health Authority of the Department of Industries and Business; and the highly professional staff of the Transport Division of the Department of Transport and Works. It is great to see such cooperative efforts resulting in services that are both needed and wanted by industry. I table this copy of the driver fatigue management materials for the information of members.
Mr HENDERSON (Industries and Business): Madam Speaker, I rise to report to the House the current status of the Brunei, Indonesia, Malaysia, Philippines - East Asian Growth Area, otherwise known as BIMP-EAGA, and to update the House on opportunities for Territory business through this forum.
Firstly, some background for honourable members. BIMP-EAGA was first proposed by Philippines President, Fidel Ramos, at an ASEAN leaders meeting in Brunei in October 1992. The group was formed by agreement of involved ASEAN ministers and senior officials meeting in Davao City, Mindanao, Philippines in March 1994. The central goal of BIMP-EAGA is to increase trade, investment and tourism within the participating areas through transport cooperation. The principle for BIMP-EAGA is that the private sector takes a leading role in developing the economic activities on a joint venture basis whilst government acts as facilitators. The objectives are to intensify and strengthen regional cooperation to: facilitate the freer movement of people, goods and services in order to stimulate the subregional economy by rapidly expanding its market and resource base; rationalise the developments of vital infrastructure in the subregion to address the short and medium term infrastructure gaps; and to coordinate the management of ecosystems and common resources to ensure sustainable development.
Initially BIMP-EAGA included Brunei; Indonesia - west and east Kalimantan, north Sulawesi; Malaysia - Sabah, Sarawak and Labaun; and the Philippines - Mindanao and Palawan. Additional east Indonesian areas were later added - central and south Kalamantan, central, south and south-east Sulawesi, Maluku Islands and Irian Jaya.
BIMP-EAGA currently covers 1 600 000 km , around 46 000 000 people, and a GDP of more than $US32bn. The initial priorities for BIMP-EAGA coorporation were: expanding air linkages; expanding sea transportation and shipping services; expanding fisheries cooperation; and joint tourism developments. Nine other areas of cooperation were identified and added including: construction; agri-industry; capital formation and financial services; forestry; telecommunications; energy; people mobility; human resource development; and environment protection and management.
The Northern Territory was recognised as an interested party from the outset. The Northern Territory has been involved in ministerials, senior officials, working group and other meetings. After some slow progress over the past few years during the Asian economic crisis and due to other regional factors BIMP-EAGA has now been revitalised. Officers of the Department of Asian Relations and Trade attended the recent meeting in Brunei and provided positive feedback as to the continuation of BIMP-EAGA, and the group’s support for the Northern Territory’s continued participation as an observer at these meetings. The BIMP-EAGA area provides opportunities for Territory business which the government is keen to pursue. The region has significant and growing industrial resources, opportunities exist in downstream activities related to the above areas, or in joint development and marketing of resources. Prospective sectors with possibilities for Northern Territory based businesses to win work include: mining, oil and gas projects and support services; tourism projects; agriculture and agribusiness; defence support; transport services; infrastructure and construction expertise; communications equipment and services; education and health services; professional services; and governments administration.
Whilst a number of impediments remain to fully exploit the potential of the region, areas where the Northern Territory has already achieved success include transport, communications, agribusiness and service provision. The Northern Territory will continue to participate with BIMP-EAGA to maximise the opportunities the grouping provides for mutually beneficial links for trade, economic development and job creation. The continuing benefits to the Territory from participation include: stronger links with participating governments and better access to wider trade and investment opportunities; early identification and access to two-way trade and investment opportunities; better ability to convert these opportunities; and a greater understanding of regional and market trends affecting existing Northern Territory trade and investment; opportunities to promote the Northern Territory especially rail, port, two-way trade flows, oil and gas, tourism, agriculture and other investment opportunities.
This government is continuing to continue to support this key regional grouping and I am happy to report further progress back to the House as we move forward.
Mr BURKE: A point of order, Madam Speaker! A point of clarification in terms of these ministerial statements. I understand that there is no opportunity for the opposition to debate each minister’s as they produce their statement. I wonder if a motion is about to be put to these statements - is there any opportunity for the opposition to comment on any of the statements that have been made? I give the example of the last statement from the Minister for Resource Development where he has made a number of comments with regards to the future potential of BIMP-EAGA. Certainly, I have a point of view on that issue. I certainly have some concerns with the positive outlook he puts on BIMP-EAGA. There was certainly continuing opposition from major countries of not only, in particular …
Mr STIRLING: A point of order, Madam Speaker! I think the Leader of the Opposition has made his point. He is now debating the report whether he likes it or not …
Madam SPEAKER: The Leader of the Opposition has the floor.
Mr BURKE: … the continued involvement of the Northern Territory.
Madam SPEAKER: Before you continue on with your statement about that report, I am advised that the only way you could possibly do it, is to seek leave to move that the statement be noted, and then in that debate you could do it. I think it might be appropriate if the Leader of the Oppostion and the Leader of Government Business get together and discuss this particular point that has been raised a number of times about debate in the House, and the opportunity to respond, rather than have the debate at the moment, that would obviously be defeated. I just believe it needs to be clarified.
Mr BURKE: Madam Speaker, if I could - just for a moment - I am not trying to cause a disagreement. I am simply saying that perhaps the minister, in this sort of instance, could give an undertaking to the House that he will bring forward these statements with a full ministerial statement in the near future. There are opportunities for comment and debate – constructive - and this forum gives not only no opportunity for the opposition to comment, but certainly no indication that the House will ever have an opportunity to debate these types of initiatives in any shape or form.
Mr STIRLING: Madam Speaker, in response to the point of order, I am happy to meet with the Leader of the Opposition on these matters. There are, of course, opportunities for the opposition to respond to these either by bringing them up at Question Time at 2 o’clock, by Matter of Public Importance …
Mr Burke: What, in adjournment?
Mr STIRLING: Or by adjournment. There are those options available and, of course, on the General Business day, the Leader of the Opposition as a minister in this House, has the floor for half an hour without response from the government under the sessional orders as they currently stand. I am happy to meet with the Leader of the Opposition and work through these issues. His other option, of course, is to take suggestions through standing orders.
Madam SPEAKER: I believe that you and the Leader of the Opposition should get together and come to some resolution on this matter because it has been a question that has been raised a number of times throughout these sittings.
Reports noted pursuant to Sessional Order.
Ms MARTIN (Chief Minister): Madam Speaker, I move that so much of Standing orders be suspended as would prevent bills entitled Government Owned Corporations Bill 2001 (Serial 21) and Power and Water Authority Amendment Bill 2001 (Serial 22), (a) being presented and read a first time together and one motion being put in regard to respectively, the second readings, the committee’s report stage and the third readings of the bill together; and (b) consideration of the bills separately in the Committee of the Whole.
Motion agreed to.
Bills presented and read a first time.
Ms MARTIN (Chief Minister): Madam Speaker, I move that the bills be now read a second time.
These bills are a major and essential step in repairing the Territory’s finances. Professor Percy Allan’s recent report on the Territory’s financial position recommended that government trading enterprises be corporatised with a view to lifting their efficiency and ability to contribute to the budget. Professor Allan also recommended that training enterprises be moved off budget and be made subject to a Government Owned Corporations Act as the appropriate performance and accountability framework for them. With the Government Owned Corporations Bill the government is addressing these recommendations.
The bill will put in place a shareholder model of corporate governance to apply to key Territory businesses. This involves firstly, replicating as far as possible the shareholder disciplines that apply to private sector businesses - for example, a board of directors that exercises corporate control and which reports to shareholders; and secondly, changing the accountability arrangements from those that are appropriate for budget-dependent agencies to those suited to off-budget government-owned corporations.
The Power and Water Authority, the Territory’s largest trading enterprise, will be the first government-owned corporation. It will come under the framework this financial year as soon as all prerequisite steps are completed. This change of status will assist PAWA in best responding to the regulatory frameworks now applying to the electricity, water and sewerage industries, and to competition in the electricity market.
The government-owned corporations legislation framework has several key elements:
This replaces the accountability provisions that currently apply to budget-dependent agencies.
The central objective of the Government Owned Corporations Bill is to provide a basis for improved performance by government-owned businesses under continuing public ownership and for greater sustainable financial returns to the Territory on its investment in those businesses. Consistent with this, the objectives of government-owned corporations will be to perform at least efficiently as any comparable businesses and to maximise the sustainable return to the Territory on its investment. The government-owned corporations framework provides for distinct and separate responsibilities for the various parties including the shareholding minister, the portfolio minister, the commercial board of directors and the chief executive officer.
The shareholding minister will have a role similar to that of a large investor in a private corporation and will focus on receiving maximum sustainable returns from the business. As the shareholder, the shareholding minister’s responsibilities will include recommending appointment of directors to the commercial board and, in conjunction with the board, the chief executive officer. Other key responsibilities will be to approve the Statement of Corporate Intent and major investments, including the establishment of any subsidiaries.
The shareholding minister will also have a power to direct the government-owned corporation. This will apply in the event of agreement not being reached with the board on, for example, the threshold for ministerial approval of capital works and financial investments. Given the focus on financial issues, the role of shareholding minister is most appropriately undertaken by the Treasurer.
The portfolio minister, in contrast, will continue to administer the government-owned corporation’s own legislation. The portfolio minister will be responsible, in consultation with the shareholding minister, for community service obligations. The portfolio minister will also remain responsible for relevant industry-wide policy issues. Under the existing framework, the chief executive officer is accountable for the performance of government businesses. In contrast, under the new framework board accountability will replace chief executive officer accountability in line with private sector arrangements, and reflecting the commercial nature of the corporation.
The board of a government-owned corporation is to be accountable to the shareholding minister for the financial and business performance of the corporation. The board of a government-owned corporation will also explicitly be a decision-making body rather than an advisory one. The administrator will appoint directors, with the shareholding minister recommending the appointments, with due regard to the expertise necessary for the corporation to achieve its objectives. The shareholding minister will also select one of the directors to be chair of the board. Under the government-owned corporations framework, directors’ duties will be consistent with Corporations Act requirements. However, directors will have some additional responsibilities due to the public ownership of government-owned corporations. These additional responsibilities include maintaining relationships with both ministers and keeping the ministers informed of material events.
Unlike general agencies, government-owned corporations will not be accountable through the existing budget approval and parliamentary scrutiny process. The legislation, nevertheless, ensures that government-owned corporations will be fully accountable for their performance. The bill provides for an annually negotiated performance agreement between the shareholding minister and the board of the government-owned corporation. Covering a three-year period, the Statement of Corporate Intent will set out what the shareholder may expect in terms of performance, particularly financial performance; any material risks faced by the corporation; and the corporation’s business strategies to achieve the financial targets and minimise the risks. It will also include the government-owned corporations capital investment program.
The Government Owned Corporations Board will provide an annual report against the objectives and financial targets of the statement of corporate intent to the shareholding minister and the portfolio minister. Reports will include commentary on specific factors affecting performance, risks and strategic and other issues. The shareholding minister will table a statement of corporate intent in parliament and also the report on performance. This report may be included in the corporation’s annual report. The statement of corporate intent framework will provide a robust mechanism for monitoring the performance of the government-owned corporation and ensuring the board is accountable for the corporation’s performance. The framework will encourage improved performance.
Consistent with existing arrangements applying to government business divisions the Auditor-General will audit the financial statements of government-owned corporations. The Audit Act will apply to government-owned corporations just as it does to agencies, but with audit reports to be provided to the board rather than to the accountable officer before being sent to the shareholding minister. The shareholding minister may also request the Auditor-General or, alternatively, another auditor to undertake special audits. Special audits may relate to any aspect of the government-owned corporations accounts, performance or systems.
Turning to financial arrangements, the shareholding minister will approve capital works and financial investments above a threshold level. The threshold is to be agreed by the board and the shareholding minister or, alternatively, established by the shareholding minister’s direction. As statutory corporations, government-owned corporations will undertake their own banking arrangements separate from the public account. Under the bill the Treasurer’s guarantee will not apply to the borrowings and other liabilities of government-owned corporations. This is to ensure a level playing field with the private sector.
A guarantee would only be available in special circumstances, for example, in cases where a government-owned corporation is required to undertake an activity outside its normal functions. Similarly, government-owned corporations will not have Crown immunity protection from the operation of legislation of the Territory or the Commonwealth. However, transitional provisions will preserve Crown immunity in respect of matters that arose before the business became a government-owned corporation. At this stage, government-owned corporations will continue to borrow and invest with the Northern Territory Treasury Corporation. They will continue to pay a margin on top of the Territory’s borrowing rate, in recognition of the fact that the Territory’s cost of borrowing is lower than a comparable private corporation in place.
To ensure they are not unfairly advantaged by public ownership, government-owned corporations may also be liable for a competitive neutrality fee if, and when, they are approved to borrow externally. Consistent with existing arrangements applying to government business divisions the bill provides for government-owned corporations to make annual dividend payments from after-tax profits. The bill also provides for government-owned corporations and their subsidiaries to make income tax equivalent payments.
Since 1 July 2001, PAWA has been subject to the national tax equivalents regime for income tax administered on behalf of the states and territories by the Australian Taxation Office. The Territory’s tax equivalents regime has also been extended to include local government rate equivalents payments, pending removal in due course of the exemption from rates that currently apply to the Power and Water Authority. Tax equivalents payments from government-owned corporations and dividends, together with the community service obligation funding provided to government-owned corporations, will continue to be included in the Territory’s budget.
The bill also requires government-owned corporations to have in place a procurement policy that is consistent with the principles of the government’s procurement arrangements. The portfolio minister would approve this policy. Government-owned corporations will also be able to tender for government-funded projects.
I turn to the Power and Water Authority Amendment Bill. The Power and Water Authority Act is to be amended to establish PAWA as a government-owned corporation. The amendments will also ensure that the Power and Water Authority Act is aligned appropriately with the provisions of the Government Owned Corporations Bill. PAWA’s establishment as a government-owned corporation will mean that its existing commercial board of directors will become directly accountable for performance rather than the Chief Executive Officer as currently.
Under the bill, PAWA’s functions will be altered by removing those provisions which could be interpreted as placing commercial objectives secondary to non-commercial ones. The bill also provides for PAWA’s existing board to remain in place but with the government owned corporations act rather than the Power and Water Authority Act to govern its operation and all future appointments. However, the terms of the current appointees to the board are unchanged. PAWA’s Chief Executive Officer will also continue on a similar basis.
PAWA’s existing employment arrangements involving an enterprise agreement under the Public Sector Employment and Management Act will remain in place. This framework should continue to provide PAWA with significant flexibility to achieve its commercial objectives. The Public Sector Employment and Management Act will therefore continue to apply with limited changes as set out in the bill. In particular, under the Public Sector Employment and Management Act, the Commissioner for Public Employment delegates his powers directly to the Chief Executive Officer of an agency. In order to ensure involvement of the board in employment matters, the Chief Executive Officer will be required to have regard to any recommendation to the board when exercising employment delegations. The Power and Water Authority Amendment Bill will come into affect as soon as PAWA’s Statement of Corporate Intent is completed and approved in the near future.
Madam Speaker, the government-owned corporations legislation provides an essential step in lifting the business performance of the Territory’s government-owned businesses and, in the first instance, that of the Power and Water Authority. This legislation presents a key part of the action needed to restore the Territory’s finances for the benefit of all Territorians.
Madam Speaker, I commend the bills to the Assembly.
Debate adjourned.
Dr TOYNE (Attorney-General): Madam Speaker, I move that so much of Standing orders be suspended as would prevent the Validation (Chief Magistrate) Bill 2001 (Serial 18) passing through all stages at this sittings.
Motion agreed to.
Bill presented and read a first time.
Dr TOYNE (Attorney-General): Madam Speaker, I move that the bill be now read a second time.
The purpose of this bill is to ensure that the administration of justice in the Territory is not adversely affected if the appointment of the Chief Magistrate made on 27 February 1998 is declared by the Federal Court to be invalid.
The bill validates in separate provisions the appointment of the Chief Magistrate made on 27 February 1998; the determination of remuneration and allowances and the terms of conditions made on 27 February 1998; and the actions of the Chief Magistrate. Any one or all provisions can be commenced upon the Federal Court decision being handed down. The bill will ensure that the actions of the Chief Magistrate since his appointment on 27 February 1998 are valid and recognised as enforceable at law.
Madam Speaker, I commend the bill to honourable members.
Debate adjourned.
Bill presented and read a first time.
Mr VATSKALIS (Local Government): Madam Speaker, I move that the bill be now read a second time.
This bill was previously introduced in the House on 5 July 2001 by the former Minister for Local Government. Upon the change of government in August this year the bill lapsed. The government has considered the lapsed bill and has agreed that it should be reintroduced.
The purpose of the bill is twofold. Firstly, to allow for new names of local government councils in the future. Secondly, for the avoidance of any doubt, to confirm retrospectively the title chosen by the Tiwi people for their new local government body when it was established on 12 July 2001.
Under the Local Government Act, the name of a council must be include the words ‘city’, ‘town’ or ‘shire’ or the words ‘community government’. Up until recently this description has satisfied communities in respect of all councils established under the act. It is true the title for organisations, and the image they present, can be significant not only to the members of that organisation but to others who relate to the organisation. The Tiwi people recognise that their new council is more than the sum of three community government councils that it has replaced. This three council were established at Nguiu, Pirlangimpi and Milikapiti. A new title was warranted for the new entity.
A second reason behind the change to titles is that some groups of communities, including the Tiwi, want to amalgamate their existing councils into a new style of local government that will have more of a regional vision and role. They will be more sustainable local governments with more encompassing responsibilities. The term ‘community government’ is not appropriate for such organisations and clearly was not appropriate for the Tiwi Islands. For these reasons, the Tiwi people chose a new title for their council, namely the Tiwi Islands Local Government, when it was established last July. That title is included in its constitution.
It is proposed in the bill now before the House to amend the Local Government Act so as to permit the Minister for Local Government to approve titles for new councils other than one of the four options that I have already mentioned. I have undertaken to consult with the Chief Minister about proposed new titles for councils prior to their approval under the act. To ensure that there can be no doubts about the Tiwi title, the effect of the bill will be retrospective to 1 July 2001, thus covering the establishment of the Tiwi Islands Local Government. No known detriment would be caused to any person or organisation by the retrospectivity.
Madam Speaker, I commend the bill to the Assembly.
Debate adjourned.
Bill presented and read a first time.
Mr STIRLING (Education, Employment and Training): Madam Speaker, I move that the bill be now read a second time.
The purpose of this bill is to amend Schedule 1 of the Public Sector Employment and Management Act to remove reference to the Office of the Commissioner for Public Employment from that schedule. This will enable the functions and staff of the Office of the Commissioner for Public Employment to be merged with the Northern Territory Employment and Training Authority to form the Department of Employment and Training.
Madam Speaker, you will be aware, one of the election promises of Northern Territory Labor was to establish a Department of Employment and Training to train the Territorian workforce to take advantage of the future jobs growth in the Northern Territory. This proposed amendment clears the way for the department to be properly integrated by allowing the functions of the Office of Commissioner for Public Employment to be vested in the department by an administrative arrangements order. I commend the bill to honourable members.
Debate adjourned.
Continued from 23 October 2001.
Madam SPEAKER: I remind members that this is the member for Barkly’s maiden speech and accordingly, I request honourable members to extend the appropriate courtesy to listen in silence.
Mr McADAM (Barkly): Madam Speaker, allow me to acknowledge the traditional owners of this piece of country upon which this Assembly is built, the Larrakia nation. May I also pay tribute to their resilience over time and their capacity to be innovative and creative in growing this great Territory. I would also like to take this opportunity to congratulate all members of the House on their recent success, and I look forward to healthy and robust debate in the interest of all sectors of the Territory.
I particularly wish to congratulate the member for Arafura, Marion Scrymgour, the member for Millner, Matthew Bonson, the member for Karama, Delia Lawrie, the member for Sanderson, Len Kiely, the member for Johnston, Chris Burns, and I wish them all the very best. Also, to the member for Nightcliff, Jane Aagaard, and the member for Casuarina, Kon Vatskalis, I extend my sincere congratulations on your appointment to your respective ministries and I wish you both well. As indeed I do, in respect to all ministers of the first Labor government in the Northern Territory. Your collective responsibilities will be enormous and your tasks, at times, will be both challenging and all-consuming. On this side of the House let it be noted that you have our full support.
Best wishes also to the member for Nelson, Gerry Wood. To my two colleagues opposite, the member for Araluen, Jodeen Carney, and the member for Goyder, Peter Maley, please accept my best wishes also.
It is both an honour and a privilege to represent the people of the Barkly in this Assembly, and I say to the people of the Barkly I will always try to represent your interests in a fair and equitable manner, and without fear or favour. The people in the Barkly are truly independent, courageous and determined people, with a great capacity to work together and get things done. We are always respectful of each other’s social, cultural and political differences, and we recognise that these qualities have served us well in the past, as they will well into the future.
Other than the construction of the railway, we have been doing it tough over the past few years, with the downturn of the regional economy and its associated impact on the local businesses and communities in the Barkly. However, I am confident that, with the principles of good governance and a commitment to redress the previous government’s lack of vision south of Katherine, the Barkly, over time, will once again become a dynamic, viable and cohesive community, underpinned by a sustainable economy based on partnerships with interest to all people in the Territory.
Madam Speaker, allow me a little indulgence to showcase the potential of the Barkly and its capacity to contribute significantly to the economy of the Northern Territory, Australia and globally. As mentioned previously, the lack of a working mine has contributed significantly to the lack of business and community confidence in Tennant Creek. But I am pleased to advise that the Warumungu traditional owners have entered into two indigenous land use agreements in respect to mineral exploration in and around Tennant Creek with Giants Reef which, no doubt, will bring long-term benefits to all. To this extent the Chariot Mine should kick in by mid next year with up to 70 to 80 jobs coming on line. It is important to note that this mine will not operate on a fly-in fly-out basis, and that all employees will reside in Tennant Creek. I also applaud the Warumungu traditional owners, the Central Land Council and Nick Byrne of Giants Reef, for their commitment and their no-nonsense and mature approach to getting down to business and growing the Barkly.
The pastoral industry is also a very important component of the economy in the Barkly, with approximately 500 000 head of cattle, with a turn-off rate of about 180 000 for export and for the Australian market. The challenge for this government is to grow this place by being creative and facilitating the indigenous landholders and the land council in developing viable properties to be brought on stream as producers, thus enhancing employment opportunities and economic growth to all indigenous people and the region in general. This will be a challenge and I will work hard with all sectors of the industry to bring this to fruition.
The recent spate of bush fires have set back the pastoral industry and, indeed, the relationship between indigenous people and the pastoralists. I use this matter by way as an example only. Sometimes, reports in the media, fueled by the politics of division, tend to concentrate on the negative as opposed to the positive strategies. This very serious issue was heading that way. I became concerned enough to phone Ross Peatling, the manager of Alexandria Station, and the President of the NT Cattlemen’s Association, to discuss the possibility of all stakeholders getting together to develop strategies instead of debate by the media. To Ross’s credit, this occurred. I thank Ross Peatling, the Central Land Council, the government agencies and the minister, for sitting down and working towards resolving this issue. That is the way to go - sit down, enter into full and frank dialogue, develop strategies, and implement them in the interests of all.
Tourism opportunities also abound in the Barkly, and I will be working hard to build on the good work of the previous government, and the hard work of the Barkly Regional Tourist Association. It is important, again, that we be creative, innovative and inclusive and include the indigenous people as part of this overall strategy. I will also be pushing hard to include the Power Creek Telegraph Station and the Longreach Waterhole, west of Elliott, as new destinations. They may not sound important, but I believe that they have the capacity to provide options in our area. Also included as part of my commitment, is to develop new marketing strategies in respect to the Davenport Ranges and the Limmen Bight area.
The proposed Nyinkka Nyunyu interpretative centre in Tennant Creek will be an important new tourism development and I pay tribute to the perseverance of the traditional owners and the Julalikari Council for their vision. Everyone can be assured that this particular development will stand alone as one of the real attractions in the Northern Territory. In our region, development tourism is also important. We need to be aggressive in identifying new products, particularly to attract tourists who will access the passenger train service, as well as the drive and the bus market. I will work hard with all involved to try and achieve these outcomes.
The same applies to the fishing industry, both commercial and recreational. In Borroloola recently, I represented the Minister for Primary Industry and Fisheries in respect to a recent spate of dugong deaths. Again, we sat down with all parties and came away with some strategies to prevent these unnecessary deaths. The discussions were frank and in the interests of all. I thank the traditional owners, the Mabunji Aboriginal Corporation, the Northern Land Council, the Amateur Fisherman’s Association of the Northern Territory, the Seafood Council, and many others who were present. I just cannot stress enough the importance of taking this approach. Sometimes the confrontationist approach just does not work. I must also acknowledge that, obviously, by having the capacity to sit down we are going to have some blues and we are going to have some differences, but I think it is probably the best option.
Also in respect to Borroloola and that region, I am relieved that we, as a government, have committed to building a bridge across the McArthur and upgrade the major crossings to the Queensland border. Of absolute importance also is the upgrading of health services in the region, culminating in a community-based health service at Borroloola. It is important that we, as a government, provide every support and assistance. Congratulations to Dr Peter Fitzpatrick and Maria Pyro, and the community, for working so hard to achieve their outcomes. They will have my full support, as they will of the government.
I also applaud and thank this new government and the Minister for Health, for their commitment to establishing a renal dialysis facility in Tennant Creek. May I also pay tribute to Anyinginyi Congress for their dedication in pursuing this very important facility for the Barkly. Again I must emphasise, like most initiatives in our region they have broad community support. Indeed, the service clubs have raised approximately $16 000 for this much-needed facility, and I thank them on behalf of all the people in the Barkly.
Education in the bush and across the Territory remains a real issue. Our attendance and retention rates are excessively poor. There is no high school outside of Tennant Creek and our residential facilities cannot meet the demands of indigenous people wishing to access secondary school in Tennant Creek. It is critical that we be innovative and flexible in responding to the education needs of our young people. Quite honestly, we have lost two generations - perhaps even three - and we all need to address this issue in a bipartisan manner. I seek assurances from the opposition that we will all work together to overcome the disadvantage of young people in the bush.
The issues that I have spoken about previously are dear to me, as they are to many people in the Barkly, and I pledge that I will engage all people in an inclusive way to improve our social, cultural and economic position.
May I now take this opportunity to thank a whole host of people who assisted me over the past few years. To the members of the community of Elliott, where I was born, I would like to thank Mark Raymond, Rosemary Raymond, Kevin Neade, Roy Avery, Harold Dalywaters and my brother, Pompey Raymond. When times got tough I always new I could go there and there was a shoulder to lean on, so I thank them very sincerely. To the people at Ali Curung – Marjorie Limbiari, the Rankine family, the Shannon family and many others - I thank them, and congratulate them for their law and order program. It is probably one of the better law and order strategies in the remote communities. I do pay tribute to the previous government who were instrumental in that. I would like to think that we, as a government, can also have a look at developing those types of strategies in some of the other communities.
To Tara down near Barrow Creek; Uncle Tommy; Vincent and Sonny, who were also always on hand as required; to the people at Canteen Creek, and, in particular, Kenny Philomac, Millie Mick and her family, thank you so much. Also to the people at Epenarra - Mr Beasley, Nelson Casson and his wife Shirley; at Kalinjarri - Michael James and his family; to Borroloola - Graham Dingwall, Ahmad, BJ, Maria Pyro, Jack Louis, Thelma Douglas, Roy Hammer, and a whole lot of other people; and also to the Robinson River community - Tony Jack and his family. In Tennant Creek - Gerry McCarthy, Nigel Rush, Chris Shaw, Noni Nelson, Digger, Gummo, Daryl Fitz and family, Pat Braun, Tim Rankine, Rick, Raelene Brown, thank you very much for your support.
I would also like to extend a very special thanks to Sharon Kinraid, my campaign manager, for a very professional and disciplined campaign. Sharon, as those of you who know her will be aware, keeps everyone on her toes, and on this occasion it was no exception. Also to Steven McVay who put in the long hours and provided a sense of humour which is so necessary during these periods; to Kerry Gardiner, my dear friend who was always available when needed; to the member for Fannie Bay and Chief Minister, Clare Martin; to the member for Stuart, Minister Peter Toyne; the member for Arnhem, Minister John Ah Kit; and the member for Nhulunbuy, Minister Syd Stirling, thank you all for sharing your time and coming down during the last two years. I can assure you it was much appreciated and we invite you all down in the next few months.
I would also like to pay a tribute to Maggie Hickey, the previous member for Barkly, who was a source of inspiration and a wonderful mentor, who gave of her time so unselfishly. We had some wonderful times together travelling the electorate and those of you who know, maybe you will understand what I mean when I say that. Maggie, again, thank you, and I am certain that all the Assembly today wish you well in your future endeavours.
Members: Hear, hear!
Mr McADAM: To my beautiful partner, Barb Shaw, thank you for your patience and your love and support. To my three children, Ngara, Adrian and Alira, I thank them as well.
I would like to dedicate this occasion to a number of people. Firstly, Max Smith, a mate of mine who was working out at Kurundi Station and was burnt during the spate of bush fires that occurred in that area. Max has lost all the fingers on both his hands as a result of fighting these fires. Max used to travel in on 350 km of dirt road to come to meetings, to come down and say: ‘G’day’, and he was a great support to me. So to Max, our thoughts and prayers are with you and your family and I know that you will be back in Tennant Creek pretty soon.
I would also like to dedicate this to John Hickey, Maggie Hickey’s husband, who was a source of inspiration and someone whom I could rely on for unbiased, straight-to-the-guts advice. Also to Ross Alley who has also passed on. Ross was my brother-in-law, a very kind, gentle person, a real believer, and I thank him and his family for their support. Finally, to my parents who, incidentally, are both deceased - Dorcas Wesley and James McAdam.
In conclusion, let it be known that the push for the bush is on. I know the people of the Barkly will not let me rest, and nor will I.
Mr BALDWIN (Daly): Madam Speaker, I, too, rise to make my contribution to the Administrator’s address and this Address-In-Reply. I congratulate the member for Barkly for making his maiden speech in this parliament, as I do all of the new members in the parliament for not only their election, but for getting their maiden speeches over and done with. It is not an easy thing to do, so it is great to see that they have completed those. I congratulate all members of this House who have been re-elected. Like the member for Barkly, I, too, hold a rural seat and it is great to hear that somebody else is pushing for the bush. I am sure there are a few others in this House who are glad to hear that as well.
I take the opportunity to place on the record my thanks to all those people in the electorate for their support leading up to, and during, the election. It is been a great honour to have been elected to the seat of Victoria River twice, and now - probably a little piece of history and, indeed, a very great honour to have been elected to that seat, now called the seat of Daly - for a third time. It is a point of interest that there has not been a member who has consecutively held that seat for more than two terms in the entire history of self-government in the Northern Territory. So, it is indeed a very great honour that the people of that previous seat of Victoria River, now called Daly, have put their faith in me and re-elected me for this third term. I certainly thank them, and I would like to assure them that I will be acting very faithfully to raise their issues and concerns in this next term of government, as I have done over the last seven years.
The issues for all bush electorates are, of course, very diverse. The large electorates like the electorate of Daly - and others, like the member for Barkly’s electorate - have diverse issues to grapple with, not the least of which is, obviously, capital infrastructure in terms of access and roads and health and education facilities and all of the social issues that go with it. That is what makes them very interesting, that they are so diverse. There are different issues out there compared with urban issues. Obviously, we all deal with the bigger issues.
At the local level we do not get constituents coming to us complaining about the guttering on suburban roads and the dogs barking next door. We get much greater issues concerning things like bituminising 250 km of road and new health clinics. They are very substantial issues that take a great deal of work and are a great challenge - exciting, actually – to achieve. I am certainly glad that I have been able to achieve a number of those kinds of initiatives in that electorate of Victoria River, and now Daly, over the last seven years, and I certainly look forward to doing that again.
The new electorate of Daly, when you look at the demographics, is still a very diverse electorate in terms of its make-up, predominantly an Aboriginal vote out there. Aboriginal residents still hold the proportion of numbers in the Daly electorate. It still has a great make-up of pastoral properties and freehold mixed farming properties and includes, obviously, a number of communities such as Port Keats, Daly River, Peppimenarti, Palumpa, Amanbidji, Timber Creek, and includes now some new communities, those of Batchelor, Adelaide River and Pine Creek. I certainly look forward to working with those newer communities in those new areas both at the local government level and the business and individual level. They are not altogether new to me, having lived in Batchelor for a number of years, about seven years. I am very familiar with the Bachelor/Adelaide River area and, obviously, now living in Katherine, I have an affiliation with the people of Pine Creek. Since the boundary redistribution, I have lost some areas and obviously picked up some others, as we all did. It has been great that the transition into those new communities has been a good one and one that I am sure has been well received.
Looking to the future, contributing both inside and outside of this Chamber is going to be very interesting, particularly in my new shadow ministerial portfolio areas. Having been responsible for the portfolios of lands, planning and environment, Department of Primary Industry and Fisheries and, of course, racing, gaming and licensing, I have been taking note of ministers’ deliveries in this first two weeks of parliament, certainly looking as to what direction they may take these portfolios in the future. I say once again that, in those areas, I am very proud of the achievements that I was able to contribute to in the former government, in my term as minister over four years. One of those achievements, in the area of lands, planning and environment, was the implementation of the new Planning Act. I note that the new minister has begun an internal review of that and it will be very interesting to watch where that goes. My understanding is that the review will take into account a number of areas.
One area I would urge the minister not to tamper with too much is the implementation of the integrated planning scheme right across the Northern Territory. That is going to provide a consistent and coherent scheme that everybody will come to understand will have the same kind of attributes no matter where you go in the Northern Territory, particularly in the areas of zoning and so on. That is something that I initiated under the new Planning Act and, in fact, instructed the department some time ago to start implementation. When we were in government, there were a lot of workshops, a lot of briefings to the opposition and, obviously, to local government and business groups and communities around the Territory. I would urge the minister to make sure that that part of the act is implemented so that we do have that consistency, particularly to business right across the Territory and, of course, to families and individuals.
I note also that in his planning review the minister is talking about third party appeals. Whilst the member for Nelson may not agree with me, I would urge him to seek some advice from those down south who have the third party appeals and tread very carefully. Third party appeals are not good news for investment in the Northern Territory. If you talk to developers who have had experiences down south with third party appeals, then they will tell you straight from the horse’s mouth, that they are certainly not good in terms of wanting to invest in a jurisdiction where third party appeals can cause major delays and added costs.
I think it was the Minister for Lands who mentioned that the use of regional agreements and indigenous land use agreements will be enhanced and used more in the future under this new Labor government. That is going to be an interesting exercise to watch. I note that the new Western Australian Labor government has made an agreement on the Ord River scheme as far as native title goes. I think that was at a cost of some $40m. That is something that is going to be interesting to watch as far as the Northern Territory is concerned on its participation in stage 2 of the Ord River scheme.
The other area is the extensive work that the CLP government has done on the Darwin Harbour and the planning that was going on, and is currently going on. That is leading, of course, to a plan of management. I am happy to see that that is going to continue, obviously incorporating a strategic plan under the beneficial uses of the Water Act. That will be something that I look forward to seeing culminated, because there has been a lot of work go into that and a lot of community consultation over more than a year by independent consultants who have carried out that work. It will be great to see that be finalised.
I also look forward to participating in primary industry and fisheries issues. I thank the minister for his briefing the other day with his department people. That was very interesting. As a minister prior to this, I have not had direct involvement in that sector of the department. Obviously, with my background, I have a wide range of experiences in the primary industry area, but it was certainly very good to get that briefing and get the overall picture. I am sure as issues come up there will be many more of those occasions and I will look forward to those.
On that, the work that is being done in areas like the Douglas Daly/Katherine Daly basin, the Stray Creek release of land, the Ord River scheme that I have mentioned, the Ti Tree area and Owen Springs and Pine Hill have been promoted and developed by the former government to assist in the development of agricultural opportunities for the Territory. They are areas that are going to come under - and other areas similarly - increasing pressure environmentally under the national environmental plans that are around. It is going to need a fine balance when it comes to development in the Northern Territory, something that we were working on, something that will be a challenge to the future. I look forward to participating in that because we will have to ensure that the balance is right.
The Northern Territory is a large jurisdiction with very little development in comparable terms to any other jurisdiction down south. I think something like 0.003% of the Northern Territory is cleared and that includes urban clearing and all pastoral and freehold clearing. We are a developing jurisdiction. There will be more pressure on us in the future - in all tropical and sub-tropical areas of the world in fact - to produce more and more food and particularly agricultural products that are used to supply those areas in need. We have to ensure that we do not lock ourselves down into a no-clearing policy so that these things cannot occur, because the pressure will certainly be on us to open up some more of these areas and allow them to be developed, to use our natural resources in the right way, environmentally responsibly, but to utilise those vast water resources and land and soil resources that we have.
Speaking of those kinds of resources, I would just like to raise the issue of Owen Springs Station and urge that the government make sure they proceed with this. This was bought for a number of reasons. It was bought at a market price that was provided to us in advice from the Australian Valuation Office. It is a good investment for the future of the Northern Territory, particularly for the Alice Springs region, of course. It is not only suitable for the unfettered expansion of Alice Springs into the future but it also provides some real benefits, immediate benefits, in terms of the Park Estate, adding to that the West MacDonnells and so forth down there, to make that more attractive to tourism and bring financial benefits and jobs to that region. It also provides opportunities for horticultural land to be turned off where suitable. It also provides opportunity for recreation and tourism use on a great piece of land that is very valuable. Keep in mind that this land, whilst it was bought at a cost of $3.6m, will return far more than that in terms of benefits and jobs into the future. If you want to add it up and try to calculate it on a cash basis, well you can go for it. But on the basis of a $3.6m sale, even the sale of the land for horticulture in the future and probably for things like industrial expansion of Alice Springs, will provide a return on that land in terms of cash and, obviously, the balance of that property can be turned back to the pastoral estate once the other uses are defined and taken up.
The process that was going on there was that there were expressions of interest that had been received from all kinds of people interested in utilisation of that land. They should be pursued and brought to book and dealt with in the proper manner. The departments were working on - and it should be in the minister’s hands by now - a plan for the future development and future needs for that area. I would urge you to continue with that program that will bring many benefits economically and socially for the future of the Territory and Alice Springs in particular.
In the area of racing and gaming that I have shadow responsibility for, I certainly enjoyed my role as minister for that area. It is certainly an exciting area to be in, one that I was proud to be involved in, being at the cutting edge in terms of things like Internet gambling, sports betting, and the sale of the NT TAB. It was one area that I was proud of, and the CLP government had a proud record of a cautious policy towards the introduction of community gaming machines. That has turned out to have worked very well. I just hope that the Labor government continues to be proactive in this area because it is an exciting area that obviously needs balance as well, but an area that is full of opportunities for investment into the Territory.
I was involved in things like the kava licensing, another exciting area. I am sure the new minister responsible will get to know that, very, very quickly, and go and visit a few of those people and get both sides of the story. It is a complex one, and the member for Nhulunbuy will be able to certainly give you a briefing on all of the background of that. That legislation is now in for the licensing of kava sales and, whilst not everyone agrees with it, we all recognised that something had to be done, and it was, and I hope that turns out for the best.
The next term of parliament will be a very interesting one. The members opposite, like ourselves, have a new set of roles and we will all be developing those as we go along. As we have said on this side of the House, we will certainly be a very honest and very strong opposition, and we do not shy away from that in any terms whatsoever. We know that is our role and we will carry that out with a great amount of dignity and a great amount of strength. I certainly wish members on the other side of the House my best wishes and, as I said, I will be watching with interest, as I am sure all Territorians will be, during their term of government.
Speaking of performance, while I have some time left, I would like to raise the issue of government promises. I do not think these promises have appeared anywhere, but I am just putting them on the record so they get added to the list of promises that go on everybody’s fridges out there. These are actually on fridges in my electorate, and I am sure the government’s had some correspondence on some of these already. For the sake of my constituency, it is something that I will be making sure does not get shoved under the carpet, so to speak, and to make sure that they are on the record.
The first promise - and these were promises made leading up to and during the campaign - was a promise by the now Chief Minister for power to the Wooliana Road area, some $1.5m promised for reticulation of electricity down the Wooliana Road at Daly River. That is something that they are looking forward to hearing about, perhaps in the mini-budget. A little mini-capital works would be a nice thing. So $1.5m there. $0.5m additional to that for the upgrade of the power supply in that area, which is supplied from the community of Nguiu.
The second one is a promise to the people of Palumpa, who are building a rodeo ground. It is a local initiative, and it is a great initiative, being a cattle station that has been in production for some 19 years now as a proprietary limited company. Palumpa Station is a great testament to an Aboriginal owned and controlled business. Because of their stock skills and stockman skills, they want to build their own rodeo arena to keep those skills honed and to provide recreation. So they are building a rodeo arena, and there has been a promise, that has been authorised during the campaign, of a commitment of an additional $15 000 to the rodeo ground and they would like to see that.
Dr Toyne: Applications due in November. Tell them to get it in.
Mr BALDWIN: No, no this is a promise. I am not going to tell them to get it in. They are waiting to get this money.
Dr Toyne: Just to get it into our funding.
Mr BALDWIN: Just to pick up on the interjection, I am just alerting you to the fact that you have commitments that have been made and people are expecting some action. So $15 000 there goes on the record.
The other one is very, very important and needs to be placed on the record, and needs some urgent attention, in fact. I do not know whether it comes from the Sport and Recreation Minister or who it might come from. The previous government gave a grant of $300 000 to the Wadeye community for the construction of a pool. Now they are ready to go with that, we have done a lot of raising of funds: there is $300 000 from the former government; there is $300 000 from the local store there; the schools contributed some money; Murin Association has contributed some money; the Kardu Numida Council has contributed some money and will do work in kind through CDEP and so forth; and in total there is upwards of $800 000 sitting ready for the beginning of that pool. But, they would like the additional $300 000 that has been committed.
This commits, as I said, an additional $300 000 towards the Port Keats swimming pool – ‘Labor will look after Wadeye people’. Well, I am glad to hear that, and the people of Wadeye will be very glad. I am sure they have written to whoever the respective minister is, to alert them of that and ask they keep that promise, because they would like to begin that as soon as possible. That is a major infrastructure project that has been locally thought of, locally developed and the funds put together on a local basis between all of the organisations, and to begin to reach their goal of cash, the $300 000 would be very well received out there. I have given the people of Wadeye an undertaking that I would pursue that matter on their behalf and that is why I have put it on the record today. So that would be nice if those promises could be kept and you could add those promises to your fridge, if you have not already done so. I am sure you were alerted to those because they would not have been endorsed without your say so. So there is an amount of a couple of million dollars that I would like to see committed to, in terms of real cash.
Finally, I thank all those people who helped me during my campaign at a personal level. I would also like to thank the Country Liberal Party for their support over the last seven years, especially under the stewardship of Suzanne Cavanagh and Charlie Taylor. I take this opportunity to thank my lovely wife of 28 years, and my children, who are now almost adults, for their support and standing by me over these last seven years and, hopefully, over the next four years, as I have been fulfilling my political aspirations. It has been a great pleasure, as I said, and an honour to have represented the seat of Victoria River, and it will be a great honour and an exciting challenge to represent the people of Daly River over the next four years.
Dr TOYNE (Stuart): Madam Speaker, I begin by also acknowledging the Larrakia people, the traditional owners of the land on which this House stands. Equally, I would like to acknowledge the Warlpiri, the Anmatjere, Gurindji, Alyawarra, Kaytej, Ngaringman, Wardaman and Mudbura people, whose land encompasses the seat of Stuart which I represent. In acknowledging the traditional owners, I would also like to acknowledge all the people of Stuart of non-indigenous background, whether they be in jobs within our public service delivering public programs to the communities in my electorate; in the private sector, in things like the gold mines up in the Tanami province; the tourist operations around the area; and, of course, the pastoralists throughout my electorate.
I am constantly reminded, during my trips through the electorate, of how much quality work is going on, how much commitment there is out there, not only to the work that each group is undertaking but to each other. I think that the spirit of community in our remote communities is still very strong and alive today. We used to see it very clearly when the short wave radio network was there, and you could actually hear what was going on around the district, around what is now my electorate. You could see just how close people were to each other, how supportive they were when it came to the crunch. We might have our stoushes over particular issues at times, but when it came to the crunch when someone was in trouble, there were always people, from all kinds of backgrounds, there to help.
I am first and foremost the member for Stuart, and I am very conscious of my responsibilities to properly represent the people of Stuart. I believe a member of parliament should be a leader who serves, someone who provides leadership on issues, but serves the people they represent. I think the penalty of not going back and listening to the people you represent and carefully acting on the concerns that they bring forward to their representative, is that you will lose their support - and quite rightly so. I certainly feel that it is a great honour to represent the seat of Stuart. In previous debates in this House we have pointed just how difficult an electorate it is to represent.
We are trying to be clever about how to provide people with the contact with their local member, and with government, that they need to get their needs properly responded to. It is not easy because of the electoral changes that were brought in under the last redistribution. It made the seat of Stuart extraordinarily disparate. It created a seat where the affairs of people in that electorate were being brokered through all major urban centres of the Northern Territory. We are seeing offices in Alice Springs dealing with Stuart, offices in Tennant Creek, office in Katherine, offices in Darwin. So, for the local member it makes it a very, very difficult job indeed. On winning government, obviously we have now got access to additional people and resources to try to respond to these needs. I believe that we will put a plan together that will give the people adequate representation, but under difficulties, I must say.
I owe a lot to the helpers who presented me with the honour of entering this House for a third time. It is something that I will never forget - the work of the volunteers. I seek leave to incorporate a full list of the well over 100 volunteers who worked in Stuart during the campaign.
Leave granted.
Thea Toyne Billy Tommy
Dr TOYNE: Thank you very much. It is important that these names are in full in the Hansard record because these people have worked for democracy. They have worked whether we won or whether we lost, and they were out there doing the job, making sure everyone had the ability to vote in the election in a proper way.
I would like to make special thanks to my wife Theadora. Thea is a political wife and no one says that the partner of a politician has an easy time. It is a life of constant separation when I am travelling, and I have never lost sight of the contributions Thea has made to my life and to my career here, and I love her very much. I would like to also to acknowledge Margaret Reilly who was my campaign director. Margaret put together a very good campaign. The list of volunteers and the amount of detail that had to be brought together for such a broad campaign was just huge, and Marg did a great job. Doug White and Susan Heffernan came up especially from Victoria to help keep the details of the campaign going while we were all out bush trying to cover the booths.
I would like to talk a little about some of the key areas in my portfolios. I think with six ministries it is hard to go through the whole lot in a short speech. But I would like to start with the most important to me - one of the two most important - and that is the Ministry for Central Australia. I want to publicly state here my commitment to dismantling any effect of the Berrimah line in my time in this ministry. It is a difficult task given that the centre of government is in Darwin. There is always going to be a tendency for decisions to be made up here without proper recourse to the opinions of people in Central Australia. Wherever it is humanly possible, I will make sure that Central Australians’ priorities, their opinions about public policy, are properly represented in our processes. That is a very difficult task, but it is one that I have been committed to for the last 20 years. The further you get away from this centre of government the more likely people are to feel that they are not fully in contact with our processes. It is something that requires total, on-going vigilance to make sure that we are considering things properly when decisions are being made. I am sure that issues will come up, as they already have, that do require strong input.
I am very proud of the fact that the Martin government has established a much more powerful ministerial office in Central Australia, the Office of Central Australia, which has seven people working in it, and has direct contact to our ministries. As that structure beds down and we get a strong discourse going between the Darwin offices of each minister and that office, I think we are going to see a much better meshing of the priorities of Central Australia to the decisions made by our government. The early responses of Alice Springs and the region to that office have been very positive. People are saying that is a spot where you get your concerns listened to and acted on. We certainly will be working very hard to bring that structure into its full fruition as we go forward in government.
My other major portfolio - and not to mention that the other portfolios are important as well - but certainly, it is a great honour to be the Attorney-General of the Northern Territory. I have a particular view of the role of Attorney-General. As the first law officer I am responsible for defending the integrity and reputation of our legal system. I strongly believe that this role carries with it the duty to defend the court system and protect it from undue influence from the political processes. As first law officer, I also have a duty to uphold two fundamental principles - the rule of law and the separation of powers. These principles are vitally important to the operation of our modern democratic system.
The rule of law provides that no individual regardless of race, wealth, religious or political beliefs - no individual whatsoever - is above the law. It provides that the law must apply equally to all members of our society. The separation of powers relates to the traditional arrangements that exist between the parliament and politicians, and the courts and members of the judiciary. It seeks to confine the exercise of each of the three powers - legislative, executive and judicial - to the respective roles and institutions.
These principles find no better expression than the statement put forward by the delegates of the NADA Legal Forum which was held at Gukula in August this year. They stated:
I intend to foster a climate of mutual respect between the parliamentary system and the legal system. I am intending - and my government is intending - to be careful guardians of the independence of the judiciary and the judicial system.
Mandatory sentencing has been repealed, and the time for this unjust and ineffective law is over. Discretion in sentencing has been restored to the courts. Concurrent with the repeal, the first elements of my government’s crime prevention strategy have been enacted. My government knows that the safety and security of people …
Members interjecting.
Dr TOYNE: Settle, settle!
Members interjecting.
Madam SPEAKER: Order! Member for Drysdale, will you resume your seat.
Mr Dunham: I am just going to …
Madam SPEAKER: Resume your seat for now because I have something to say to you. You know for one thing you do not walk out of this House talking. If you have any comment to make you make it in your seat. You may leave now if you wish.
Dr TOYNE: Thank you, Madam Speaker, that is a lot better. My government knows the safety and security of people in the Territory is of paramount importance. It is committed to safeguarding both people and their property. There will be no soft approach to crime or to those who commit crime. Under our crime prevention strategy it is very clear that, unless there are extenuating circumstances, it is the intention of parliament that property offenders serve time in gaol. My government will monitor sentences and request the Director of Public Prosecutions to contemplate appeals where it considers the intention of parliament has not been achieved. This, and not inferring with the operation of the courts, is the correct role for the Attorney-General.
Our efforts to prevent crime will not stop there. My government’s crime prevention strategy represents a comprehensive and coordinated approach to crime which confronts the real issues, the underlying causes of crime, and criminal behaviour. National and international research consistently demonstrates the link between factors like unemployment and drug abuse and criminal behaviour. We know that drug abuse is a major cause of property crime in the Territory. We know that mandatory sentencing has not worked as a deterrent for that motivation or any other. We know that the CLP’s blank refusal to acknowledge the impact of drug abuse on our community has contributed to the problem.
These issues must be addressed, and they must be addressed in a careful and considered manner, if we are going to truly implement a crime prevention strategy. We will adequately equip our courts and communities to deal with the problems that exist. Drug courts, staffed and supported by experienced people, will manage both punishment and rehabilitation and work to reduce repeat offending. The expertise built up within drug courts will maximise the apprehension and conviction of those behind the industry.
Victims of crime deserve to be helped and to be heard. That is why our Labor government is committed to providing assistance to victims of crime to clean and secure their homes. It is also the principle guiding our policy, now law, that victims’ wishes will be taken into account in the sentencing process. Victim/offender conferencing is a highly empowering process for victims of crime, often allowing more meaningful resolution than the traditional court processes. We will work with victim organisations and those skilled in the area of mediation and conciliation to make this process available through community mediation centres.
Consultation and cooperation must become the focus of our approach to dealing with these issues that affect us all. The views of the community, and in particular the legal community, will be an important element of my government’s approach to law and order. My government looks forward to building bridges with the Territory legal community and creating a relationship of trust and mutual respect. I have had, since my appointment as Attorney-General, the opportunity to meet with members of the legal profession, and I thank them for the time they have taken to talk with me about the key issues they consider we are facing in the Territory.
As law minister, I also have responsibility for the administration of justice and operation of the legal system. I have already signalled my intention to return to the protocol governing the appointment of Queen’s Counsel - or perhaps to be called Senior Counsel - which leaves this decision firmly in the hands of the Chief Justice with the assistance of the legal community. I will be seeking to review this protocol to ensure that the possibility of political interference is removed, regardless of who is in the role of Attorney-General.
Through the Office of Courts Administration I will work to ensure that the courts meet the needs of the community in the way in which legal services are delivered. I have already sought from the Commonwealth government a guarantee that it will continue to fund the Aboriginal Interpreter Service and the diversionary programs. I will promote the innovative use of technologies to bring courts closer to the community. In addition, a magistrates court will be established in Palmerston to allow local support programs to be more effectively delivered, and allow for mediation and victim/offender conferencing to take place in the local community.
Significant changes will be brought in the area of land rights and native title over our first term. The High Court’s decision in Mabo recognised the prior ownership of Australia by indigenous peoples. It is from this foundation that we will proceed in our negotiations. We do not want to see a return to the politics of division or disharmony which was so harmful to the Territory community. We look forward to resolution, not litigation, and to the creation of true partnerships between Aboriginal people and government. We know that all Territorians benefit from economic development on Aboriginal land. A change in focus is required from delaying and defeating this development for political ends, to facilitating practical and constructive regional land use agreements.
The Labor government is committed to a new era of openness and accountability. The Labor government believes that good government requires informed community debate and open discussion of public affairs. Freedom of information legislation is one of the building blocks to achieve these aims. In every other jurisdiction of Australia, debate and discussion is encouraged by freedom of information legislation. It is now the Territory’s turn to reap the benefits that such legislation will bring.
I have tabled a draft freedom of information bill in these sittings, drawing on the best FOI legislation nationally and internationally, along with the best of the privacy bills. It aims to provide the right of access for all Territorians to information on government and on government decision making. Our legislation will enhance the operations of government and improve decision making. It serves to constantly remind and reinforce to government decision makers - the politicians and the public servants - that they are responsible to the community and that the decisions they make are for, and on behalf of, the people of the Northern Territory.
Our draft bill seeks to build trust and confidence in government and its use of information. It recognises a vast array of personal and commercial information that may be collected by government agencies, and on which important decisions are based. The draft legislation provides that members of the community have a right of access to this material and, where necessary, to update and correct it. We know that disclosure of some information held by government may be prejudicial to personal and commercial interests. This is why our draft legislation strikes a balance between the right to access and the right to privacy. It proposes to prevent disclosure where it would prejudice the personal or business affairs of a member of the community.
The information scheme we propose also seeks to protect the community against improper use of personal and commercial information held by government. It will place constraints on the use of such information for commercial purposes, and provide an opportunity for an independent review where someone believes that improper use has occurred. The introduction and operation of our information and privacy scheme is a major undertaking. The input of members of the community is crucial to its success, and I strongly encourage Territorians to read the draft and accompanying discussion paper, and have their say on the final bill.
My Department of Corporate and Information Services will be actively involved in implementing the information and privacy scheme adopted by the Territory. DCIS is established to centralise corporate and information technology services across agencies, and is the agency responsible for the whole-of-government record management system. It will play a key role in developing the policies and systems to ensure all agencies are equipped to fulfil their information and privacy obligations.
DCIS has another important role to play in the development of the Territory. The effective adoption of new technology is essential to the delivery of government services to all Territorians. DCIS is working with information technology specialists in a move towards e-government and the provision of government services online. The business community, in particular, will benefit from the introduction of online tendering procurement services and bill paying facilities. The harnessing of the new technology will also transform the delivery of services in remote communities. The needs of regional and remote communities have too long been overlooked. The services provided to Territorians in remote areas, in communities and on cattle stations, are of a significantly lower standard than those taken for granted within urban settings.
From 1990 to 1994, I was involved in the establishment of the Tanami Network, a satellite-based video conferencing network that enabled the isolated communities of Yuendumu, Lajamanu, Willowra and Kintore to have access to face-to-face visual telecommunications. The network linked those isolated communities with each other and with services in Alice Springs, Darwin, Sydney and beyond. The Tanami Network demonstrated, in a pioneering phase, the huge potential of these technologies to allow enhanced services to be delivered to the most remote places of the Northern Territory. It refocused attention not on the systems, but on the people who use them. DCIS will play an important role in ensuring that all government agencies have appropriate and reliable access to the Internet, video and teleconferencing, and telemedicine facilities, amongst others.
I have spoken today about the consultation and cooperation in areas of law and order and native title. This emphasis on consultation will characterise my approach to other portfolios. Labor is committed to bringing together recreational fishing representatives, Aboriginal traditional owners and commercial fishing interests to establish access agreements over Aboriginal land and waters. The Amateur Fishermen’s Association of the Northern Territory is the peak body for recreational anglers in the Territory. Representatives from the Tiwi Islands have established an effective precedent for these agreements by negotiating access for recreational anglers to specific points on the island. Meetings with AFANT are already assisting in the development of a model of negotiation and cooperation for use across the Northern Territory. These regional or site-specific agreements will be supplemented by rolling capital works programs for the construction of ramps, jetties and camp grounds.
It is a simple fact that Territorians love to fish. It is an activity that Territorians have embraced like no other group. and it is an activity that we want future generations to enjoy. The Labor government knows that recreational fishers are concerned about the future of Territory fish stocks. They want to see - and my government will ensure - the protection of our fishing resources through scientific research, inter-fish numbers and preservation of our harbours. The Territory has a unique environment and it offers natural resources of unsurpassed quality and pristine ecosystems which have abundant species of marine fish.
I would like to also give an assurance to the commercial fishing industry that in our allocation of fish stocks through these agreements, we are very mindful of the important place that the commercial fishing industry plays in our economy. We are very committed to seeing that industry’s place in our economy continues and expands through greater knowledge. What we are saying is that the allocation of fish stocks and other marine resources should be based on maximum consultation per locality, and maximum consultation with the major interest groups, and wherever possible - and in fact almost exclusively - it should also be based on a solid base of scientific research.
The Territory government will establish a marine park in the Bynoe Harbour area. The marine park will not restrict recreational fishing. It will, however, protect an environment prized by many recreational anglers. There will be no damming of harbour tributaries. Let me say that again - rivers and creeks leading to the Darwin Harbour will not be dammed under a Labor government. Fish nurseries will be protected and I look forward, along with Territorians, to enjoying the harbour and all that it offers well into the future.
The Northern Territory primary industries are another of my responsibilities. They make a major contribution to the Territory’s economy and regional employment. The rural industries are a vital source of export income and provide the basis for much of the economic activity in regional areas. My government will create a new economic environment in which these key industries will continue to grow and prosper. We will actively support opportunities to expand our export markets. Supply chain problems, which potentially have had a negative impact on the delivery of Territory mangoes to interstate and overseas markets, must be addressed. Our recent trial shipment to Hong Kong is one of the many activities that we are undertaking to improve the infrastructure, the supply chain, and the market development for this important aspect of our horticultural industry.
Our live cattle and buffalo exports, despite fluctuations in international currencies, have remained our major export earner and the position of this valuable industry will be sustained. In fact, I am intending to go to the Philippines in the near future to talk about that very subject with the Filipino government.
We will also promote opportunities for the emergence and expansion of new rural industries. Particularly exciting for the Territory are developments in the area of aquaculture and agriculture. Government funding over four years will assist our fledgling peanut industry to become self-supporting. This funding will support the industry to purchase the expertise and equipment necessary to boost production and processing, in line with our newly-found guaranteed supply arrangements with the Peanut Company of Australia.
The government recognises that where primary producers invest their time and money in research, development, training and infrastructure, the Territory government should invest in them alongside. The result is a better outcome for all Territorians. High quality research and advisory services will identify and capitalise on the opportunities for industry development, broaden the Territory’s production base, and ensure our economic growth. In partnership with Aboriginal land owners, land councils and the Indigenous Land Corporation, the government will implement programs to provide pastoral, horticultural, agricultural and aquaculture development opportunities on Aboriginal land.
I come now to my final portfolio area which is sport and recreation. The involvement in sport, whether as a social activity or at an elite level, contributes to the health and well-being of both individuals and the community. Young people, in particular, need appropriate recreational and community activities - activities which promote self-esteem and focus on healthy lifestyles. Sports provide an excellent vehicle for these aims. Sport can also be a source of unity, bringing together the diversity of Territorians. Almost 60% of Territorians play sport or regularly participate in an organised recreational activity, putting our levels of participation above the national average. Young people in the Northern Territory have wholeheartedly embraced organised sports, with the NT having the highest rate of youth participation in the country.
Activities of the Department of Sport and Recreation are diverse, covering a range of services for Aboriginal communities, and support for established community youth and recreation organisations throughout the Northern Territory. These activities will be expanded over coming years with the establishment of a remote area sports development network. The government has already committed $150 000 to fund additional recreation offices in remote areas. We will progress partnerships with organisations such as Kickstart, the AFL’s skills development program, and programs such as Soccer in the Outback, to further expand the sporting and recreational activities for our remote area kids.
I will be working with my colleague, Hon Syd Stirling, Minister for Education, to revitalise competitive sports in schools. Both sporting and academic pursuits have a role to play in the creation of healthy, young Territorians. The exposure of children and young people to sports in schools encourages their future participation in clubs and sporting organisations. It also provides an opportunity for young people to develop leadership and life skills and to interact with other young people in a scene which is safe and encouraging.
Facility development remains a high priority. A combination of capital works and organisational grants will support the expansion of Territory sporting facilities and the sporting groups and activities available to all Territorians. Many Territorians now compete at the highest level in their sport and I wish them well into the future.
I wish all members well in this Assembly and I congratulate them all on being elected to the House. I hope, where possible, we can work in a bipartisan manner on issues that are of importance to the Northern Territory and, if we have our stoushes, let us maintain respect for each other.
Debate adjourned.
Madam SPEAKER: Honourable members, I wish to advise you that I have given permission for Dani Gawlik from the NT News and David Hancock, on behalf of The Age and Sydney Morning Herald, to take photos during the motion relating to the separation of families. I also advise members that I have given permission for TOP FM, Karu, ABC, Channel 8, Imparja Television to broadcast, with sound and vision, the motion relating to the separation of families.
Ms MARTIN (Chief Minister): Madam Speaker, I rise to present the following motion:
Let me begin this afternoon by welcoming members of the Stolen Generation and their families to this House for this very, very important parliamentary motion.
Like other parliaments in this country, this House has engaged in debate on the issue of an apology to the Stolen Generation before. That debate was brought on in 1998, three years ago, by the then Leader of the Opposition, Maggie Hickey. It was noted by Maggie Hickey at the time that most other jurisdictions had already moved a motion of apology to members of the Stolen Generation and their families.
What followed Labor’s proposed motion was a four-hour debate that included some of the most ignoble statements and sentiments ever uttered in this House. Ultimately, a motion was passed. It was a motion of regret that spoke more of the activities of the CLP government than of the effects on Territorians of past policies of forcibly removing indigenous children from their families. It was a motion that did not include an apology. It was a motion that was not supported by the opposition.
Today, the Northern Territory’s first Labor government seeks bipartisan support for a motion of apology to members of the Stolen Generation and their families. I ask members opposite to join with government members to express their sorrow, show their compassion and apologise for past wrongs in order that we can move forward together towards reconciliation. I ask members opposite to examine their consciences and support this very worthwhile motion. I believe that parliament, as the supreme representative institution of the Territory body politic, must play a leadership role.
I appreciate that there are some people in the community, in our community, who cannot bring themselves to apologise to the Stolen Generation. To them I say: if you cannot, then this apology may anger you. I urge you, though, to read this debate when it appears in Hansard and listen to the accounts of members of the Stolen Generation and their families. I urge you to do this in the interests of providing an opportunity for possible closure for the Stolen Generation and their families. I urge you to do this in the interests of moving on and beginning work on the critical issue of genuine reconciliation. I ask Territorians to support at least the concept of an apology, if not this particular motion. After all, it will be by our actions as a community rather than by our words that future generations will judge us.
In the Territory, more than any other jurisdiction, issues relating to the Stolen Generation are prominent. More than a quarter of our population is indigenous. It is unlikely that a single indigenous Territorian family has not been affected in some way by the past practices of forcible removal of indigenous children. Members of the Stolen Generation are alive today, are with us today. We do not have to look too far back in history to see the effects of this heartless and misguided policy. The profound effects upon those who were removed continue to be felt in subsequent generations who have inherited a history that is forever affected by institutionalisation, of not knowing family life, of not knowing their ancestry and all that entails. Thousands of Territorians continue to bear the scars of those practices.
The issue of an apology to the Stolen Generation is not new in Australia. Indigenous people have been calling for appropriate recognition of their history for decades. They have been fighting for changes in government policies and practices that will allow them to turn around the outcomes we presently see in education, employment and health.
In 1997, as the President of the Human Rights and Equal Opportunity Commission, Sir Ronald Wilson presented the report Bringing Them Home - National Inquiry into the Separation of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Children from their Families. In what will be forever one of the most important inquiries undertaken, and one of the most important reports ever written, tragic and terrible moments in Australian history were chronicled, state by state and territory by territory. As noted in the report, indigenous children have been forcibly separated from their families and communities since the very first days of European occupation of Australia.
The chapter on the history of the Northern Territory is all the more distressing for knowing that the people whose story is being recounted are prominent Territorians and, in many cases, friends. The chapter commences by quoting the patrol officer whose responsibility included the removal of Aboriginal children. In 1949, he wrote:
He went on:
That account happened here in the Northern Territory, in 1949.
The chapter goes on to note that in the Northern Territory, as in other parts of Australia, indigenous people were brutally dispossessed. Forced off their land, they moved to pastoral stations or the edges of non-indigenous settlement. They were barely paid subsistence wages, in the knowledge that they had few other choices.
By the 1890s, the report notes, the presence of pale-skinned indigenous children within the Aboriginal communities and the sexual exploitation of young indigenous girls by non-indigenous men, were matters of public concern. In response, the government sought to take these children away from the communities in which they were living and place them in care of missions. It should be noted, too, that children from around Australia were also removed to these missions.
In 1912, the Chief Protector of Aborigines, Professor Walter Baldwin Spencer wrote that:
Spencer argued that in town areas, compounds should be established to contain all the Aboriginal people. Kahlin Compound was established outside Darwin in 1913. In 1914, an iron shed called The Bungalow was constructed in Alice Springs next to the police station. The practice began of removing light-skinned children from Aboriginal camps and placing them in The Bungalow. During the 1920s, the pace of forcible removals increased, leading to severe overcrowding in Kahlin Compound and in The Bungalow.
The Methodist Missionary Society indicated it was prepared to take the mixed-descent children from the Kahlin Compound, where they still had some possibility of contact with their family, to its mission on Goulburn Island.
In evidence before the inquiry, a man who had been removed to Kahlin Compound at three years in the 1930s, and subsequently placed in The Bungalow stated:
The bombing of Darwin saw the evacuation of some of the mission children from the Territory. After the war, the forcible removal of children to institutions recommenced. One of the main homes for children in the 1950s was the Retta Dixon Home here in Darwin. It opened after the war and operated until 1980. The Bringing Them Home report sadly recounts how some former inmates of Kahlin Compound and the half-caste home:
The consequences of the removal policies and practices are vividly and horrifically detailed through the stories of those affected. Who could have read those accounts and not been moved to tears; moved to take action to ensure that such horror would not be inflicted again by governments; moved to apologise to those affected; moved to say sorry?
The position of former CLP governments was that it was not appropriate to apologise, as this parliament was not constituted when the various policies that saw the forced removal of indigenous children were current. The former government believes that the policies were Commonwealth policies, and that the Northern Territory was then a Commonwealth responsibility. That is certainly true, but it misses the point. The current Commonwealth government has refused to apologise on the grounds that the current generation cannot be held accountable for the action of earlier generations. There is a widespread and erroneous view that saying sorry to indigenous Australians will somehow open the floodgates for litigation, that ‘sorry’ will equal ‘compensation’. Not only has time proven this not to be true, but we are all, as Australians, diminished by this inability to show compassion, maturity, and a desire in some way to right such dreadful wrongs. Only the Commonwealth and the Northern Territory have not given a full and frank apology for those affected by the practice of forced removals.
I recall the comments I made in this House in 1998 during that last debate. I said at the time:
Bringing Them Home, through graphic personal accounts and scientific evidence based on comprehensive studies details the effects of separation from the primary carer, institutionalisation, abuses and denigration, separation from the indigenous community and separation from family and community. Using expert evidence, Sir Ronald Wilson’s report lays bare for all Australians the intergenerational effects of those separation policies. On the consequences for the children of those children who were removed form their families, he wrote:
This effect, within families and between generations, is appalling. Let us not forget though, the wider effects on so many people who have been violently dislocated from kin and culture. Indeed, let us remember it. Let us have it in the forefront of our minds when we look at indigenous health outcomes, education outcomes, indigenous performance in the business sector, and the unacceptably high unemployment figures for indigenous people. Let us not forget the effects of forced removal policies when we initiate urgent action to address all these areas, when we develop government policies, and when we deliver government services. We must acknowledge the pain and ongoing grief of those affected by the removal policies, and we must take steps to ensure that such practices will never occur again.
In addition to the motion of apology, this government is well underway to introducing freedom of information legislation to the Territory. This will fulfil not only Labor’s important election commitment, but will fulfill recommendation 26 of the Bringing Them Home report. This government makes a commitment to strive towards redressing the situation for those affected by the policies of forcible removal of indigenous children. In so doing, the emphasis is very much on healing - healing for subsequent generations, as well as those directly affected as removed children. The submissions made by the Top End and Central Australian Stolen Generation groups to the Senate Legal and Constitutional Committee Inquiry into the Stolen Generation will be revisited by this government with a view to identifying gaps in appropriate government support.
Yes, the policies were Commonwealth policies. Yes, the Northern Territory government had not yet been formed, but these people are our own - these people are Territorians. The Stolen Generation and their families are incredibly important members of our wider community. They have made, and continue to make, a significant contribution to the Northern Territory, and this government wants to see those who are still suffering the trauma of separation heal.
I note again Sir Ronald Wilson’s words:
Members: Hear, hear!
Mr BURKE (Opposition Leader): Madam Speaker, this is an important debate. It is a debate in which I begin my comments with a great sense of responsibility, particularly as I look around this Chamber and see that there are so many people who will be affected by anything that is said in this Chamber today. I guess it is one of those occasions when, as an individual, you realise the deep responsibility you do bear as a politician in this Chamber. I do say this most sincerely to everyone who is gathered here today - most of whom will most likely disagree with what I say - that one thing you can be sure about me, is that when I speak and say something, I say what I mean and I stand by what I say.
When I first entered politics one of the phrases that struck me, that I came across one day, was that Disraeili, a Prime Minister of Great Britain towards the end of the 19th century, once said: ‘There is no honour in politics’. That is a really sad statement - that politics, as a calling, has been so degraded over time by the actions of politicians, that a prime minister would make that particular observation. It has always been a personal point of view of mine to check myself all the time, and be able to look at myself in the mirror and square off with the person I see because, as my mother always said to me: ‘The only person, really, at the end of the day, you have to convince is the face that stares back at you from that mirror’. There are occasions because of the different responsibilities one bears and jobs that we have, that each of us have to reconsider that particular position.
So, if today, in that context, is a time for apologies, I would like to begin with an apology of my own. I apologise to all those who were led to believe that the new Labor government would apologise to Territorians who were removed from their families because of past Commonwealth policies. I apologise because what we are witnessing today is a sham and it is, quite frankly, a deception. It is a deception against very decent Territorians. It is a sham because the government cannot even agree itself, whether to apologise or not, nor how to do it. It is a deception because this motion that we have before us now was not what the government wanted to debate today.
Today, and in countless debates on this subject, we hear stories of personal hardship and heartbreak. These are harrowing stories - stories of separation and trauma that we all empathise with, and no one could not adopt that point of view. They are also stories of triumph against the odds, stories that we can all admire, stories that exemplify traits of courage, determination and honour, characteristics that we as politicians should all look up to.
But what courage do we perceive in our Chief Minister and her colleagues? What honourable traits do they demonstrate to us with this motion today? Weakness and dishonour are the traits and the clothes that they wear in this debate. Weak, dishonourable and led into this Chamber by our new Chief Minister, our new Chief Minister who plays with deep emotions and the scars of separation as a cat plays with a mouse - carelessly. Once again, our new Chief Minister demonstrates her callous disregard for others in her search for political opportunity, for that is what this debate has eventually settled down to be all about - a chance for political gain regardless of whose feelings are affected.
However, the saddest thing is that. in this debate no one is satisfied, not even our new Chief Minister, because of the hopeless botch-up she and her colleagues have made in bringing this motion forward here today. For the members opposite in this Chamber, I have no sympathy. This mess is your own making. For those Territorians who expected some dignity and honour from our new government through this parliament, I am sorry you have been subjected to such deception. As members of this Chamber are well aware, 24 hours ago the government brought forward another motion as their motion for debate in this Chamber. It began with these words:
The Chief Minister spoke forcefully that this parliament was the only parliament in Australia that had not made such a gesture. She said an apology motion would be one of the first initiatives of her government. Now, for a government whose intent was genuine, whose motives were pure, deciding the words for such a motion should have been a very simple task. The Chief Minister herself said in this Assembly on 18 February 1998:
She told The Australian newspaper yesterday - it is in today’s The Australian newspaper:
Those sentiments have a familiar ring to them but, of course, that was only her firm position at one time yesterday. She has now changed the first paragraph of her motion to read:
What has happened to heartfelt sympathy, sorrow and condolence for those senior Territorians? Those words are gone. Or has your heart gone completely out of the exercise? And why are you so explicit, I ask, about naming the Commonwealth Aboriginals Ordinance? No other parliament, that I am aware of, is so specific. Are you only apologising to the members of the Stolen Generation who were directly affected by this ordinance and this ordinance alone? Are there no members of the Stolen Generation who suffered or were affected under any other law or action? Or are you so sincere about this whole exercise that you have carefully chosen your words to limit any possible liability?
How can you expect anyone to believe you are sincere in your actions after this fiasco? How can anyone believe you really meant it? How can those here to witness this debate be expected to believe now, that this apology is anything more than a cynical political manoeuvre? No one doubts this is a very emotional issue, a very sensitive issue for those people involved, but amongst the community as a whole, the formal offering of an apology is a divisive issue. This government has added a totally new element. It has turned it into high farce.
Back in 1998, the member for Fannie Bay castigated the CLP government for its attitude to an apology motion. She said:
So simple and straight forward that, when she gets her chance to do it, she makes a complete mess of the exercise. The Chief Minister has ditched her principles, her beliefs, and she has dumped on the people who have come to witness her actions.
Exactly what did happen yesterday? What happened at the urgent caucus meeting late yesterday? What happened to make the Chief Minister change her mind yet again? Was she rolled yesterday or was she rolled in the first wording of the apology? One thing we do know is that the Chief Minister has been overruled by her party in this tragic comedy of errors. Or was it a case of the whole Territory parliamentary Labor Party being rolled by the federal member for the Northern Territory, Labor’s left wing enforcer, Warren Snowdon? Perhaps the Chief Minister could tell us just who the honourable member for the Northern Territory rang, and what did he say to get her to roll over.
Yesterday, we had the spectacle of the Chief Minister holding a press conference explaining that her original motion was an apology. More than that, she said the original motion was just what the members of the Stolen Generation wanted. Given the comments of members of the Stolen Generation in the media yesterday, one would have to ask with whom the Chief Minister consulted to get her approval for her original motion. However, notwithstanding the fact that the original motion was, according to the Chief Minister, an apology, and notwithstanding the fact that, according to the Chief Minister it was satisfactory to members of the Stolen Generation, within hours she was back explaining she was changing her motion to include the actual word ‘apologises’. One has to ask, what does she really believe, and what do the individual members of the Labor caucus themselves believe?
We heard in the media yesterday that the motion had to be ‘negotiated’. How many factions are there amongst 13 members that you have to negotiate and renegotiate? Obviously, it was renegotiated in a hurriedly called caucus meeting when they realised - or were told from on high - the huge gaffe that they had made. They then buckled under pressure. One thing for sure is that, from the series of blackflips on this issue, the Labor Party is divided on whether to formally apologise or not, perhaps as divided as the community is on this particular issue.
For example, we now know that the member for Arnhem is adamant there must be an apology. He has said so in this Chamber on a number of occasions. What did he think of the original motion put forward by the Chief Minister? The new member for Millner was savage on Monday about the need for an apology, telling those who may disagree to ‘get used to it’. I wonder how he matched up his comments then, with what his leader gave notice of in this parliament yesterday. However, the new member for Araluen takes a different view. She said in her maiden speech to this Assembly last week that the issue of seeking an apology from the Commonwealth is one that she will make it her business to pursue. She went on and I quote …
Members: Arafura.
Mr BURKE: Arafura, my apologies. She went on:
The Northern Territory government was established long after the events that impacted on my father, and
bears no responsibility for those events.
She was quoted on ABC radio yesterday as saying that people get too hung up on the word ‘sorry’. She was trotted out yesterday to support the original motion to show that it was supported by the Stolen Generation groups, only to have everything she said to the media totally overturned a few hours later. I will be interested to hear her contribution to this debate and how she feels about being totally hung out to dry. But her views do reflect those put to the Senate committee that reported on the Bringing Them Home report. In chapter 4 of the Senate report it says:
When asked to assess the Northern Territory government’s response to Bringing Them Home and the fact that this
response extends to not accepting responsibility for matters that occurred prior to the Territory coming into existence
as a self-governing territory, the Northern Australian Stolen Generation Aboriginal Organisation and the Central
Australia Stolen Generation and Family’s Aboriginal Corporation stated:
The Senate report also noted that the two Stolen Generation organisations believed that an apology concerning them could only come from the Commonwealth government, not the Northern Territory government.
On this issue my colleagues and I cannot speak for what the Commonwealth government or parliament should do in this matter, nor do we believe we can speak for Territorians on this issue. I can stand here, as an individual, and say I am sorry for what happened to many of these people. I regret the misguided policies that caused such trauma and sadness, not just to those taken away but also to the mothers who were left behind. I can and do say that emphatically on my own behalf. But I cannot, and will not, pretend to say it for others. That is for them to decide.
I certainly do not believe it is my right, or the right of anybody, to apologise on behalf of the Territory government or the Territory parliament - or even more importantly, by default - on behalf of all Territorians. That is something for each and every Territorian to decide.
I do know that we have always taken the position, like the members of the Stolen Generation groups, the member for Arafura, and sometimes, the Chief Minister, that the Northern Territory as a political entity did not exist and had no responsibility for any of the policies that produced the Stolen Generation. It is, therefore, illogical for it as an entity to apologise. That position remains unchanged. However, it is the responsibility of the Northern Territory government to do all it can to help and assist those Territorians.
As the Senate committee report I previously mentioned noted, the CLP in government did exactly that. As far back as 1978, the CLP government in one of its first acts, amended the child placement policy to incorporate the principle that ensured Aboriginal children up for adoption for whatever reason would first of all be placed with the families or extended families. Amongst other forms of ongoing support, the CLP government sponsored the Going Home conference at Kormilda College in 1994. The CLP government gave both cash and in-kind support to the Territory Stolen Generation Reference Group to prepare their submission in 1994 and 1995. The CLP government provided grants to set up an office for the group in 1996 and 1997, and the government made grants to enable Danila Dilba to provide counselling services for those affected by the discredited policies that produced the Stolen Generation. In 1997, the CLP government put in place a protocol to enable easier access to any Northern Territory records that could help those members of the Stolen Generation researching their family histories. The CLP government acknowledged the existence of the Stolen Generation, it repudiated the policies that had caused it and it did all it could to help whenever assistance was called for.
It is worth remembering that this parliament did pass a motion in 1998 endorsing actions of support to those Territorians who were adversely affected by the previous policies and practices of Commonwealth governments under which children were separated from their mothers and their families. The motion recognised the valuable contribution many of these victims of Commonwealth policy had made to the social, economic, and political development of the Territory, and acknowledged the personal trauma which many have suffered.
However, the motion we have before us today has been so degraded by the internal politics of the Labor Party, that I do not believe anyone will be able to walk away from this Assembly believing they have received a sincere and heartfelt apology of some sort. While we have maintained that it is a divisive issue within our community to offer a formal apology on behalf of all Territorians, we acknowledge the hurt felt by the members of the Stolen Generation. Today, I believe, that they have been further hurt by the insincere, cynical, and farcical way they have been treated by this Labor government. They are not political play things, they deserve better than this. I believe they have endured enough.
Disraeili said: ‘There is no honour in politics’. Perhaps it is past time we all search for some. Today, in this Chamber, the government has been found wanting.
Madam SPEAKER: Before we go on, I wish to remind guests in the gallery that it is convention in this House to listen in silence. It is also the convention to remain seated. If you do not wish to remain seated then I suggest you leave the gallery. Remember, it is convention and courteous to treat the Chamber in this way.
Mr AH KIT (Transport and Infrastructure Development): Madam Speaker, before I start my contribution to the debate in the paper I have to present, I cannot resist taking issue with the Leader of the Opposition and the comments he made. To me, it was a very dismal performance and one expected better. This former Chief Minister, the Leader of the Opposition, knows very well that there are mechanisms in this House for him to move amendments to motions. He stands here and criticises our Chief Minister and our government but he is not prepared to do anything …
Mr Burke: It is your motion, your action, not ours.
Mr AH KIT: I will ask the Leader of the Opposition to hear me in silence and provide me with a bit of courtesy, as I did him.
He knows that there are mechanisms in this House to move amendments to the motion. If he feels strongly about it, he should not stand up there and criticise. Get your busy heads going, the whole 10 of you, and put up an amendment and make it stronger if you so desire. We know what you said on the radio, that your members will not be supporting this motion in this Chamber today. I just heard you again - you contradict yourself again. You say: ‘Well it is up to each individual’. I certainly hope some of the members of the opposition take advantage of that and speak out truthfully on how they feel about this particular debate.
Seven years ago, hundreds of the Stolen Generation held a conference in Darwin called Going Home. Among other things, they called for the simple justice of an apology from the governments of Australia. Many of those who attended are here today, and you are most welcome. Sadly, many passed away before this Northern Territory parliament - the second last in the nation to do so - finally brought itself to listen to that plea.
As a young Warramungu girl living on her traditional lands north of Tennant Creek, my mother was rounded up and sent to The Bungalow in Alice Springs. She was given the name Stella Tennant, a lifetime reminder for her of the place she was abducted from. It was something she never spoke about. She never talked to us about her Warramungu heritage, her language, or her culture. It was something I always wondered about as I was growing up and coming to terms with my Aboriginality. It was something I thought deeply about as I tried to work out what my heritage was and where my people came from.
Life as a young man for me then was like a huge jigsaw puzzle, but some pieces just did not fit. It was not until many years later, when I went off to study and started to learn about history and politics, that some of the pieces of the jigsaw finally started to fall into place. It was not until then that I became comfortable about my heritage and understood for the first time the terrible things my mother must have gone through. Of all the acts of inhumanity that have faced our people since our land was taken from us, the deliberate government and church sponsored policies of the abduction of our children must rate as the single worst policy choice of the last 200 years or so.
I doubt there is a single Aboriginal family in the Northern Territory that has not had at least one of their relations stolen. I doubt there is a single family which has not been scarred and damaged by those church and state policies. So, where does this leave the kids and their descendants who were abducted from their traditional lands? For those whose connections with land are two or three generations and hundreds of kilometres apart; for those whose language and culture were, in some cases, flogged out of them by church and state; or for those who have been unable to find a link with their lost families; it leaves us now with the power of knowledge. We know we are Aboriginal people and we are proud of it. Through the power of knowledge we have learnt to reject the notions of assimilation. These ideas were sponsored by sections of the media and, in part, at least, by the former government.
With our own knowledge, we have rejected the notion that there are real Aboriginal people - those of us living and working out bush - and gammon Aboriginal people - those of us in the towns and cities. We have also learnt to reject the politics of exclusion that tried to tell us that there are real Territorians who believe in progress and the rest of us, usually black fellows, who stand in the way of progress.
The election of the Martin Labor government shows that people of the Northern Territory want to move on. We know it is time to move on from the politics of exclusion, to embrace the opportunities presented by inclusion. That is why we are making this parliamentary apology today. It is not - I repeat, not - an appeal to guilt; quite the opposite. It is a way of saying to the whole world that the Stolen Generation of Aboriginal people refuse to be considered as just victims of historic injustice. It is our way of telling the world that the Stolen Generation will have some control over our histories and create their own futures. It is a way of saying that the Stolen Generation have a real and continuing connection with the families and country that were alienated from them by the policies of past governments, and the hope that those links will be restored in the future.
As Barbara Cummings wrote some years ago: ‘There are mothers all over the Northern Territory waiting for their kids to return’. This parliamentary apology is a dedication to those mothers and a memorial to the families who had their children abducted from them. The consequences of this apology will not be seen this week, or even this year. They will be achievements that will not be fully realised until the healing process, begun by this apology, can be appreciated by our children and grandchildren. And it is the children and grandchildren of all Territorians who will ultimately benefit from this apology.
In years to come, it is when our children and grandchildren have cause to refer to this day, they will understand the simple justice of it. They will understand we have apologised and moved on. We have recognised and acknowledged the past and grown stronger together because of it. It is only then that we will have brought simple justice back home to this parliament. When members opposite vote on this motion, I would ask you to consider this. Think of all the great words that describe grandmothers - respected, loving, wise, nurturing, caring. It is a long and deserving list.
Because my mother was taken, I do not know who my maternal grandmother is, and I will never know. In these difficult times that we now face in the world, let today stand as a moment of tolerance and togetherness, in a world that surely needs as much tolerance and understanding as it can get. Let us cross the line and walk together.
My final call today is a personal one, and is from the bottom of my heart. I appeal to all members here, let us all support this motion and understand that we can bring all Territorians together, that is what matters today. I am deeply sorry that the Stolen Generation had these terrible things happen to them. I am sorry for my family, and I am sorry on behalf of this government. To all the people and their families gathered here today, and also to those families who are unable to be here with us, this parliament will apologise when the motion is passed. It is a great day for me and my family, and it is a great day for all Territorians.
I was deeply moved when, in April last year, our champion footballer, Michael Long, published a letter on the front page of The Age newspaper in response to the federal government’s attacks on the Stolen Generation. I want to read that letter out and then table it. There is a part of the letter that I find where the language is a bit strong and I will not be able to read that out, obviously. But I will, with your indulgence, read out the letter for the record because I find that this letter is quite to the point:
I seek leave to table that.
Leave granted.
Ms SCRYMGOUR (Arafura): Madam Speaker, I already outlined in my maiden speech last week the background to my own personal commitment to this issue. Since last week I have been trying to get some factual information, because it is very clear that there is a real lack of understanding about Stolen Generation matters.
Firstly, I do want to say to those members of the Stolen Generation that I am sorry if it was construed or seen in any way that myself or this government, in terms of the apology, is not genuine. It is genuine. If you guys can sit there and think that there is no emotion and there is no genuineness in saying sorry - I will say sorry to them because I think that the way it was handled was appalling, but it was taken all out of context.
Going to what the Leader of the Opposition said - and it makes me a bit angry because I am having to defend myself in relation to claims that the version of the motion that we distributed yesterday constituted an embarrassing backdown. What utter nonsense! I challenge anyone in this Chamber to look me in the eye and accuse me of backing down on my quest to seek justice for my father and his contemporaries.
Last night, there was a story on ABC television news which featured a very short and selective extract from an interview with me. The extract stated we should not get too hung up on the word ‘sorry’, which the Leader of the Opposition had pointed out. The context of what I was saying, which included my concern about ensuring the responsibility was sheeted home to the Commonwealth, was inexplicably left out. Naive? Yes, very naive - lesson learnt. If we stop to think that we have got no lessons to learn in this life, well, let us give up. I have learnt a lesson in this. It is a shame though, that all too often the detail and the balancing in reporting - and when we talk about indigenous issues all the time - that this is always sacrificed for the sake of an emphasis on perceived conflict and contentiousness.
What I still want to do is actually point to a number of facts in terms of where we were coming from, in terms of the Aboriginals Ordinance official policy documentation and archival material. In relation to the period between 1918 and 1940, it revealed that children were removed - and this is what the Chief Minister highlighted in her statement - because of the colour of their skin. The aim was to prevent them from absorbing the culture and the language of their Aboriginal families and to try and assimilate them into the non-Aboriginal population.
Secondly, in the period after the World War II, up until the significant amendments that were made to the ordinance in 1953, patrol officers tasked with the implementing of the removals policy started questioning. Their concerns are reflected in memorandum correspondence of the time.
Thirdly, I am not a lawyer and I do not profess to be a lawyer, but in my view, the way the Commonwealth was let off the hook in all of these cases – Alex Kruger and others, Lorna Cubillo and Peter Gunner - is what I call getting off on a technicality. Finally, although we are debating the motion, we should not be debating on the removals under the Aboriginals Ordinance - there should be full support from both sides of government. To answer the Leader of the Opposition, we have not forgotten that which was enforced between 1918 and 1957.
I also want to make the point - and something that we have not forgotten - that the more subtle, but equally destructive, assimilationist child welfare practices did continue - and they continued under the Commonwealth administration of the Northern Territory - right up until self-government. Many of the parents affected had themselves been removed and institutionalised under the Aboriginals Ordinance, and the fostering out or adoption of their own children perpetuated a pattern of loss and dislocation that has extended through two or three generations.
Before I sit down and hand over to the next person, I have to say that what the opposition has failed to bring up with a lot of this is, for the first time in the history of the 26 years of this parliament, the people have spoken. Indigenous people have said: ‘We do not like what is happening’. We have listened. Clare Martin has probably shown more leadership than any Chief Minister in your government. We are inclusive and we are showing that.
Mr BONSON (Millner): Madam Speaker, I stand before this House today a very humble man because I look around and see many friends and families in this gallery today who have shown a lot of character and leadership when listening to the ex-Chief Minister give an explanation of his weak stand on this issue to do with an apology. The character and class that you have shown today shows me why people have survived. I cannot stand here today without thinking of the opportunities I have been given, when compared to the Australian people known as the Stolen Generation. I note the member for Arnhem’s struggle for Aboriginal identity and I understand where he is coming from. I now know my ancestry. I look around today and see many faces that I know who are descendants from the Stolen Generation. Welcome, one and all.
I will give a speech based on Stolen Generation experiences. I would like to use material contained in the document Between Two Worlds, which extracts I will table. I believe this will help explain the history behind this issue. I cannot speak for all the Stolen Generation, only some. However, I hope today to show leadership. I hope to outline in words my thoughts on this matter. I do not want to blame any person who, through their deeds and actions, participated in the removal of Aboriginal children. What I do hope to do is recognise that throughout the last century, many Aboriginal people over many generations were affected by the policy of removing children.
For many people of the Northern Territory the Stolen Generation means many things and an apology has many different consequences. The fact is, an apology will be given and the only real change to people has been symbolic. That symbolism is important to healing old wounds that run deep throughout Australia. I firmly hope this is another step towards healing and reconciliation. The following paragraph is taken out of the preface of Between Two Worlds, and this paragraph I hope will assist in being a description of what I hope this apology will achieve:
A report by the Parliament of the Commonwealth of Australia, author J W Bleakley, 1928:
I would like now to read a letter that my grandmother, Daisy Ruddick, wrote in 1938:
Chapter 13, Coming Home:
I seek leave to table these documents.
Leave granted.
Madam SPEAKER: I would like to advise honourable members of the presence in the gallery of Senator Aden Ridgeway. On behalf of honourable members, I extend a warm welcome.
Members: Hear, hear!
Mr McADAM (Barkly): Madam Speaker, I rise to support the motion. I wish to acknowledge the members of the Stolen Generation from the Barkly who have travelled a long distance from Tennant Creek to be here for this historic occasion. I especially acknowledge Annie Lane; Annie Phillips and her daughter, Ruth; Agatha Liddy; Dora Dawson and her daughter, June; and Nellie Waddel, who are all here today. Special thanks to Colleen Aplin for driving the people up here. Joyce Schroder Naparula, unfortunately, could not be here today as she is in Adelaide, and also Vera Doran, who is in Port Hedland. She wanted to be here but could not make it. I also want to acknowledge Lorna Cubillo who was taken from her family at Phillip Creek in my electorate. Lorna has fought as hard as anyone to secure justice for the Stolen Generation.
These women I have mentioned were forcibly removed from their families, community and culture. They went on to overcome adversity and accomplish great things. However, nothing can give them back the childhood they were denied, or the experience of belonging - belonging to their mothers, belonging to their fathers, belonging to their brothers, belonging to their sisters, and belonging to their wider extended families. They have spent a lifetime of regret of what could have been. They were told they were not wanted and that nobody cared. They endured stresses of unacceptable magnitude. Their wounds are evident and their self-esteem tested beyond belief. Many had children who had also spent time in institutions, as this was their family history or what they were familiar with. Their parenting role model, if you like - they had no measure of family. This background only exemplifies their great achievements, the achievements of showing resilience in the face of incredible adversity. Most have returned to the Barkly where they have drawn on the strengths of one another, where they have grieved together, to begin their own healing.
These women and their families have shown an extraordinary capacity to survive and pass on their love and warmth to family and to the community, and for that I congratulate them. I also pay tribute to them for their fight for justice on this critical social issue. For us, they teach us. They make a powerful statement about Australia’s shared history and lessons for future policy-makers. I am advised by the Stolen Generation members that the healing process, so important to them, cannot occur without an apology, without the acknowledgement this motion provides, without the story of this abhorrent history being publicly known.
I urge members opposite to support this motion, because whilst there is a political culture of denial and a sweeping of difficult issues under the carpet, then these people will have no opportunity to rest their suffering and move on. Nothing can give them back what was taken, but with this motion we can begin to help them forward.
Members opposite should be aware that we are seeing a new maturation in the Territory community - a leaving behind of the entrenched, failed positions, a new beginning where, hopefully, members opposite can work with the government, and we with them, in a climate of bipartisan cooperation for the benefit of all. I congratulate the Martin Labor government for having the political courage to take on the difficult issue of the apology to the Stolen Generation, and I call on members opposite to join us in supporting this motion.
Mr WOOD (Nelson): Madam Speaker, there was a wise old fellow in the Old Testament who once said we should live justly, love tenderly and walk humbly. What I have to say today I hope encompasses these words, because the motion put before us today by the government is one that requires such a response. This will be my response as I believe I cannot speak for others. It comes from the heart, and it comes from what I know personally and what I have been told by others. Although some may not agree with what I say, nevertheless to speak otherwise would be dishonest.
History is a strange thing. Some regard it as a science, philosophy, a memory, an opinion, a tool, or just a useful piece of information used to support a viewpoint. History can be ancient or modern or recent. History can be confusing, opinionated, imprecise, judgmental, omissive and, occasionally, speculative. History can be the truth for some and a lie for others. For me, that is the difficulty I have when dealing with this whole debate. Much of what I say today is about history and how that history has been interpreted. It is what we remember and how we are affected today by those memories. You can judge for yourself about my interpretation.
So, where to start? Perhaps an abridged story about myself. It was Melbourne in 1970, and I had studied horticultural science and felt the need to use that knowledge to help Aboriginals. Why I had that desire may have had something to do with my religious upbringing, but who knows? After all, I was enjoying life: footy, tennis, and girls were interesting, too. I was also wondering if my number would come up for a trip for Vietnam. I felt there was more to life than just doing what everyone else was doing, and before I knew it, I was at the Daly River Mission, now known as Nauiyu Nambiyu As the song says: I was only nineteen.
The shift from a white, comfortable, middle-class background with the modern amenities of the day, to a lonely outpost, hot, humid, mosquitoes, snakes, a Sidney Williams hut, no electricity, no TV, little sport, Slim Dusty and Charley Pride, and a people whom I had never seen except for Lionel Rose, was sudden and dramatic. I could have been on another planet.
I met my wife there, Imelda, a Wagait, who was born at Channel Point near the mouth of the Daly River. Her mother was a full-blood Aborigine and Dad, who is still alive today, was part-Aboriginal and part-Chinese. Her grandfather was called Mr Morgan, and he sailed a sampan around the coast, something I only found out last night.
Imelda was declared an Aboriginal, and here is her certificate to prove it under the Declaration of Persons as an Aboriginal:
Harry Morgan, the father of Alda (Imelda) Morgan, six years of age, has requested me to declare Alda Morgan
an aboriginal within the meaning of the Aboriginals Ordinance. Harry Morgan has made his request in writing
and in it states that Alda Morgan is of part aboriginal descent. I believe his statement to be correct. In accordance
with the provisions of the ordinance I consider that a declaration would be in the best interests of Alda Morgan
for the following reasons:
She is part aboriginal;
Her mother is a full-blood aborigine, she resides at Delissaville;
She has always been a subject of the ordinance prior to it coming into operation as ordinance 9 of 1953;
Her social standards are primitive;
She associates with full-blood aboriginals and she seeks them out for companionship.
Signed the Acting Director of Native Affairs.
She had come to Daly River Mission with her father and brothers and sisters because their mother had leprosy and could not be cared for at Delissaville, now Belyuen. Her mother, Kitty, died from that leprosy. She was cared for by the sisters, and one of the Territory’s greatest humanitarians, Dr Hargreaves, at East Arm.
My main work at the Daly River was growing fruit and vegetables during the day, and looking after young Aboriginal boys from the cattle stations during the evenings and at weekends. At one time, I looked after 30 boys. We had many great experiences - movies and boxing at night, with Friday night left for the band, which specialised in Elvis Presley music. Hunting and fishing were the norm on the weekend.
In 1973, I married Imelda at the mission, but was told by the Bishop that because of that, I could no longer live there, and had to find another place to live and work. I eventually moved to another community on an island, but there, I had to get approval from the elders, because by now we had our first child who was of mixed race. It is interesting to note that 20 years before I was married, if I had lived with my wife without being married I would now have a criminal record, because I could have been sentenced to three months gaol or 100 fine or both. This law applied up to 1953.
Imelda and I have been married for 28 years, we have three daughters. Angela is now the manager of DEETYA in Kununurra. Caroline trained as a ringer at Mataranka Station as part of a Katherine Rural College course, and became, perhaps, one of the first female ringers ever to work at Wave Hill Station. She married a ringer and now has three children, and I suppose you could call them all dead ringers. She now works at Batchelor Institute. My last daughter, Joanne, works at computer desktop publishing, also at the Batchelor Institute.
I would like to also detail a number of other stories related to me by my family and my friends. There is an Aboriginal lady who used to work with me in the garden at Daly River who, when young, had a child by a local worker. On the day the child was born everyone was excited, including my wife and her sisters. A nun took the child, and when they asked where the child was, they were told it had died. In fact, it had been put on a plane that day. It was not until a few years ago that the boy found his mother, who still lives on the Daly. The nun has since personally apologised, and her order has also said: ‘We sincerely and deeply regret any hurt, however unwittingly caused, to any child in our care’.
My nephew on my wife’s side, born about 30 years ago, has an Aboriginal mother and an unknown white father. He was also born on a nearby island community, but the traditional owners would not allow the child to stay there. My brother-in-law adopted him and he was raised on the Daly River. Again, there is a case of twins being born to an Aboriginal family on the same island. It was not acceptable to keep both, one of the twins was left to die on the beach. One of the nuns heard about it, found the child, and both children are alive today.
My friend Ungunmeer at Daly River had her sister taken away - same mother, white father. The law said a white person could not cohabit with an Aboriginal. Part of the punishment was likely to be the removal of the child, and so it was. There is a lady at Howard Springs called Marjorie, who said she is glad she is adopted. She does not like to be called Aboriginal, she says she is coloured or half-caste, and she is adamant about that.
I have also listened to the stories from my friends on the government side, the honourable members for Arafura and Millner, from Arnhem and from Barkly. I have listened to what they had to say, but I make no comment about the rights or wrongs of all these stories. I use them to highlight the fact that history is not straightforward. There have been many things which today we would say were wrong. They were done in the context of the thinking of the day. Today’s standards are different, today’s thinking is different.
Therefore, shouldn’t we also be careful that in saying sorry to one group of people in an effort to right an injustice of the past, we do not create an injustice to other groups that also should be recognised as part of a stolen generation? For instance, there were others who were affected by a period in our history when the removal of children was a common practice in attempts to solve a perceived problem. I speak here specifically of those mothers whose children were removed by subtle pressure, based on the stigma of bearing a child out of wedlock. It was not the done thing to have a child when you were not married; it was a shame job. How many of these women were grief-stricken at the loss of their child? Those people deserve an apology, too.
There were others, too, who were not accepted by their own communities and had to live elsewhere - should we not say sorry to them? Then we have the British children who were sent to Australia after the war. Many of these young people never saw their parents again. Their homes were far, far away and they were stolen, too. Should we not say sorry to them? I think so.
To me, to say sorry without also recognising the good that many people had in their hearts, and showed by example through their deeds, is simply wrong. Of course, not everyone acted properly, because we are all humans and have our faults, but let us neither forget nor condemn those who did their best to help Aboriginal people. Whether they were missionaries, patrol officers, welfare workers, policemen, government officials, it is wrong to judge and condemn them for all the wrongs of the past. Many of these people thought they were doing the best for the child.
From my own experience, there were good and bad people in these days, just as today. I would be remiss if I did not at least remember those many people like Sister Marita and others who lived their whole lives giving. They worked tirelessly under very poor conditions, with a love for Aboriginal people that had no bounds. If we say sorry to the Stolen Generation without recognising their contribution, it is a selfish, self-centred sorry. If we recognise them for what they were, and what they tried to do, with all their faults, then it is a just sorry. After all, to say each child was removed for exactly the same reason is simplifying the facts without understanding the individuality of each case. To say, as this motion says, this was due to the implementation of the assimilation policy, is just too general and too simplistic.
I believe there are others who should say sorry: the land councils who did not always protect the traditional owners, as in my wife’s case, but support those who are noisy, clever, articulate and pretend to have a claim; some of the Aboriginal clans that still have a long-standing and deep animosity towards one another, sometimes reflected in violence; those people who do not accept native title and have very little understanding of the fact that Aboriginal people owned this land not so very long ago - does anyone ever recognise that the estates of Dundee and Channel Point were Wagait land within living memory?; and those people on both sides who have a big racial chip on their shoulders and cannot get rid of it.
In summary, this whole issue is not simple, it is not straightforward. I will say sorry for the things that happened, even though I am personally not to blame, especially to the Stolen Generation. My apology will be also directed to all those mothers, fathers and children, Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal, who suffered because of the policies of the day. After all, pain and sorrow has no racial bounds. I will, at the same time, recognise the good people who tried, and are still trying, to help Aboriginal people, not for any self-centred satisfaction, but because of a genuine desire to help fellow human beings.
I hope that my 14 years of working with Aborigines at Daly River and Bathurst Island, and my support for indigenous rights, and for the Darwin Harbour through the concept of native title, at least, are partly recognised as a practical and genuine concern. I would be remiss if I did not recognise the work the previous government has done in assisting and helping with the Going Home conference, counselling, office space and other assistance.
We cannot dwell on the past. If we say sorry, so what? We might get a warm feeling, but if that is all this is about today, if there is no moving forward after an apology, if there are no practical goals set by both sides to obtain real outcomes in education, health, housing, employment, respect for elders, tolerance and a spiritual yearning, then everything said today is just hot air. This motion before us does not lead on to a new era, it dwells on the past. For me, in saying sorry or giving an apology, there must be a forgiveness by the party to which the apology is extended and then together, move on. Words are useless if there is no change.
I have agonised for the last few days over this motion. I have read books, I have spoken to many, many people. In fact, I have probably done a little extra praying. I thank my friend here for his assistance as well. I have spoken to people on both sides of the House and I thank them for their advice. I will neither vote for this motion nor oppose it; I will abstain. The government has tried to do its best and I recognise that, and there are people in the government who are very genuine in what they are trying to do, and I applaud them for that.
I cannot support the motion. For me, there are generalisations and rhetoric in this motion that I would dispute, and to generalise can create more injustice. There is no recognition of the people who did their best for the benefit of Aboriginal people. There is no statement of moving on, the motion is about the past. Perhaps I should have feelings of injustice, but I do not hold anything against the Bishop of Darwin for asking my wife and I to leave Daly River, or those elders who sent my nephew away from his island home. My wife is now an assistant teacher, my children are making a success of their lives. They are moving on, and so should we.
Neither will I oppose this motion, because this motion has good intent and a total rebuff just panders to those - and I am not here referring to members on this side who oppose this motion; I am referring to those who do not understand, never want to understand, or simply cannot understand. I do believe that the Leader of the Opposition is genuine when he says he is sorry.
To oppose this motion would also send out the wrong message, because I do care. In hindsight, perhaps this whole issue may have been handled better if we could have let this motion sit on the table to be debated by the people, and then to see if all the sides could have come up with an acceptable motion which addresses the concerns of all. This may have been a good opportunity for reconciliation.
So, I abstain. This is my way. It is not avoiding this issue, it is the only way I can honestly express my independent view. But I do have one last apology. I mentioned before that I looked after 30 boys in the dormitory at Daly River. They ranged in age from about nine to 16. Before they reached the age of 21, half of them had died because of alcohol. They would have been in their 40s today. One generation missing; a culture if not destroyed, crippled for life - that is my Stolen Generation, and for that I will always be deeply saddened and very sorry. I hope I can help do something in this parliament to stop that happening again.
Mr STIRLING (Leader of Government Business): Madam Speaker, I do not wish to dignify the Leader of the Opposition’s lack of support for this motion with a detailed response of my own, other than to say and put on the record my very clear disappointment of both his, and the opposition members’, inability to reach inside and find the compassion necessary to support a motion such as this. Second, I want to put on the record my view that it is hypocrisy in the extreme to accuse this government of not going far enough with the motion. No matter what form it hit the desks of this Assembly, it was never going to be supported by the opposition, and you do not get any more hypocritical than that. The third point I wanted to make was, whilst I commend the former government for their financial support of the Stolen Generation and their work in the Northern Territory, it was, in fact, Commonwealth money delivered to the Northern Territory: it was incumbent on them to pass that money on to them.
In relation to member for Nelson, and what I found to be a very powerful and moving testimony of his own experience, I say to him that it is genuine attempt on behalf of this government to say sorry. It is a genuine attempt to facilitate and help those to move on and find closure, with an acknowledgement by the government of the Northern Territory, that it is so, that this Assembly is able to say sorry for those who can, at that level, find closure. We would hope it will move relations on to the new era that you believe in your own heart should have been embodied in this motion. I totally agree with you and totally support you in what you are saying, but I do not believe that those other areas ought to have been part of this motion today. I thank you for your very moving contribution.
After the war, the forcible removal of Aboriginal children in the Northern Territory recommenced. Patrol officers were required to report on the presence of children of mixed descent living in Aboriginal communities, and make arrangements for their removal to settlements and mission homes. The Northern Territory Stolen Generation submission to the National Inquiry into the Separation of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Children from their Families, included this description:
We are all moved by the stories told in the Bringing Them Home report. We are all touched too, by the many stories told to us by our neighbours, our work colleagues, our friends - fellow Territorians - who are forever affected by these past policies. In the Northern Territory, members of the Stolen Generation and their families are sporting heroes, businessmen and women, community leaders, volunteers and fellow workers. They may also be people who are having difficulty reconciling the past that robbed them of family experiences for no other reason than their descent. The issue of apology is one that enables parliament to fully and frankly express our sorrow to those people who live in our midst, who make up the community to which we all belong.
My own experience of working with and knowing people affected by the removal policies, is that many have good jobs, have contributed much to our community, and make it the place that we all love living in so much. But all would have preferred to have remained with their parents, despite the fact that in terms of income, employment, and levels of education attainment, they may have been better off than if they had remained with their families all those years ago. Their hurt, their sense of loss, is not dissipated in any way by the various successes each have made of their lives.
There are those who say that an apology is an empty gesture. They may say that it is meaningless, but clearly, it is important to many of those who remain affected by the policies of forced removal. It is important for us all, as a community, to acknowledge that there were such policies; that this tragedy occurred; that the suffering has continued to be felt through generations. It is particularly important for parliaments, as the people’s representatives, to formally recognise that these injustices were perpetrated under misguided government policies, instead of trying to pretend that it did not happen.
Why should it be parliaments in particular? Listen to the words of one of those affected:
In 1996 Sir William Deane said:
It is a tremendous honour for to be Minister for Aboriginal Affairs in the first Labor Territory government. I have a strong personal commitment to lasting and positive change for indigenous Territorians. This government’s path is set on being inclusive of all Territorians. As much as we celebrate the richness and uniqueness that indigenous Territorians bring to our community, we recognise, at the same time, the pressing and urgent need to redress the disadvantaged, which too many years of misguided policies and practices have resulted in. This government is committed to this goal. We are committed to real and lasting reconciliation between indigenous and non-indigenous Territorians. This motion is just one first, but important, step towards that goal.
As the Chief Minister said, the government will soon introduce freedom of information legislation. We will revisit the submissions made by Northern Territory Stolen Generation groups to last years Senate inquiry, and we will do whatever we can to assist in the healing process. I can say, as well, that if a reparations tribunal and associated funding comes about federally, this government will support the concept of control resting with Stolen Generation groups.
This government, the federal government and all other jurisdictional governments are the body politic. They are the only authorities that can issue an apology to the Stolen Generation. That is why the Chief Minister has presented this motion. That is why everyone of us in this Assembly should be supporting it in its entirety.
Dr TOYNE (Attorney-General): Madam Speaker, the motion before us is a very simple proposition: do we or do we not offer an apology to the Stolen Generation? I will begin by responding to that proposition. I am sorry for what happened to the people of the Stolen Generation. I am sorry, very personally, to the people in this House today. I congratulate you on your survival, and I feel absolutely no hesitation in offering an apology to you.
This motion is about being human, of having resolved feelings, a place of belonging, a place in the community that cares - in short, a secure identity. We either stand on a secure identity or we spend our lives searching for one. Those of us who stand outside the families of the Stolen Generation can only imagine the depths of their loss. For me, the story of my close friend Peter Gunner symbolises the cost.
Peter showed enormous courage in joining Lorna Cubillo in a class action aimed at testing the claims of the Stolen Generation. I saw the terrible cost to Peter, of recalling and relating the traumatic experiences of his life as he gave the evidence. For Peter, the case offered no closure, only painful recollection. He remains, he prevails, supported by the sympathy of his rediscovered kin in Utopia, but separated from them by the lack of a shared upbringing and heritage.
It feels entirely right to say I am sorry today, because today I am saying sorry to Peter for what happened to him as a result of a tragic and misguided policy. In offering this apology to Peter, I am offering it through him to all the members of the Stolen Generation. To support someone else is to be more human yourself.
Madam Speaker, I support the motion.
Mr HENDERSON (Industries and Business): Madam Speaker, to say sorry is difficult. It requires courage and principle, empathy and understanding. We usually say sorry with the benefit of hindsight. It is not often that we deliberately make mistakes. To know that you have made a mistake, to admit it to yourself and others, and to offer an apology is the right thing to do. It is the mature thing to do, and our Legislative Assembly has matured very quickly during the first sittings of the Ninth Assembly.
The members of the Legislative Assembly who are here today did not make any decisions regarding the removal of children from their families during the years of the lost and neglected generation. However, part of the honour and privilege of being elected members of parliament is the responsibility we have to the present and future generations - as well as to the past - recognising what happened in the past. I support the Chief Minister’s motion of apology to people who were removed from their families as an appropriate, necessary and important part of the healing process.
On 18 August, the Northern Territory decided to move forward. We are moving away from guilt and blame, emotions that should not be part of this debate, and we are moving towards a more mature society - an open and inclusive society. Part of this movement forward is the painful and necessary process of saying sorry - painful because it often brings up unwanted memories and emotions; necessary because we were one of the few places in Australia where the lost generation has had a palpable impact, from our red heart to our tropical north.
The Northern Territory is blessed for its cultural diversity. We value highly our bright and vibrant community which provides the Territory with such a distinct identity. We are blessed that we have so many members of the Aboriginal family within our borders, contributing to our community. It is essential that everybody feels welcomed and valued within our society. Our apology today is an important issue for many people, but it is of tremendous importance to our Aboriginal people.
It has been my pleasure in my 20 years in the Northern Territory to befriend many people within the Aboriginal community. Today I will talk briefly about Hilda Muir - Aunty Hilda to all of us on this side of the House - someone who is very special and has contributed so much to this debate. Her family and friends love her dearly, and there are many hundreds of them in Darwin and the Northern Territory. For me, she is one of the reasons why my heart tugs when I talk about the lost and neglected generation. Aunty Hilda has been able to join us, she is in the gallery today. I have asked her permission to tell some of her story and I hope I do not embarrass her. I am quoting from Hilda Muir’s reminiscence:
Aunty Hilda is understandably upset that she never saw her mother again. Hilda holds no bitter feelings towards anyone, she is one of the sweetest people you could ever meet. She does have regrets, though, and it is always the small things that are the most palpable, the words you do not get to say. Hilda would like to go back and see her mother, to hug her mother and say: ‘I love you very much and I am sorry if I was naughty’. I hope that today, Aunty Hilda, this motion in our parliament gives you some measure of comfort. Hilda is a very wise woman, and I appreciate immensely her opinion on how and why we are here in the Chamber debating this motion today. Hilda described today’s motion and our Chief Minister as ‘compassionate, wonderful and mature’.
Saying sorry is about acknowledging the past, about healing the wound, about moving on. The Territory, and this Assembly, have a great opportunity to move forward on many issues in many areas. We have been given a mandate for change, for a breath of fresh air. While everything we do in the Assembly is important, today’s motion will probably have a greater emotional impact on some people’s lives than anything else we will do in this parliament. This Assembly, our government, is committed to working in partnership with the people of the Northern Territory to build a better Territory. Partnership is more than a message or a theme, it has real substance.
The best chance for the Northern Territory, and all of us who live here, lies in our working together. Today, saying sorry costs us nothing, but it has real substance for the people who were affected.
Mrs AAGAARD (Health, Family and Children’s Services): Madam Speaker, I feel privileged to be part of a government that is formally recording an apology to those among us who have been so affected by the policies and practices of Commonwealth governments in the past. Perhaps, in the Northern Territory, this motion has more resonance than anywhere else in Australia, as we live together with the knowledge and results of these measures. I support the motion of an apology wholeheartedly as a public expression of sorrow and regret for actions that have made such a significant impact on the lives of our people here.
I suppose the first time I ever heard anything about young Aboriginal children being taken to missions and other institutions throughout Australia, including the Northern Territory, was as a child at Sunday school in Brisbane, and later as a student at a church school. My family, along with many families from all the different Christian denominations, gave generous donations to missions who were caring for Aboriginal children. I am sure many members of this House, on both sides, would belong to families who did the same.
I remember seeing brochures of beautiful young Aboriginal children who were in the care of the church missions, and thinking that I was happy that my family supported such projects. It was my understanding at the time, bearing in mind I was very young, that the children had been abandoned by their parents or orphaned. I really did not think much more about this until I first heard about the Bringing Them Home report, authored by Sir Ronald Wilson, a friend to many of us on this side of the House, and I am sure to many in the public gallery today; and Mr Mick Dodson. I remember thinking could these stories be really true? Had all those young Aboriginal children my family, and so many other families, had supported through church missions really been treated like that? It seemed incredible to me.
In October 1997, I attended a sorry ceremony between the Uniting Church - the church which encompasses the previous Presbyterian and Methodist Churches in Australia - and the people who had been children at Crocker Island Mission which had been a Methodist Mission from 1941 to 1967, at the Nightcliff Uniting Church. The Uniting Church, even though it was not the church at the time of the events, acknowledged complicity in the government policy of the day - that is to assimilate Aboriginal children into mainstream society. It also accepted that this policy was both inherently wrong and that it occurred at the expense of ensuring family, community support, and language and cultural heritage. It also recognised the damage done to children by separation from mothers and family, and from their own community, and a sense of Aboriginality of the children, including, for some, the loss of sense of personal identity. It also apologised for the fact that the care provided to the children was not always of the quality, love, generosity and compassion that the church would always want to provide.
After the ceremony, those of us present stayed to listen to the stories of the senior Territorians who had lived on Crocker Island - stories of such hardship, cruelty and sadness. The only light in the whole saga was that they had each other. They also relayed the remarkable story of what was described as 95 part-Aboriginal children aged from one to 18 years travelling 3000 miles by boat, truck and train transport across Arnhem Land during the Wet Season to escape the bombing of Darwin. They were led by the missionary, Margaret Sommerville. It should be noted that they were only alerted to the possibility of raids on 13 February 1942, just prior to the raids on the 19 February. I understand that non-indigenous women and children had been evacuated in late 1941.
The apologies of the Uniting Church have been added to by those of the Catholic and Anglican Churches, and by state governments. The argument that this generation should not apologise for things that happened in the past is a very odd one, I believe. I have also heard people say that Stolen Generation people should simply put it behind them and get on with their lives. As Australians, we meet every year and say ‘Lest we Forget’ for our ANZACs, and I am proud to be someone who upholds this respect for our servicemen and women. In the same way, we need to acknowledge that something happened to our Aboriginal Territorians, so that it cannot happen again. We must remember.
Public apologies for past wrongdoings are not unusual. In recent years there have been many public apologies. The United States Congress has apologised to Japanese Americans for imprisoning them during World War II, and to native Hawaiians for helping to overthrow the Kingdom of Hawaii a century ago, as well as apologising for slavery. Other countries have also apologised. Britain’s Prime Minister apologised to the Irish people for failing to relieve the 19th century potato famine. East Germany apologised for the holocaust. Japan’s Emperor apologised for atrocities in Korea, and in recent years many religious leaders including his Holiness the Pope, have apologised for significant earlier events.
An apology provides the foundation for a new beginning and is the first step on the journey to genuine healing and reconciliation. I commend the motion to the House.
Dr BURNS (Johnston): Madam Speaker, I rise to support this motion on an apology to the Stolen Generation. Perhaps the best way I can do this is to tell a life story of one of my constituents, Mr Luke Morcom who lives in Jingili and, tragically, I know that there are many others. The story I am about to tell is essentially the one that Luke has told me.
Luke was born in Borroloola on the banks of the McArthur River on 14 June 1951 at a place called Mabunji or Rocky Creek, outside the old Borroloola store under a mango tree. His father, Albert Morcom, ran the store and registered him at birth as Sidney Morcom. His name was changed a week later to Luke Morcom when he arrived at the Catholic Mission at Garden Point. Another baby arrived that day at the mission, and his name was changed from Hector John to Mark Casey. Changing children’s names was common practice.
Luke’s mother died a week after he was born. Her name was Yima, the daughter of Banjo McKinnon, an Elder of the Yanyuwa people. Luke’s mother had previously suffered the removal of Luke’s older sister, May, three years before. She had been placed on the Crocker Island Mission but was moved to Garden Point after months of protest from her father. May had her name changed to Florence.
When Luke was nine, his father died at the old Darwin Hospital and was buried in the McMillans Road Cemetery. Neither Luke nor his sister attended the funeral. Some months later, Florence was adopted by the Guy family in Adelaide and left Garden Point Mission, leaving Luke all alone. When Luke was 12, he was adopted by Jack and Maimi Smith in Adelaide. When he was 21, his foster parents encouraged him to return to the Northern Territory to find his Aboriginal family. He found many uncles and his grandfather living at Borroloola. Luke has lived in Darwin since 1972, and I am sure he is known to many people who are here today. He has worked for the Commonwealth and Northern Territory Public Service for more than 30 years. His sister, Florence May Morcom, currently works as a nurse in Saudi Arabia and visits her brother and friends in Darwin every year.
Luke has three children and their maternal grandparents, George Paul and Louise Campbell, were also part of the Stolen Generation. Luke has written here what I think is beautiful poetry to express the feeling of profound loss experienced by many Aboriginal people from the Stolen Generation. I would like to read some extracts from Luke’s poem, A Mother’s Comfort:
Sorry I could not return
But Welfare ruled the day
Sent to an island mission
I was again taken away.
…
You are my inspiration
Thank you for my birth
One day we will be together
comforted by mother earth.
Mother, although they stole me
And tore your world apart
I know where to find you
You dwell within my heart.
Luke Morcom and his family are fine Territorians who have borne much sorrow through the Commonwealth Aboriginals Ordinance.
I know this is a complex issue, but it is also an issue of the heart. I have always been taught that if hurt is given, whether by a design or inadvertently, even with the best intentions, then an apology is the honourable thing to do. It also establishes respect. So, it is an honour for me to support this apology motion to all those Territorians who were removed from their families and suffered under the Commonwealth Aboriginals Ordinance.
Ms LAWRIE (Karama): Madam Speaker, I rise today to say sorry. Sorry to the families and individuals affected by the very wrongful actions perpetrated under the Commonwealth Aboriginals Ordinance that resulted in the separation of Aboriginal children from their friends, their family, their community and their land.
As the member for Karama, I say sorry, too. I say sorry to my constituents in Karama and Malak, some of whom are here today who have borne the very real ill-effects of being separated from family. As a young girl growing up in Darwin, I had the very great privilege of being taken into local Aboriginal families who were in Darwin because they were brought to Darwin, removed from their parents, removed from their homeland and put into Kahlin Compound. These people have given me the very great honour of being able to call them family, and Nanna sits here today. Nanna, I acknowledge you.
In 1984, I was a 17-year-old cadet on the Northern Territory News, the only daily newspaper we had in the Territory. I was given a call from my family who said: ‘Come on, sister girl, there is a gathering, there is a reunion. Come and talk to these women. Come and tell their story’. This is in 1984, before the term Stolen Generation was even conceived or reported. I have that article here today. It is an article that tells a story of eight sisters. With your indulgence, I will quickly read it into the Parliamentary Record because it begins to tell just a glimpse of a story of a couple of the sisters:
As a 17-year-old girl in Darwin, I thought to myself: ‘I could not bear the thought of having been taken away from my mother’. Now, as an adult and a mother myself with two daughters, I cannot bear the thought, as a mother, of having my children taken from me. It is a very small thing to do in this Chamber today, to apologise, to say sorry. I call on all members of this House to look deep into themselves and understand that there are a people who have been affected by past actions.
Those people have asked for an apology. It is a very small thing, indeed, for us to tender that apology. It is of symbolic importance; it is a beginning of, hopefully, actions that we can take as a government to heal some of the hurt of the past. The past actions were wrong - they were wrong, wrong and very wrong - and they require an apology. That is why I have the strength and conviction to support my government in saying sorry. I will close with the words of the Australian Reconciliation Council, of their vision:
Mr KIELY (Sanderson): Madam Speaker, I rise today in support of the apology motion. I have been very moved by the stories, and the strength of the Stolen Generation. I would also consider this apology a sign of strength, a sign of support for the people and what they have been through, and a way to go forward.
I admire the strength of the people sitting here today for what they and their families have endured. I believe it is incumbent upon all of us to recognise that, and to recognise the past. I know that with this motion, and with the genuine feeling from this side, in the hearts of this side - certainly around us, in the streets of Darwin, in the streets of Alice Springs, in the bush, in the communities - I feel that today is sending a strong foundation for us all to go forward together.
Mr VATSKALIS (Lands, Planning and Environment): Madam Speaker, I rise to support this motion. I must admit I have not prepared any speeches and I am not going to read anything. I am going to speak from my heart.
I came to Australia in 1983, and I was amazed to find out that Aboriginal people only acquired full citizenship rights in 1967. For me, Australia was heaven. Parts of my family came here in the 1960s, and when they were coming back to Greece they were well-fed, well-dressed, with a lot of money. We thought: ‘This is a fantastic place, this is unbelievable, it treats its people with respect, it gives opportunities to people.’ You can imagine my amazement when I found out the original inhabitants of this place were not full citizens and they only became citizens in 1967.
From Perth, I moved north and northwest to Port Hedland, and later to Darwin. I was equally amazed when I found out that until 1958-59, kids were removed from their families for the simple reason they were half-caste, as they were called, under the pretext of welfare and education. The reality was the authorities wanted them to be assimilated into the mainstream of Australian society.
I can understand the bitterness of these people because all of us have our own experience. We had a Stolen Generation in my country. My mother and my grandmother were part of the Stolen Generation in Greece. In the late 1940s, in the middle of the civil war in Greece, my mother was taken from her family by one part of the people we were fighting. She was taken away from her mother, her father, her family, the place where she was born, to another country. She was well-fed, she was educated, they looked after her, but she was taken away. Not only that, my grandmother was taken. She was taken away for eight years. She did not see her kids, she did not see her husband, her relatives for eight years. When my mother was taken, she was 14 years old, when they met again, my mother was about to get married.
I recall last year, when I went back to Greece to visit my family, that was the first time my mother ever spoke about those days. She had never spoken about what happened. As a matter of fact, she was trained to fight and she fought, and she was lucky to survive. One thing she said to me is: ‘Why did they take us away; why did they do that to us? I did not see my mother for eight years. Why? And the worst thing is that nobody came to say sorry for that, nobody apologised for it’. I recall the bitterness in her voice, and the same bitterness I have heard from the people in the Stolen Generation, because I had the privilege to work for an Aboriginal medical service, an Aboriginal organisation.
As a member of this parliament, as a member of this government, as an individual, and as a Christian person, I say sorry. I will always work to make sure this will never happen again.
Ms MARTIN (Chief Minister): Madam Speaker, I would like to thank all members in this House for their contribution to this debate. It has been one of very strong emotion, but I do not think any of us should feel embarrassed that we have had people near to tears because of their contribution to this debate. There is no shame in that. It is a very emotional and a very tragic issue for Territorians. It is a very healing process to go through, that members of Parliament feel so strongly about this that it does bring them to tears. We have all very strongly felt the emotion of this afternoon.
The personal stories are the ones that I think will stay with us, the personal stories of fathers, mothers, grandparents and friends for many of us. Just the impact on lives of those policies that we now cover under the Stolen Generation. Very sadly for this parliament, there has been a strong contrast to that from the very cynical politics of the opposition. To hear just one contribution - and that a very cynical one simply concentrating on questioning motives, on trying to demean - is very sad for this parliament. My government is a new government. We are determined to move the Territory forward, we are determined to find the points of healing. There have been divisions in our community - this is certainly one. The only contribution from the opposition is one that is heartless and cynical. There is no understanding of the important symbols, and all we heard was excuse after excuse, but no leadership, sadly. It is very sad for this parliament, and personally saddens me deeply.
I would like to thank everyone for coming today. It is a very important event for the Territory. I would like to thank all members of the Stolen Generation for being here, for being part of this important event; for their families and their friends being here; and those who simply support the need for a motion like this.
The motion is a quite complex one. It apologies; it acknowledges the hurt that was done; it recognises the profound sense of loss; it recognised that, for many hundreds of Territorians, they received inadequate care, guidance and education and had a very tough time under the guise of the Aboriginals Ordinance. This motion does call on the Commonwealth government to make that formal and specific apology to all those who were removed, and to acknowledge that the Commonwealth failed in discharging its moral obligations towards them. So, it is a five-part motion. What it does say, the bottom line of it, and what I am proud to stand here now and say is that - and shared by this side of the House - that I am sorry, the other members of my government are sorry, that this government is sorry, this new Labor government in the Territory is sorry, and this parliament, by majority vote, is sorry.
So let us, as a community, move on. Let us hope this debate contributes to the healing. I say, proudly, to all indigenous Territorians that this new government treasures and celebrates indigenous Territorians. Certainly, I hope you recognise that from our hearts, and that we are strongly supporting this motion. Thank you for being here.
Motion agreed to.
Mr STIRLING (Leader of Government Business): Division, Madam Speaker!
Madam SPEAKER: No, the motion was passed in the affirmative. We are going on with the next business of the day. Those people in the gallery, I thank you for your patience, and to all members of the House and members in the gallery who listened so quietly. That was very good.
Mr STIRLING (Tourism): Madam Speaker, I rise to make a statement on the collapse of Ansett and the impact on the Northern Territory tourism industry. As honourable members would be aware, Ansett accounted for approximately 43% of domestic passenger capacity, some 9300 seats per week across the Territory. In terms of air freight and, in particular, perishable produce, Ansett Air Cargo consigned approximately 60% to 80% of the market share and had the equipment, expertise and experience in moving perishable goods. Ansett was also involved in providing a number of regional services to Gove and Groote Eylandt, through contract operations under Air North and Flight West.
It goes without saying that Ansett was a significant operator in the Territory in terms of services provided, and employment generated. All Australians have felt the loss of Ansett, and none more so than here in the Territory, which relies so heavily on air transport to overcome isolation, breakdown and tyranny-of-distance factors that hamper Territorians in their daily approach to business and family life. I say, unequivocally, that this government would love to see Ansett back in Territory skies and, indeed, wants the 147 Ansett jobs back in the Territory community.
Since this government came to power, we have worked to reinstate air services into and out of the Territory. Even prior to the collapse, this government was in contact with Ansett because, along with many others, we were hearing rumours of instability and threats to services. We were being assured by Ansett senior management that the airline was not in trouble, and would certainly be there for the long haul. As members would appreciate, despite that information, the collapse of Ansett did still come as a shock. The government reacted quickly and decisively to counter the impact of the collapse on both inbound and outbound passenger movements, freight capacity, as well as resolving issues of intra-Territory regional services.
Government became aware of the Ansett collapse at around 3 am on Friday, 14 September, and a high-level task force was established and met at 9 am the same day. Its task was to comprehensively assess the full impact that the loss of air services would have on the Territory. The task force, of which I was a member, met daily and continues to meet when required to monitor the situation and develop appropriate strategies. In addition, a joint industry government air transport task force was formed to enhance communication channels between industry and government, and allow specific concerns to be quickly addressed by government. The task force comprises representatives from the Chamber of Commerce and Industry, Qantas, regional tourist associations, NT Airports, Australian Air Express, Air North and relevant government agencies, and first met on 20 September. Passenger capacity, freight, and regional services continue to be the focus of this task force.
An immediate priority after the collapse of Ansett was to increase supply to meet demand. This simply means more, or bigger, aircraft servicing the Territory. At this point, may I make special reference to Qantas and their locally-based staff for their endeavours to ensure the backlog of passengers in the Territory was dealt with quickly and efficiently, a job well done that underlies their professionalism, their commitment to the aviation industry and, most important of all to us, their commitment to the Northern Territory. I also point out that it was, indeed, this government that facilitated the attainment of federal government approval for international airlines such as Royal Brunei and Malaysia Airlines, to carry domestic passengers and freight within Australia. This approval greatly enhanced capacity to move the travelling public, the upshot being that through a coordinated and well-managed approach, the backlog of stranded Ansett passengers was cleared by 19 September, some five days after the collapse.
The task force was able to work with Qantas to secure additional services to increase capacity. On 25 September, Qantas announced additional flights between Sydney/Alice Springs/Ayers Rock and Sydney/Darwin. On 28 September, Qantas announced 15 additional return flights per week on top of those already scheduled. Government continues to work closely with Qantas to ensure reinstatement of services equivalent to those enjoyed under a two-airline operation. Qantas has further announced schedules that represent approximately 80% of the previous total seating capacity - that is Ansett and Qantas previously together - that will be effective as at 28 October 2001. In essence, this will cover 100% of last year’s demand to Darwin, 80% to Alice Springs and approximately 60% to Gove. Given the circumstances, and to put it in context with other areas of Australia, particularly northern Western Australia, this provides a solid platform fairly quickly after Ansett’s collapse. The government is not satisfied that this is enough, and will continue to work with the federal government and private operators to resolve those constraints still on Alice Springs.
Additionally, we are still continuing dialogue with Virgin Blue to determine the commencement of operations in the Territory. It will mean further passenger capacity, as well as an alternate service provider into and out of the Territory. As a low-cost airline, I would think it would be welcomed by Territorians because they will be coming into the marketplace with much cheaper fares.
My government has also been communicating with the Ansett administrator requesting Ansett #2 services be established to the Territory. It is a great pity that the administrator required full underwriting by this government, rather than being prepared to accept an arrangement similar to the Virgin operation, where the government takes up 50 seats and sells them through its Tourist Commission. I would also like it noted that the government applauds the approach of the Ansett staff in Darwin and their endeavours to secure the return of Ansett services to the Territory. It is very much the Territorian way of never giving up and always having a go, and this government is happy to support their activities, and have worked with them for some weeks.
I last met with a delegation of Ansett employees on Monday 22 October, and I will continue to assist them and work with them. Arrangements are being established with the Employee Assistance Service to provide additional counselling and training assistance through the Northern Territory Employment and Training Authority. We thought that it was necessary to take that additional step, given that some of the staff members have gone along to Centrelink, and because they had a spouse working full-time, there was no capacity under Centrelink’s guidelines to help them with forms of training. You can appreciate their skills are customer service operator based in terms of the aviation industry. They are a little specialised along those lines. It is not that easy for them to simply walk out and get similar jobs. In fact, those jobs do not exist. Whatever we can do in terms of the Northern Territory Employment and Training Authority - and we will continue to work with Centrelink as well, because we think that those guidelines that they act with, ought to be lifted in times of exceptional circumstances where we have 147 dedicated airline staff with suddenly no jobs. They ought to be able to employ a bit of flexibility with their guidelines and work with us, if necessary, to help those people gain other skills. Many times, it would only be complementary skills, not new skills.
In terms of freight, there were also difficulties - particularly in the first two weeks after the Ansett collapse - for shipments of Territory perishable produce. However, it is understood from Australian Air Express, the cargo agent for Qantas, that their freight sheds are now cleared and all goods consigned uplifted within 12 to 24 hours. After 28 October, the new Qantas schedule will include the provision of 14 wide-body 767 aircraft from Darwin to Sydney and Brisbane per week. This will reflect a real increase of approximately 11% of freight capacity on that previously enjoyed with the two airlines operating in the Territory.
In relation to regional Territory services, the government quickly facilitated the federal support package under the Rapid Route Recovery Scheme, to reinstate full services to Groote Eylandt by Air North. That service had previously been under contract to Air North by Ansett, but is now conducted by Air North in their own right. That was, of course, a service that went off the route immediately Ansett collapsed, and was eligible …
Ms CARNEY: A point of order, Mr Deputy Speaker! The minister is deviating from his Ministerial Statement and I ask that he not do so.
Mr HENDERSON: Just speaking to the point of order, there is no Standing Order that says that the minister cannot deviate. He is talking generally to his statement and he should be allowed to continue.
Mr DEPUTY SPEAKER: Member for Wanguri, I will take advice on this. Minister, I would ask you to keep your comments in line with what you are reading there.
Mr Reed: You have called points of order on this yourself, Syd, if a minister has deviated. You know what the rules are.
Mr STIRLING: Mr Deputy Speaker, I will go back to the speech. I would not have thought I would have ever seen a Ministerial Statement read word-for-word from the copy in front of us. And in fact, responding to interjections, additional information from the minister …
Members interjecting.
Mr Reed: Are you questioning the Speaker’s ruling?
Mr DEPUTY SPEAKER: Order! Member for Katherine.
Mr STIRLING: No, I am not. I am simply correcting yourself. Maybe I should not be doing that, I should be going through the Deputy Speaker.
Mr Reed: Would you like us to call the state of the House? Get on with the job.
Mr STIRLING: Too cute, Deputy Leader of the Opposition, too cute by half.
Services to Gove have been maintained by Qantas. However, demand for seats remains high. It is, with pleasure, that I tell honourable members that we were successful in negotiating agreement with the Territory’s own airline, Air North, to provide Gove and Groote with access to Darwin and Cairns. In fact, that new route, to commence on 28 October, will go from Cairns, Gove, Darwin through to Broome on a four-day-a-week basis, hopefully moving to a daily basis as the service picks up. The government has provided a one-off grant of less than $200 000 to help underpin that new schedule until the end of February 2002. I am confident the community and business support for Air North’s services will ensure that the new schedules will be self-sustaining after that time. I do not wish to go into the area of the honourable Minister for Transport and Infrastructure Development’s comments, because he will expand further on freight and remote air service issues.
In regard to international airlines, the despicable and deplorable acts of terrorism against the United States of America have changed the world as we know it in many ways, not least of which includes the impact on international aviation. Examples such as the 70-year-old airline, Swissair, collapsing and the thousands of jobs lost worldwide, show the impacts of the 11 September attack. I think something like 120 000 jobs have now disappeared from international airlines since 11 September. Whilst the announcement of Malaysia Airlines to withdraw services from Darwin effective 4 February 2002 was not completely unexpected, the downturn in international aviation traffic resulting from the recent terrorism attacks has hastened its withdrawal from a number of international routes. In fact, Darwin was one of 10 international routes that Malaysia was pulling back on. In fact, that was another area of concern to government because it was …
Ms CARNEY: A point of order, Mr Deputy Speaker! I refer to the previous ruling, and I draw your attention to the state of this House.
Mr DEPUTY SPEAKER: Ring the bells. A quorum is present. Minister, continue.
Mr STIRLING: Mr Deputy Speaker, the downturn in international aviation traffic resulting from the recent terrorism attacks, has hastened Malaysia Airlines’ withdrawal from a number of international routes. As I was saying, Darwin was one of about 10 or 11 international destinations that Malaysia Airlines pulled back from. Malaysia Airlines’ service represents some 12% of total inbound seat capacity. We continue to work with Qantas to mitigate the impact of its reduction of daily services on the Singapore/Darwin route from 1 December 2001, to three per week. We are pursuing a positive outcome, being the resumption of daily services by Qantas’ new low-cost carrier, Australian Airlines. Although we do not have a date of commencement yet, we expect it within months.
In regard to Royal Brunei Airlines, I am pleased to announce that, effective from the end of October 2001, Royal Brunei will operate two dedicated services per week to Darwin. This will effectively deliver an additional 348 seats per week from the international market to the Territory’s tourism and business sectors. There is no doubt that there will be continued fall-out in the aviation industry, and some analysts are saying that there will be less than 10 international airlines operating into the future.
It is important that we recognise the challenges Ansett’s collapse has thrust upon our tourism industry. Coming just days after the terrorist attacks in the United States shut down its aviation industry and forced Americans to reconsider their travel plans, Ansett’s demise created chaos on the domestic front. In 2000, 69% of our visitors arrived in the Northern Territory by air. Ansett carried around half of those. This industry is worth $936m to the Northern Territory. Researchers have calculated that the economic activity generated by tourism expands that figure to $1.5bn. The beneficiaries include supermarkets, take-away food outlets, clothing stores, doctors, and dentists. Tourism is everybody’s business and when the industry suffers a blow, everybody feels it.
Let me tell you about the days that followed 14 September. Within hours of the news of Ansett’s demise, the Tourist Commission held crisis talks to map out immediate strategies. Its holiday centre staff began telephoning its clients who had been booked on Ansett, to help them find seats on Qantas aircraft. Clients who had not yet travelled were contacted so other arrangements could be made. Most said they still wanted to holiday in the Northern Territory. In relation to Qantas, they proved a commitment to the Northern Territory and, indeed, to the Australian aviation industry - as there should be as the flag carrier for the country – when they carried 100 000 people for free. 100 000 stranded Ansett travellers got home for free on Qantas flights. The Northern Territory Tourist Commission immediately reviewed its marketing strategies to bring them into line with the industries new reality. As a short-term measure, funds were taken from the international markets and allocated to ramp-up campaigns focusing on the drive market and intra-Territory tourism. Daily communication with the industry ensured that the government’s strategies were known and supported.
The Tourist Commission’s research unit channelled resources into accumulating timely market intelligence which could be shared with industry to help operators plan their way through the new challenges. Problems and solutions came and went daily during the first few weeks after 14 September. We had lost some 50% of our air capacity in 24 hours. As of 28 October, the hard work and magnificent partnership between government and industry, will have seen, and led to the restoration of, 80% of the original air capacity into the Northern Territory. Our efforts will continue.
Mr Deputy Speaker, I move that the Assembly take note of the statement.
Ms CARNEY (Araluen): Mr Deputy Speaker, I rise to respond to the minister’s statement. There are a number of matters that require comment. From the outset, I should say that I have not had a personal briefing, although I did receive a written brief a week or so ago. I do not blame the minister for that, it has just been one of those things. However, it is appropriate that I have put on the record that it would have been of some assistance prior to today.
First, I commend the government on its facilitation with the federal government, that effected Royal Brunei and Malaysia Airlines into Darwin to carry domestic passengers and freight. I am not sure of the government’s exact involvement, perhaps it was the federal government that really did the work. In any event, it was a good outcome and the opposition is pleased with it. I must, however, take exception to the minister’s assertion that the government did all that it could to re-instate air services into and out of the Territory, and that it has been communicating with the Ansett administrator requesting Ansett #2 be established.
This government has written a lot of letters. On 1 October, I called on the government to become more than just a letter writer, and to pursue our proposal that the government offer Ansett a financial package to come to the Northern Territory. At that time, I said that, in the interests of Territory tourism, Territory Ansett workers and the Territory economy, the new government should act urgently to offer assistance to the administrator of Ansett. The Territory government must accept that it shares the responsibility of making sure that regional Northern Territory services continue, in addition to its responsibility to Territory-wide tourism. Those who remember the devastating effects on the Territory during the pilots’ dispute in the late 1980s will know, only too well, what the grounding of Ansett has meant for tourism.
The government put $2m away for Virgin Blue Airline flights, which are not going to happen until March. It is disappointing that the government does that on the one hand and then, on the other, does not offer similar funding to the administrator for Ansett. It is the opposition’s view that the government should have immediately offered the Ansett administrator the same deal as it offered to Virgin, and it will be condemned by failing to do so. Specifically, the government should have underwritten 50 seats daily on a A320 Airbus to get Ansett flying into the Territory again, and they should do that now. This would help Territorians, the tourism industry and most importantly, the Ansett staff in the Territory who seem to have been forgotten by this government.
We discussed the idea with Ansett employees in Darwin, and they were convinced that an Ansett A320 Airbus, or similar plane, operating overnight if need, be would be ideal. Indeed, on 16 October, the union representing the Ansett workers appealed on radio for the government’s help in this crisis. They want this government to offer a financial inducement to the Ansett administrator along the same lines that it offered to Richard Branson.
Had we been in government, we would have grabbed this problem by the throat and got on with it. We would have risen to the challenge, but instead, we saw the government sitting on its hands, backing a foreigner, but not the workers in the Northern Territory. This government must show that it has some initiative and act now to get Ansett back into the Northern Territory. I do not accept that the government has done, or is doing, all that it can.
Again, it has been very disappointing that the government rejected fairly early on, a proposal which would have seen the resumption of regular airline services between Brisbane, Cairns, Gove and Darwin, and Brisbane, Cairns, Ayers Rock and Alice Springs. The proposal, known as the Flight West proposal, would see the Northern Territory government provide indemnity funding for the reinstatement of a regular Flight West F100 jet. The proposal was about the Territory government being proactive and working with others to help regional Territorians in the ailing tourism industry. It was rejected out of hand by the Tourism Minister at a meeting of a meeting of 100 residents in Nhulunbuy on 7 October - out of hand. I am advised that he said that it was a federal government responsibility and that his government would not give 1 to Flight West.
When the announcement was made that Ansett has resumed services into Brisbane, the proposal became more critical. It meant that there were connecting Ansett services along the east coast. This proposal could result in jobs for Ansett and Flight West workers. The Ansett booking system is operating and is able to be used by Flight West. Flight West and Ansett staff will be employed. Again, I say that the Labor government had no problems finding $2m for an English millionaire, however, when it comes to putting up funds to help the Territory’s Ansett workers and Territory travellers, it is put in the too hard basket.
The Territory government must accept that it shares the responsibility of making sure that regional Northern Territory services continue, and that those benefiting from tourism in the Northern Territory are looked after by this government. It is a sober responsibility that this government carries and it has not discharged its responsibility at all well. The fact of the matter is that the government has not come up with practical solutions of its own, but has rejected out of hand proposals put to it by others to assist with this crisis. The Alice Springs Town Council and the Central Australian Tourism Industry Association support the Flight West proposal. It is now abundantly clear that this government is the odd one out. It is astonishing that tourism operators are forced to put this proposal together without the government assisting them in any way. I am embarrassed that it refuses to assist the tourism industry by failing to support this proposal.
The minister referred in his statement to his task force. Well, what does it do? The tourism industry has been left to fend for itself. So too, regional Territorians, and the Territory’s 147 Ansett workers and their families. Tourism operators are wondering what the government’s task force is doing, and I can understand why they are asking that question, and ringing my office with that question. This government wants to help a foreigner, but again, does nothing to assist locals who are being forced to leave the Northern Territory, and it is disgraceful.
Mr AH KIT (Transport and Infrastructure Development): Mr Deputy Speaker, I would like to pick up on some comments from the member for Araluen whilst they are still fresh in my mind.
I put it on record and say quite clearly, that the Ansett administrator was offered the same as Virgin Blue Airlines - this $2m offer - but it was refused. I do not know what she expects us to do - to write the cheque out and send it off anyway, to go out and ram it down their throats. I just do not know. That was offered, but it was rejected. If her party is against Virgin Blue Airlines coming into the Northern Territory earlier than we hoped, then they should go out and tell people in the Territory. Write to Mr Branson and say: ‘The CLP in the Northern Territory is against Virgin Blue Airline. We believe that the Martin government favours you, and you are not welcome’. Go out and do it. I also would ask the member for Araluen: how many letters have been sent off to the Prime Minister since the Ansett collapse - or the Deputy Prime Minister who, I understand, is also the minister for Transport? How much correspondence has flowed backwards and forwards from your office, or the Leader of the Opposition’s office, to Canberra?
Ms Carney: You are the government. We are the opposition. We understand.
Mr AH KIT: It is easy for the member for Araluen, and the members opposite, to lay blame here and to ask us to fix everything straight away, like we can pluck money out of the air. We understand. Over last week and this week there is this black hole. The black hole that the member for Katherine who, in the past, I have called, in this Chamber, the bodgie Treasurer. What I said at the time raised a few hackles up from the CLP government, but haven’t I been proven correct!
And whilst we are on the subject of the Deputy Leader of the Opposition, the member for Katherine, in my six years here, to call a quorum while we have an important function out there, with a couple of hundred of the Stolen Generation people, is just nothing but plain sour grapes. He should grow up, he has been here long enough. We have never, never in my six years, ever called a quorum when there was a function on in this House. We have never called a quorum, and we never showed sour grapes like that which was displayed ungraciously by the member for Katherine.
I support my colleague, the Deputy Chief Minister and Minister for Tourism’s statement on the collapse of Ansett and the impact on freight and regional air services. Firstly, may I reiterate the sentiment of my honourable colleague that this government was both shocked and saddened at the demise of Ansett. I am particularly concerned by the sudden loss of employment for the dedicated staff of Ansett. Some of these staff members have worked for decades for Ansett in the Territory. Every effort must be made to ensure that, at the very least, their full employment entitlements are paid to them. Hopefully, in the future, all of these dedicated staff can be restored to full employment.
In terms of air freight, Ansett Air Cargo consigned approximately 60% to 80% of perishable produce emanating from the Territory. This was mainly in the form of live mud crabs, fish and cut flowers. Ansett was also involved in providing regional air services to Gove and Groote Eylandt, through contracts to other operators such as Air North and Flight West. In terms of freight capacity, it is true that we have lost, at least for the present, an experienced and valued perishable produce air cargo transporter in Ansett. However, the news is not all bad. Having survived the last month, I am pleased to report that overall total air freight capacity outbound from the Territory will actually increase by approximately 11% as of 28 October this year. This is capacity over and above that previously provided by Ansett and Qantas.
This situation has arisen as a result of this government’s close consultation and tireless efforts to work constructively with Qantas to ensure the best possible outcomes for primary producers and exporters in the Territory. In particular, Qantas domestic services alone with provide some 14 wide-body Boeing 767 aircraft a week from Darwin to Brisbane and Sydney. It is true that considerable strains were placed on the movement of perishable produce out of the Territory in the two weeks following the collapse of Ansett. It is also true that goods were offloaded at short notice. But it is also very true that, within a couple of weeks, all goods consigned through Australian Air Express, the cargo agent for Qantas, were uplifted within 12 to 24 hours of receipt. In typical Territory style, the job got done.
May I also remind honourable members that a number of issues relating to the airfreight of perishable products, such as handling, freight rates and cool chain maintenance, existed when two airlines operated. These are industry issues and are not quarantined to the Territory. It is, however, something that this government will continue to address.
If you will indulge me for a moment, I have some very interesting statistics provided by Australian Air Express on the movement of perishables for the week prior to and the week after the collapse of Ansett. For the period 1 to 7 September 2001, prior to Ansett’s collapse, Australian Air Express in Darwin uplifted over 4000 kg of live mud crabs, 700 kg of flowers and 250 kg of fish - a total of almost 5500 kg of perishable produce. In the week following Ansett’s collapse, Australian Air Express uplifted over 21 000 kg of live mud crabs, 5000 kg of cut flowers and over 4000 kg of fish - a total of over 30 000 kg of perishable produce. This represents a remarkable achievement by Australian Air Express. In the space of one week, the freight uplifted by Australian Air Express was increased by more than five times. On behalf of this government, I would like to commend Australian Air Express for their professionalism and commitment to the Territory through these difficult times.
Intra-Territory Freight Services were also previously provided, under the Ansett Air Cargo banner, with a Metro aircraft operating a Darwin/Gove/Groote service four times a week. The Metro has a two-tonne capacity. After Ansett’s collapse, Australian Air Express took over and continued the service. However, Australian Air Express withdrew the service as of Friday, 12 October 2001. Again, this government moved quickly to facilitate the Darwin-based company TNT seeking a federal government subsidy through the Rapid Route Recovery Scheme, to continue the Metro freight service into Groote.
Subject to clarification of demand, the freight service is, in part, being met through the provision of Qantas passenger services into Gove. In regard to regional Territory air passenger services, this government, the Martin government, has acted quickly and decisively to reinstate essential services for Territorians in remote communities. An example of this was the facilitation of a federal support package under the Rapid Route Recovery Scheme to reinstate full air services to Groote Eylandt by Air North. This government had the full Air North services reinstated within two days.
I take this opportunity to also pay tribute to the rapid response of Anindilyakwa Air to the collapse of air services to Groote Eylandt. When Ansett, and hence Air North, ceased operations to Groote Eylandt on 14 September, Anindilyakwa Air took an immediate decision to increase their schedule to ten flights weekly. Anindilyakwa Air had previously operated four Cessna nine-seat weekly passenger air services to Groote Eylandt. Anindilyakwa Air’s expanded service of 10 flights per week represented approximately 50% of the estimated demand. This rapid response was much appreciated by the residents of Groote Eylandt. Anindilyakwa Air continued to provide this expanded service even after Air North services were restored to the island.
Air services today have been maintained by Qantas. However, significant demand for seats above and beyond that service remain, that were previously being satisfied by a Flight West contracted service to Ansett. Let me reassure honourable members that this government heard the concerns of the Gove business community and residents, and we worked hard to resolve this matter. As announced on 11 October 2001, Air North will commence regular services to Gove and Cairns as from 28 October 2001.
I want to clearly state the initiative to restore services to the communities of Groote Eylandt and Nhulunbuy were structured so that this government is definitely not starting an airline business. I would rather provide the private sector with the confidence to take on these services in their own right. This government is not about finding a quick fix at any cost, but rather, it pursued the option that provides the best outcomes for Territorians in terms of cost, flexibility, and surety of service. This is a government that is responsible and sensible in putting in place solutions for the long term and not just responding with knee-jerk reactions.
One other aviation issue that has come to the fore since the collapse of Ansett has been the rationalisation of services provided by Air North to smaller remote communities. Air North has taken a conscious and commercial decision to divest itself of aircraft and route operations requiring less than 19 seats. This has resulted in a number of intra-Territory routes being foregone by Air North. However, Air North has been negotiating with a number of smaller airline operators, in close consultation with the government, for the immediate uptake of operations with equivalent aircraft so that no loss of service or capacity has been inflicted on communities.
A typical example includes Murin Airways, that is taking over the Minjilang and Warrawi routes using nine-seat aircraft similar to Air North’s operation. At this stage it appears that Wimray will be carrying the mail and previously-booked Air North passengers to the Tiwi Islands. Air North will continue the 19-seat Darwin/Maningrida service and for the time being, will also continue the Galiwinku/Ramingining/Milingimbi services. However, honourable members should be under no misconception that, for the immediate to long term people, communities, all levels of government, everybody, need to support the air services where they live or the viability of the service will remain under threat.
I would like to make comment on the establishment of the federal government’s air passenger ticket levy, the $10 Ansett entitlement tax. Let it be perfectly clear that this government fully supports Ansett staff in their endeavours to receive their full entitlements. However, the imposition of this tax on regional services was demonstrably not clearly thought through by the Commonwealth in their rush to implement the levy. It was for this reason that the Territory government lobbied, and was successful in its actions, to have passengers travelling on aircraft with 16 seats or less, exempt from payment of the levy. This exemption will significantly reduce the impost on small operators in terms of the collection and administration costs of the levy.
Finally, some good news for a small number of Darwin-based Ansett staff. As honourable members might be aware, the Department of Defence has chartered from the Ansett administrator a Boeing 146 aircraft complete with flight and ground handling crew, to provide troop rotation movements between Darwin and Dili. It is understood that this charter contract directly engages a number of locally-based Ansett staff for 30 days. This is a long way short of full reinstatement of the 147 Ansett employees stood down in the Territory. I commend the Department of Defence for some small way of easing the pain. I support the minister’s statement.
Mr STIRLING (Tourism): Madam Speaker, we missed you for the short time you were out of the Chair. There seemed to be some making-up of standing orders on the run here, and we missed your wise judgment and counsel in such matters.
I would like to thank members for their comments in relation to this ministerial statement, and thank the member for Araluen for her comments in relation to the lifting of the cabotage requirements on international aircraft. That enabled, of course, Royal Brunei and Malaysia Airlines to pick up in Darwin on their way through - previously outlawed for many, many years. Our predecessors worked very hard on the federal government at different times to try to get those cabotage requirements lifted. Even given the exceptional circumstances that were faced with the collapse of Ansett, and the diminished capacity to move people through, it was still a big ask on the federal government, in terms of them getting around to actually deliver on it. Even then, they only gave it for a few weeks, which was further extended until at least 31 December. So, I do thank her for support in relation to that.
The opposition seems to have a concern with the Virgin Blue package, ie, supporting a millionaire, supporting a foreign-owned company. I will try to put in context. It occurred in the first week of having been sworn in as a minister in this government, so that makes it, sworn in on 27 August, whatever that Friday was, 1, 2 September - it was still 12 days before Ansett collapsed. Now, it was not designed to get under Ansett or particularly get at Ansett or Qantas, it was to bring and acknowledge a low-cost operator into the market, which we recognised would be welcome by Territorians, because that is there game. They are a low-cost operator without the overheads that the larger airlines carry to their cost and, in the case of Ansett, to their demise in total. We think Territorians will welcome a budget-priced operator, a no-frills airline, and we look forward to getting Virgin Blue in. So, in the sense that we were looking at Virgin Blue as low-cost to keep the majors up to the mark in fair play, in terms of discount seats, it certainly was not anyone’s intention - nor was it or course Virgin Blue’s intention - to put the skids under Ansett. The skids were under Ansett well and truly by others, other than Virgin Blue, well in advance of us attracting Virgin Blue here with the offer that we have got for them.
The second concern coming from the opposition was: ‘Why didn’t we do it to the Ansett Administrator?’ Well, the fact is we did, and I do not think you were listening to the statement. We went to the Ansett Administrator. We offered a similar sort of a deal to that which we had sown up with Virgin Blue and, that is, to sell down a given number of seats on a given flight, to commit to purchase; sell them down through our wholesaling arm in the Territory Tourist Commission, and hopefully sell them all down, so that you do not lose any of the money that you have put on the table. That was thrown out the door - kicked out the door by the Ansett Administrator. He did not want to know about it, and wanted 100% underwriting - 100% underwriting of the cost of the flight. Now, we are simply not in a position to do it. In fact, it was a similar sort of ask that was being asked of us in relation to Flight West proposal, $85 000 a flight. You are not going to stay alive long.
Ms Carney: $65 000.
Mr STIRLING: $63 000, $85 000, you are still not going to stay alive long, having to put on the table that sort of underwriting.
We went with our proposal that we can live with and we are confident of, with Virgin Blue. What we wanted of Ansett #2 and the Ansett Administrator was to get back into the Alice and on to Darwin, because it would have fixed up two problems: one, capacity into the Alice that desperately need; and two, the concerns we have with Ansett staff. I might say, after Monday, they are very dispirited. I was saddened by the attitude of the Ansett staff because they have been, in a sense, kicked around for five weeks, six weeks, when they received nothing from the company or the Administrator in terms of comfort. They have now got forms of packages that they have to go and get financial counselling, and see if this is a deal that they can live with. Twelve weeks maximum, I think, is the payout. Some of them should have been looking at 102 or 104 weeks. They do go back into the queue in terms of the final sort-out of creditors, not right at the bottom, but certainly not at the top, either, because they will have had a payout. For some people it is a very, very difficult position to be put in. As long as they do not put their hand up and take the package, they are still regarded as Ansett employees, and put at risk everything if they go and get another job. It is an enormously difficult situation that these staff find themselves in through absolutely no fault of their own.
I do want to go back to this Flight West matter, because the member for Araluen said in the House that the Queensland government has offered to indemnify Flight West. Well, it is simply not true according to the minister’s office that we rang today. She also claimed the federal government agreed to indemnify up to $380 000. Again, not true according to senior officials we contacted inside the federal Department of Transport. She says Nabalco has offered to support the airline. Well, at 2.54 pm today, Doug Grimmond, the Site Manager of Nabalco - he spoke to Don Miller in the last two days - says Nabalco will support any viable proposal to get people in and out but, ‘… we have insufficient information from Don Miller to determine whether it is viable’. Insufficient information to determine whether it is viable. I begin to wonder just how genuine any of these proposals are, given the lack of detail that seems to surround them. The Alice Springs Council, we are told - also by the member for Araluen - is supportive. Well let us go to the letter that I got from Fran Erlich, Mayor:
In relation to the validity of proposal, no detail. In relation to federal and Queensland governments, no money.
Ms Carney: Queensland is supporting him.
Mr STIRLING: In relation to Queensland government, no money.
Ms Carney: Everyone but you. You are the one making Territorians leave the Northern Territory because they’ve lost their jobs, mate.
Mr STIRLING: Table your information, your evidence that the Commonwealth government is going to put $380 000 in here. Table the information from Nabalco that they are going to dig in deep. Table your information, from whoever else you said was going to give in support of this, because it is simply not true. I remind the member that misleading this House is a very serious offence for which one gets sent before the Privileges Committee and has to explain oneself in a very serious matter.
The other point on this, which proposal are we talking about when she says: ‘Are you going to support this proposal?’? Clearly, Alice Springs has a proposal that ties them in. Yes, it does - the Alice Springs Town Council talking about $100 000 to link Alice Springs with Brisbane air passenger movements through the Northern loop. The liquidator’s letter to me, dated 19 October, does not mention Alice Springs. The liquidator in charge of this complete mess that Flight West is now in, in his letter to me, does not mention Alice Springs. We have any number of proposals floating about - these people will put money in if we go there; those people will put in if we go there. Simply not true.
As I said, if the shadow minister has information, if she has a letter from the Commonwealth government, if she has a letter from Nabalco, if she has a letter from the council, if she has a letter from the Queensland government saying: ‘Here’s the dough’, we will have a look at it. But she comes in and makes these spurious claims that we double check in my office. We go back to them and they do not know what she’s talking about. Well, simply, I do not either. I put her on notice that I will be very careful in giving too much credence or too much attention to any claims the shadow minister is going to make in this House, unless she stumps up front with the validation of those claims.
Motion agreed to; statement noted.
Mr STIRLING (Leader of Government Business): Madam Speaker, I move that the Assembly do now adjourn.
Dr TOYNE (Stuart): Madam Speaker, I would like to talk about a couple of electorate matters tonight. I will start with the Wattie Creek causeway. I think members will be aware of the affect that the Kalkarindji floods had on the Wattie Creek causeway earlier this year. The old causeway was completely demolished by the Wattie Creek as it came down in flood, leaving a totally impassable roadway across the creek.
As part of the flood rehabilitation works that have gone on in Kalkarindji/Dagaragu, a new causeway has been funded by our government to a higher level than was originally planned under the previous government. It contains 20 concrete culverts, all armoured at the upstream side of the causeway. It will be somewhat higher than the level of the old causeway. The engineering advice regarding that structure is that it should do the job of connecting Dagaragu securely to Kalkarindji, even in times of fairly heavy rainfall. I would imagine though, that if we get a 1-in-100-year flood there again, probably people will have to leave it to its own devices for the time that the water levels are really high.
The work is progressing very quickly. The contractors realise the urgency of getting the structure completed before the rains come. We are all hoping, at least in the Victoria River area, that we do not get the substantial rains at least for another month, to allow the causeway to be fully completed and commissioned for use. If we get to mid-November without heavy rain, we should have a brand new causeway commissioned and ready to go.
I also acknowledge the member for Katherine for organising the new power station there. I think credit where it is due. I have visited the almost complete power station, and I think that it is a big step for Kalkarindji/Daguragu. We have the power station up on high ground now, and with very good machinery there to provide power for both communities. In the other matters that came out of the flood, the store at Daguragu, which was a privately-run store, is now defunct. My understanding is that ATSIC has provided sufficient funds, something in the order of $750 000, to establish a community-owned store operating in Daguragu, in addition to the existing service station and store at Kalkarindji.
That will be a big step forward for those communities, because even with the best causeway in the world, there will be times when Daguragu will be cut off for periods. To have a store fully stocked on the other side of Wattie Creek is going to make that community far more secure, not to mention, cut out a lot of the tooing and froing between the two communities, which has been happening in recent times. I still have graphic memories of going across Wattie Creek in the police boats soon after the floods had occurred. To see people struggling to keep those two communities functional, with their vital connections cut by the creek, we did need to do something about that. I say to the member for Katherine, yes most of the things have been done. I have not forgotten about the flood relief payments, but we have the infrastructure in there, and I think the communities will be well off into the future.
I would also like to talk about Pigeon Hole. We are still progressing arrangements to establish a small community store at the old homestead area at Pigeon Hole. Pigeon Hole was one of the most stable and self-sufficient communities in the Northern Territory up to the floods hitting them. They survived the floods, got their housing back together, got all their possessions back together but, at that stage, the Victoria River Downs management decided to move the pastoral operation away from the side of the river. So, they lost the local store support there that was keeping them provisioned. They kept going for quite a while using the back road down to Kalkarindji and the other back road across to Yarralin, but it is an incredibly rough road and about a two-hour journey to get across to Yarralin. It is very difficult to keep the supplies up to the families when you are having to do that on a regular basis. They have been under a lot of pressure. They have stuck it out, to be honest. They are still there, and there are still half a dozen of the families making sure that the place is occupied and working. But I am sure if we get a store operation funded by ATSIC - and that is looking increasingly likely - we can restore Pigeon Hole back to its former splendor as a very good little community that does look after itself, and deserves the sort of support that we are trying to get to it.
The other matter I will talk on tonight is Simon Jabarnardi Fisher who is about to graduate from Northern Territory University with a masters degree. Simon conducted his masters study on the history of the Mt Doreen pastoral lease and the Warlpiri people, and their experiences since that pastoral lease became established. Some very powerful and sad stories came to light with the research that Simon did. It is a highly significant matter that a Warlpiri man has taken a post graduate degree at our own university here in the Territory. I would also like to pay tribute to Lisa Watts who was his co-student in the study. It is really a tribute to the NTU, a tribute to Simon himself, and I am very proud to see him graduate with that degree. His graduation occurred last week at one of the university’s regular graduation ceremonies.
We now have a fully-fledged post graduate in amongst the Warlpiri people at Yuendumu, joining a lot of other people from that community who have stuck at it with tertiary studies. I do not think that there would be any community in the Territory that has graduated from Batchelor College more teachers and health workers, child-care workers, and community administration graduates, than Yuendumu. They have a magnificent history in undertaking that type of study, and then showing the professional commitment when they returned to their community. So, good on you, the whole of the Yuendumu people, particularly Simon for his recent success. I look forward to seeing many a graduation ceremony in the future, where the effort continues there to produce these trained people.
Mr REED (Katherine): Madam Speaker, I want to raise an issue tonight that I hope will be of interest to the Minister for Primary Industry and Fisheries. It relates to the mango industry and particularly to Katherine. The honourable member would be aware that the mango growers in Katherine are experiencing a very good season. They have a reasonable crop and they are achieving pretty good market prices. It has been drawn to my attention that there are mangoes on sale in Katherine retail outlets that are Darwin-grown. The minister will probably be aware that there are quarantine arrangements in place, because of the mango seed weevil which exists in the Darwin region, but not in the Katherine region.
There are a number of growers in the Katherine area who are concerned that the product is being transported from Darwin to Katherine for sale and, of course, that there is a high probability that mango seed weevil could exist in that produce. It is not a matter of eliminating a competition in terms of Darwin mangoes being sold in Katherine, it is a matter of grower concern and protecting the industry.
From the point of view of propagators in Katherine who seek to bring material from Darwin to Katherine, be it seeds for propagation or other mango plant material, they are required to adhere very stringently to those quarantine arrangements, and quite rightly so. They are concerned, on the other hand, that product from Darwin is on the shelves in Katherine. It is something that I ask the minister to attend to, if he could, expeditiously. He would be aware – and I appreciate that he is acknowledging my comments across my Chamber - of the potential seriousness of this.
It is most unfortunate that mango seed weevil has found its way here into the Darwin area. It has been established here for a number of years and it is an encumbrance in terms of the restrictions that are in place for Darwin growers. It is not such a problem in terms of the product going interstate, because it is not going to areas where mangoes are grown. The transport of mango seed weevil, if it occurs, to places like Melbourne and what have you, does not bring about the risk that it does in transporting fruit into somewhere like Katherine where there are many tens of thousands of mango trees.
More and more people are making very large investments in terms of their mango plantations and, of course, those now, in many cases, are well established. In some cases, they also number trees in excess of 30 000 in individual plantations. We have seen the development of a very extensive mango industry in the Katherine region. Indeed, from comments that I hear in the industry, the Katherine production this year is much larger than the Darwin production. That in itself is a demonstration of just how important that particular crop is to the Katherine horticultural region, and its contribution in terms of the overall horticultural tree crop industry in the Northern Territory. I am sure that the minister would not want to see that jeopardised, and that he and his department would not want to see us experience an enlargement in the area that is affected by mango seed weevil. I take this opportunity tonight to draw it to his attention, on behalf of the mango growers in the Katherine region.
Whilst they are probably fewer in number, there are some people who are very well established in terms of propagation, in terms also of cross-breeding, if that’s the right term, in terms of developing new varieties of mangoes, so that in the future, perhaps, we have the opportunity with different textures, different tastes of mangoes, different flavours. Again, that might contribute in the future to further expansion of the mango industry, not only in Katherine, but also more so, right across the Northern Territory, to the benefit of the industry.
It is potentially a very serious issue. I think it is one that requires expedient action, urgency, indeed, in terms of investigating whether or not the reports are true, factual. If that is the case, it requires a prompt application of the quarantine regulations in the movement of mango fruit or any mango material from Darwin to Katherine, to ensure that the industry in the Katherine region is not put at risk. Also that we can be safeguarding the areas that are not infected by mango seed weevil but, if these quarantine regulations are not strictly applied, may be. I simply draw that to the attention of the minister and I look forward to a response quickly, in terms of being able to report back to those members of the industry who have brought it to my attention today.
Mr MILLS (Blain): Madam Speaker, I rise to speak about two matters that are directly related to the city of Palmerston, though general in their scope. Before doing so, I would like to reflect on words that I have spoken here before, that we do live in very interesting times. The debate today was, once again, a very, very interesting articulation of particular concepts. I trust that anyone who follows the debate that occurred would not respond solely on emotion, that the expression of sorrow and sadness was echoed right around this Chamber, and they would understand the almost complex concepts that were being argued, particularly from this side of the House.
There are adventures ahead, as I have mentioned before, and I really do believe that, though I am not quite sure what they all are. One comes in the nature of a black and white football team, the Palmerston Magpies. I listened this morning to the Minister of Sport and Recreation give reference to the importance of sport and recreation in its positive role in building community, and particularly, in the case of the Palmerston Magpies Football Club, in its ability to reach youngsters in our community and to direct them down positive pathways.
I have always believed, as one who has worked with communities in different ways, that powerful, defining agencies within a community - in this case, sport - are things that we really must understand how they are operating, the culture of the sporting codes and the part that they play in our communities. The Palmerston Magpies, I would have to say, are a very significant group in the culture of Palmerston. Inherent within that sporting community are the potentials for directing young people, in particular, down positive pathways. For that reason, fundamentally, is why I have such strong support for this group in our town. Not only that though, I must mention that it is not only youngsters. It does give a defining interest and focus to members of our community - and well rewarded, as all members would know - with winning the flag in the 2000-01 season.
I am a little concerned though, that the member for Arnhem is now the minister for the Power and Water Authority, as he is also closely associated with the Buffaloes. Palmerston Magpies played the Buffaloes at the grand final last year and the lights went out in the fourth quarter. I have already spoken to the honourable minister and asked that he do the right thing at that moment and not keep the lights out, if that were to happen again.
The Palmerston Magpies Football Club has an extensive history. I will not go into their history, but they were a club, generally, that was formed in north Darwin - they were called the North Darwin Magpies. They saw the opportunity to move to Palmerston, and it was a difficult time for them to find a place that they called home. They had some semblance of facility and some semblance of the potential in Palmerston, but they did not have a place they could really call home, because the grounds that they were using is the Archer Sports Complex which really has proved to be unsuitable. I need to say that quite clearly. I have argued that - and anyone in Palmerston who really thinks about it and has studied it, they know, sadly, that the Archer Sports Complex does not work.
The Palmerston Magpies have been encouraged, cajoled in many different forms, to find that their home, and it simply has not worked. Nor has it really worked for the Palmerston Raiders, as well. The reason being, first and foremost, is the sandflies. The sandflies are a significant problem in that area and they are something that just cannot go away, just with people having a greater resolve to call this their home. I can speak with great experience because the school that I was principal of was also in the same vicinity. The sandfly problem there was quite a significant problem, which dictated the times that we could have school fairs, and what time the school stayed open until, of an evening.
At the moment, the Magpies have relocated from there. They were in a position ready to move from Palmerston, and perhaps even tempted to come back to Darwin, for want of that very essential thing that a sporting club needs, and that is a home. I have done a fair amount of work to strengthen the link between the club and the town, the community, but what we need as a club and as a community, is a home ground facility. They need a place they can call home. It is a club that I have the utmost respect for, in the sense that there is no culture in the club of saying: ‘Oh, we want something and we want everything given to us because we deserve it’. They are a working club and they will work very hard to add value to whatever is granted to them. Their aspirations have been raised substantially by promises that were made in the last election to the tune of $2m, to go towards the Palmerston Magpies. Anyone astute enough can see that the Palmerston Magpies were a significant group, and a group that was offered this promise by this ALP candidate - and I understand, it would be endorsed by the Labor team. The club has registered that as a promise, and it is a promise that I will do my utmost to ensure is honoured.
I will also, to be fair, reiterate the sense that it is not a situation where a club is going to be putting its hand out and hoping for complete delivery from the hands of government. The government must play its part, and I ask the government to find a home ground facility for Palmerston - a place they can call home - ground, land. I encourage the minister to have meetings with the club officials. The club officials can direct the minister to pieces of land that have been under consideration. Negotiations commenced with the former government, but they must continue. The club has substantial membership. Their expectations are very high at the moment that something must be done. They are not a group to be played with, and I would have to say, that unless there is prompt response, there will be a challenge presented to the minister and to the present government. We are talking about a group of very focused sporting folk, who happen to wear the colours black and white, and they are very single-minded in their focus. That, as an issue, which will not go away, in fact, it will increase.
Turning to another issue, the Cancer Council. Through my electorate office, we have provided support to the Cancer Council with the Australia’s Biggest Morning Tea, and organised community members to come together and to raise funds in a social context in the Palmerston Shopping Centre - Palm City Oasis, I should say. I understand that $74 000 is raised through Australia’s Biggest Morning Tea. I had the privilege recently of being involved, to some degree, in the Relay for Life. This was an event that was spoken of amongst enthusiastic people, and people who are aware of the incidence of cancer in our community, and it was a concept that has run successfully in other jurisdictions, but it was new to the Northern Territory. There it is immense credit to the organisers that they persisted with their dream and made it become reality. I went along to Marrara to see whether this Relay for Life - which involved community groups walking around the Arafura Stadium and clocking up laps and receiving sponsorship - to see whether it actually would work. It was an immense relief, and a great credit to the organisers, that it worked a treat.
I will just give an outline of the situation that was presented at Arafura Stadium a little while ago. The event itself attracted 40 teams and 550 participants. In fact, I do not think I have seen as many people at the Arafura complex, at the athletics track there. $49 700 has been raised to date, a tremendous outcome and way above the expectations of the organising committee - way above. It was just a wonderful event to see people out there. Now the concept has been translated and been taken up by 40 different groups, and the echo around the groups that were there was: ‘We certainly want to be involved next time’. It can only grow from there.
Local businesses such as Channel 8, Top End Sound, Optus, Jag Pty Ltd, the Carlton Hotel, and many more, willingly supported the event, provided in-kind support and sponsorship, and helped to minimise the cost of staging this great event. Over 100 local entertainers, dancers, singers, and musicians donated their talents - and there were even masseurs on hand to massage feet and those who had sore muscles. They received a donation to keep the runners and the walkers injury-free for a 24-hour period. Other community organisations such as the Salvation Army, Nightcliff Rotary, the Surf Club, Little Nippers, the Guides, NT Surf and Rescue, St John Ambulance, were also on hand to make sure there was food, fun and security for all the participants and spectators.
The Relay for Life organising committee came together in July and took the job with gusto and enthusiasm. Now having experienced the event, other people have come forward offering to be a part of the 2002 committee, which indicated how people have taken the relay and its potential to become the Cancer Council’s premier fundraising event. Just to report on the Cancer Council - their fundraising for the year - it has been a bumper year for them in terms of fundraising. They raised $79 000 as I mentioned, in Australia’s Biggest Morning Tea, the work of volunteers right across the Top End; Daffodil Day, $92 000 from once again, on a structure of volunteerism and people being able to contribute to such a valuable cause; and now Relay for Life which raised nearly $50 000. There is a whole range of little activities that happen around the place – there is nothing more thrilling than to see volunteers working together to address something that affects everybody.
One of the issues that I think was most telling in the Relay for Life was there was a remembrance component where they had a silent moment for anyone to gather and light a candle for somebody who has left us, through cancer. A lot of people were gathering around - there was champagne, and people resting and waiting for their turn to walk around the track. People for a moment just thought: ‘Do I know anybody who has had cancer?’ You would only have to stop for a moment and you would start to recognise people in your own family, one after the other, who have left due to cancer. It really was quite an emotional time. It is an amazing event, and I would encourage anybody, when it comes up in its preparations for next year, to be involved in it. It is a great way of focusing people’s emotional response to cancer, and to do something positive and to raise funds for this great organisation.
Before finishing, I must say that Margaret-Anne Hummerston and the committee wish me to bring to the attention of the House, that the immense organisation that goes on with volunteers to raise funds to support this great project is supported by the Northern Territory government. They do make it clear that they wish this to be addressed, however, because the funding has been $130 000 and it has been unchanged for 6 years. I think on the strength of the community support for the current event - the Relay for Life and the potential that that has, and for their great year in terms of fundraising with volunteers all across the countryside - I think it is something that really should be addressed in terms of reviewing their funding with a very appropriate response for the sort of work that this group does.
There is a local connection in the Cancer Council fundraising - I wish to draw attention to the Palmerston City Council. As I mentioned before, there were 40 different terms, and one of those teams was made up of the Palmerston City Council. There were 31 team members. The captain was Alderman Robert MacLeod, who is a stalwart on the council, a great person to be involved in community activities. The team was made up of the CEO, directors, staff, elected members and partners. The Palmerston City Council raised, in fact, $3146 – I have the exact figures here. They won the certificate for the best fancy dress. A group of them wore Wee Willie Winkie nightshirts and caps and went around the track. There was a couple of them who dressed in federation costumes to get in the spirit of things. They also won the certificate for the most laps walked - 444 laps. The event was actually opened by the acting Mayors of both Darwin and Palmerston. I notice that the Darwin City Council did not have a team in, but I will bet you they will have one there in 2002.
Dr LIM (Greatorex): Madam Speaker, I rise tonight to join my comments with the member for Araluen in regards to the Cawood Court development. I was the Minister for Housing when decisions were made by the Northern Territory government to demolish the Cawood Court complex. Now, as the shadow minister for housing, having heard what the minister said in the last couple of days about Cawood Court, I feel it warrants some comment.
The decision that was arrived at to demolish Cawood Court, came about after many, many months of consultation. The member for Araluen, who was then the candidate, had canvassed the area extensively, spoken to the neighbourhood, found out about the antisocial behaviour that has been occurring in that area for many years. By the time it came to making a decision, there were only very few families left at Cawood Court, so the decision was then made to start relocating the families to other more appropriate accommodation. Once Cawood Court was completely evacuated, the intention was then to demolish the whole complex. Remember that in the Cawood Court region, within 100 m of that, there were three other high-density blocks, namely Mokari, Liana and Palmyra Courts. That was the reason why we had such a high element of antisocial behaviour.
We were approached by developers to see whether we were keen to sell the whole complex, with the intention that the complex would be converted into developments very much like Sunset Court and South Terrace. At that time, we recognised that there was already a saturation of units in Alice Springs. The real estate industry was having difficulties moving the units or selling the units, and so an increase of units in Alice Springs was not going to help alleviate any of the accommodation issues that are there in town. Furthermore, demolishing Cawood Court released some 12 000 m2 of land which could be very easily subdivided into R1 residential blocks, particularly along Nicker Crescent and Ashwin Street. It would help, again, fill the scarcity of residential blocks in Alice Springs.
We thought that we would also reserve a central portion of Cawood Court land to develop as a seniors village, very much like those that have been developed up here in Darwin. This was something that was very much wanted and needed by the senior Territorians living in Alice Springs. Once the seniors village was developed, many of our senior Territorians living in three- and four-bedroom homes would be offered accommodation there, thus freeing up the three- and four-bedroom homes which would then become available for families who are on the waiting list to get into those homes.
All in all, it was a well considered plan. The park next to Cawood Court - I think it is called Ashwin Park - was considered by the town council as one of the parks that it will close down and sell for development. Combining the two blocks together, you will have something like 18 000m2 of land that will be freehold, well-serviced and be available for development in a way that will be very good for the amenity of the area, and thus help with the building industry, housing for first home buyers, housing for people who want private residential blocks, housing for our senior Territorians, and including freeing-up three- and four-bedroom homes for people who qualify for public housing.
It is important that this government, this new minister, listens to what is needed in Alice Springs. There is a huge outcry in Alice Springs at the moment. If the Minister for Housing and Lands, Planning and Environment is not aware, then I suggest that he consults with his Minister for Central Australia. Minister for Central Australia, I suggest, you go home and talk to people in Alice Springs. It is important that you listen to people in Alice Springs, they need the land, they want the complex demolished. I believe it is important that you at least reconsider the proposal to sell it as a private development. It is not going to help Alice Springs at all in any way.
I also asked the Minister for Lands, Planning and Environment, I think two days ago, about what he proposes to do with Owen Springs. While he answered the question that he quoted prices from the Auditor-General, he never got to answering what he plans to do with the property of Owen Springs. Owen Springs was bought by the Northern Territory government under the CLP to preserve land for the future development of Alice Springs, to reserve land to allow tourism, preserving land for the Western Macdonnell development. It is important that Alice Springs is not land locked, and Owen Springs allows that expansion of Alice Springs unhindered. It is important that that goes ahead. I think it is important that the minister advises the House as to what he plans to do with it. My question, specifically, to him was about what he plans to do with the land and not about the price, although I did say about his quoting the price. He was claiming that we paid too much for the land when we, the CLP, was in government.
In the few minutes that I have left, I would like to raise a point that was raised in the Chamber a couple of days ago. The member for Braitling accused me, when she said that, when I tabled a petition relating to the Salvation Army, and I quote here:
I do not propose to do very much about it except to draw her attention to the copy of Hansard dated 31 May 2001 where, indeed, I did present a petition from 48 petitioners. Nothing in the Hansard records that I read out the names at all. The member for Braitling might like to do something about that. I think there is some error there, and I will just table this for easy reference. It is in the Hansard already. I do not need to get it incorporated in Hansard again.
Motion agreed to; the Assembly adjourned.
VISITORS
Madam SPEAKER: Honourable members, I advise of the presence in the gallery of students from Casuarina Senior College accompanied by Carolyn Wines; the Northern Territory University literacy and numeracy adult students accompanied by Lorraine Sushames; the Northern Territory University bridging course students accompanied by Catherine Brewster; and the Northern Territory University Faculty of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander students accompanied by Scott Cooper. On behalf of honourable members I extend a warm welcome to all our visitors.
Members: Hear, hear!
MINISTERIAL REPORTS
Office of Territory Development
Office of Territory Development
Ms MARTIN (Chief Minister): Madam Speaker, I want today to update the House on how this government is moving quickly to implement yet another important component of our economic development strategy for the Territory. That is, the establishment of an Office of Territory Development, and the appointment of Bob Collins as Investment Ambassador.
The Office of Territory Development will be a key ingredient in this government’s strategic development of the Territory economy. As such, it will form a cornerstone of Labor’s objectives to improve job creation and job security in the Territory. Since forming government, we have moved quickly to establish the appropriate structures and objectives of the office so that it can work effectively within the existing frameworks of government. I am pleased to advise today that I can provide some further detail about how this will be achieved.
We envisage the Office of Territory Development playing three key roles in driving economic development in the Territory:
- strategic leadership to establish the economic direction for the Territory,
investment attraction; and
major project facilitation.
The Territory is unique in its state of development and the promise that it offers is its natural advantages. Unlike southern jurisdictions the Territory does not have a highly developed or diverse economic base. We are playing catch up. The advantage of this is that we are in a position to build an industry base that plays to our strengths and is suited to modern economic conditions. What we do have are the ingredients that will drive the rapid development of our economy - a vibrant, diverse and energetic population, a strong supply of natural resources relevant to the modern world, and a strategic location that places us as the intermediary between Asia and the rest of Australia.
What is needed in the current climate is for government to be proactive about securing growth. Government must set an overall direction for economic development. We must chase investment capital that accords with that direction and, in partnership with the private sector, we must facilitate projects that are fundamental to our development where government involvement is required to make them happen. The office will comprise a proactive group who will represent a concentration of scarce resources in government with complementary expertise to attract investment and facilitate projects with a public/private partnership approach. Their skills will be well complemented by Bob Collins, who I have already announced will be the Territory’s Investment Ambassador.
I would now like to briefly discuss how the office will approach each of these functions. First, the strategic direction. At its most fundamental, the key role for the office will be to develop a high level strategic direction for the development of the Territory economy. This work will, of its nature, require close collaboration with Territory industry. Initiatives such as the Economic Development Summit are evidence of this government’s desire to work collaboratively with the business community. It will also require close collaboration with existing agencies within government because there is a wealth of knowledge and experience within the ranks of our public service which needs to be recognised and utilised. The guiding principles of any strategic framework for the Territory economy must encompass two things: it must seek to diversify and grow our economic base so that we are less vulnerable to external shocks such as the recent crisis in the domestic and international aviation industries, and it must seek to provide overall growth in jobs and in job security.
The second aspect of the office is investment attraction. A key function of the office will be the role of investment attraction. This is a multi-faceted task. It will involve undertaking extensive research and analysis to identify particular industry sectors that fit within the overall strategic framework. It will involve creating the environment to allow the private sector to pursue opportunities within the Territory. It will involve attracting particular industry participants in strategic industries to locate within the Territory.
Our strategic framework will identify industries that are a close fit with our natural advantages. If these industries are to be sustainable in the long term, then it makes more sense to target our endeavours to make the Territory an attractive place to invest in the long term. Accordingly, the office will have to be innovative in how it attracts industry to the Territory. This could include providing infrastructure in lieu of financial support, or it could involve providing marketing assistance or accessing Commonwealth government investment attraction funds through Invest Australia. The role of the Investment Ambassador, Bob Collins, in this function will be crucial to the success of the office. With the resources of the office at his disposal he will utilise his vast experience and contacts within and outside the Territory, to act as a conduit between industry and government.
The third major area of activity of the office will be to facilitate specific major projects that are critical to the future growth of the Territory’s economic base. These projects will, by their nature, have benefits that are wider than the strict financial returns to the private investors. Accordingly, many may require a partnership between government and the private sector to allow appropriate risk sharing and to ensure that the wider government objectives are being realised.
Through the railway project the government has developed an expertise in delivering projects in partnership with the private sector. It is envisaged that the office will become a repository of that knowledge so that it can be utilised in future projects that are important to the overall strategic framework and that require close collaboration with the private sector. There are many opportunities for government where this collaborative approach could be used immediately to our benefit. These include:
- using the railway corridor and the port link to consolidate the Territory as a corridor for trade between
the southern states and Asia and beyond;
diversifying the Central Australian economy into areas that draw on and develop the region’s knowledge
in developing and living sustainably in desert regions;
getting gas onshore and establishing a gas manufacturing province that creates downstream economic
benefits;
establishing an offshore supply base to supply and service the offshore oil and gas facilities; and
facilitating the development of a Darwin Convention Centre.
These are some of the specific projects that would be suitable for the Office of Territory Development to have carriage of.
Having outlined the key functions of the office, I finally want to touch on the structure of the office. The office itself will be located within my department to ensure that it receives the central focus necessary. The Investment Ambassador will report personally to me. He will be an incredible asset to government to drive the overall strategic framework and to pursue specific investment attraction opportunities. Bob Collins has already commenced work and, as you know, he is also the Co-Chair of the forthcoming Economic Development Summit.
My government is genuinely excited about the focus and vision that the new Office of Territory Development will help foster for Territory business, and the opportunities for economic and employment growth that will flow from the projects that it sponsors. I look forward to providing further updates to the House on this matter in the future.
Youth Grants
Ms MARTIN (Young Territorians): Madam Speaker, I am pleased to inform the House that 15 Territory organisations have been funded a total of $25 000 this week to conduct activities for young people during the holiday period of December and January.
Recipients of funding from the Office of Youth Affairs Youth Grants Program will conduct a range of activities including: an open air movie night; a youth expo; a night showcasing local bands; leadership development activities; holiday programs; and arts and multicultural events. The quality of the applications for funding was outstanding and reflects the initiative and energy of the Territory’s youth organisations.
The Youth Grants Program has three categories in which organisations can apply for funding – drug and alcohol-free entertainment; youth development and leadership programs; and National Youth Week events, programs or activities. Two types of grants are available under each category. The first is mini-youth grants for funding up to $500, and young people can be directly funded through this grant. The second is major youth grants for funding from $501 to $4000, and young people or organisations applying for this grant must be incorporated or have a sponsoring body that is incorporated. Twenty-nine applications were received for the existing round from Alice Springs, Angurugu, Daguragu, Darwin, Elliott, Katherine, Nhulunbuy and Palmerston, with 15 approved. The selection process is designed to ensure an equitable spread of funding right across the Territory. I would like to tell the House what projects have been funded.
In Alice Springs, the Department of Promotions will host various local bands in the town to showcase their talent and give youth an opportunity to enjoy live music. Alice Springs Youth Centre will hold an open-air movie night with basketball and volleyball games, as well as a barbecue, prior to the movie screening. The Kaltukatjara Community Council will hold a Youth Day at Docker River. Activities will include traditional dancing with the elders, a barbecue, Carols by Candlelight and a Blue Light Disco. The Arltarlpitta community will provide recreational activities for young people. The activities will provide opportunities for elders to pass on cultural and artistic skills. Workshops will include jewellery making, clap stick and boomerang making, and canvas painting. The Angurugu Community Government Council will hold a workshop for young women focusing on the development of communication and interpersonal skills, and healthy and active lifestyles.
The Indian Cultural Society will hold a Youth Development and Leadership Workshop focusing on drug and alcohol issues and fostering leadership skills. The Multicultural Society of the Northern Territory will hold a Youth Expo featuring guest speakers, stalls, competitions, fashion parades and displays. Anglicare Top End will hold a series of workshops for newly-arrived young refugees to help them participate in the local community and form support networks. Nightcliff and Palmerston Lions Clubs will organise a leadership training course for the clubs’ Leos. There is sponsorship for Sid Vemuri to attend The Hague International Model United Nations Conference. Sid will represent the Territory in debating resolutions on contemporary international issues.
CREATE Foundation will hold a workshop to strengthen relationships between young people in care and their caseworkers. This activity will also provide a forum to discuss and experience creative approaches to problem solving and overcoming challenges. There is sponsorship for Damien Moriarty who will travel on the Ship for World Youth, a program involving youth from around the world that fosters an understanding between nations.
Elliott District Government Council will provide a drug and alcohol-free disco night for the youth of Elliott. Arafura Dance Association will provide an opportunity for the youth of Nhulunbuy to express themselves through dance, including funky jazz, over the school holidays – and I am sure the local member will join in. The YMCA Palmerston will conduct the Y-Dream 2001 Holiday Program featuring arts and crafts, live music, discos and competition.
My government will continue to support the young people of the Territory, and I certainly commend our youth organisations for their efforts.
Effluent – Ilparpa Swamp
Dr TOYNE (Central Australia): Madam Speaker, the disposal of treated effluent in Alice Springs is a long-standing problem, which is currently being addressed by my colleague, the Minister for Essential Services, as a high priority. For many years, the previous government permitted treated effluent to periodically overflow into the Ilparpa claypan and effectively created a swamp. The primary objective for future management of treated effluent in Alice Springs is, first and foremost, to prevent overflows into what is now the Ilparpa Swamp.
Discharge into the Ilparpa Swamp must cease in order to address the health and environmental consequences that are known to be associated with the continuation of that overflow. There is some media speculation that the government’s preferred option to prevent such overflows is to extend the current evaporation ponds at the Alice Springs waste water treatment facility. The options for future development of effluent and potential uses from recycled water in Alice Springs have not, at this stage, been considered by this government. The government’s baseline is that overflows to the Ilparpa Swamp will not be permitted under any future management arrangement.
As a benchmark, the Power and Water Authority Board currently considers that the least cost option to address the requirements is through an extension of the evaporation pondage system, possibly supplemented by further irrigation of trees in the Ilparpa area. However, the board will continue to examine alternative schemes, such as the use of treated effluent through supply to horticultural and other irrigation uses.
No decision has been made by the Power and Water Authority Board as to its final preferred option. Further studies on other options are underway in conjunction with other agencies such as the Department of Lands, Planning and Environment and the Department of Primary Industry and Fisheries. None of these options have been presented to government, nor have they been considered by government at this stage. Depending on the marketing analysis of the potential to supply the recycled water to commercial and other uses, some of the options for reuse may require government to consider provision of a community service obligation payment to the Power and Water Authority.
I reiterate the government’s policy, which is that overflows to the Ilparpa Swamp must cease. The government is open to consideration of all options to address this objective, including the full range of options to use recycled water in irrigation and other uses. The views of the community will continue to be listened to in this regard. These options will come forward to government in the near future for consideration. The government is committed to addressing the problem, along with many others left neglected by its predecessor.
Driver Fatigue Management
Mr AH KIT (Transport and Infrastructure Development): Madam Speaker, driver fatigue is an important safety issue for the road transport industry worldwide. In 1997, the Australian Transport Minister’s Council agreed that national truck and bus driving hour regulations, that mandated the use of driver log books, were inappropriate for the Northern Territory and Western Australia. In agreeing to this exemption, ministers recognised the different operating environment in remote areas, and accepted that the heavy vehicle transport industry in the Northern Territory had, and still has, a good safety record. While our record to date has been good, the risks of a major accident occurring cannot be underestimated and therefore needs to be addressed. The Northern Territory code of practice for fatigue management takes an alternative approach to regulated hours, where prescriptive hours and log books are used.
Following extensive consultation, both the Northern Territory and Western Australian governments have developed codes of practice for fatigue management under occupational health and safety legislation. This makes the issue a joint responsibility - an employer and employee responsibility. The Northern Territory Road Transport Fatigue Management Code of Practice was gazetted under the Northern Territory Work Health Act in September 1998. Implementation of the code of practice is voluntary. However, the requirement for operators to practically demonstrate that they have put in place systems that meet the safety outcomes required under the Work Health Act is mandatory.
The code was developed jointly by the Department of Transport and Works, the Department of Industries and Business, and the Australian Trucking Association Northern Territory. The code of practice provides operators with a set of key principles for the management of driver fatigue in the workplace. The principles have been developed on the basis of the practical experience of Northern Territory operators.
In October last year, operators were surveyed to assess the extent of industry implementation of the code. Although awareness of the need to manage driver fatigue was very high, operators indicated that they needed assistance with the development of fatigue management systems in their workplaces. The Department of Transport and Works, together with the Department of Industries and Business, Work Health and the Australian Trucking Association NT have worked collaboratively to develop the package of materials that I am releasing today. It is pleasing to note that sectors of the tourism industry have also participated in the development of this package of resources that will assist operators to meet their obligations under the code. The resources have been trialed and finetuned through use by a number of operators in the heavy vehicle and tourism sectors of the road transport industry.
I know industry is looking forward to the release of the package. This will allow them to incorporate it into their business systems, and assist in the provision of a safe working environment for their staff. The package provides the capacity for businesses to apply the principles in a manner that will best suit their individual needs. In addition to a mail-out to all operators, the package will be made available on the Department of Transport and Works’ Internet site. This will allow operators to download and adapt specific systems to suit their own requirements. Driver fatigue management has also been included in the accreditation process for tourist operators under the Northern Territory tourism accreditation program. Tourist operators are keen to receive assistance that will enable them to secure the appropriate accreditation.
I take this opportunity to congratulate all those involved in the development of this innovative package: members of the Australian Trucking Association NT, for your active and collaborative involvement; the dedicated staff of the Work Health Authority of the Department of Industries and Business; and the highly professional staff of the Transport Division of the Department of Transport and Works. It is great to see such cooperative efforts resulting in services that are both needed and wanted by industry. I table this copy of the driver fatigue management materials for the information of members.
BIMP-EAGA Growth Areas
Mr HENDERSON (Industries and Business): Madam Speaker, I rise to report to the House the current status of the Brunei, Indonesia, Malaysia, Philippines - East Asian Growth Area, otherwise known as BIMP-EAGA, and to update the House on opportunities for Territory business through this forum.
Firstly, some background for honourable members. BIMP-EAGA was first proposed by Philippines President, Fidel Ramos, at an ASEAN leaders meeting in Brunei in October 1992. The group was formed by agreement of involved ASEAN ministers and senior officials meeting in Davao City, Mindanao, Philippines in March 1994. The central goal of BIMP-EAGA is to increase trade, investment and tourism within the participating areas through transport cooperation. The principle for BIMP-EAGA is that the private sector takes a leading role in developing the economic activities on a joint venture basis whilst government acts as facilitators. The objectives are to intensify and strengthen regional cooperation to: facilitate the freer movement of people, goods and services in order to stimulate the subregional economy by rapidly expanding its market and resource base; rationalise the developments of vital infrastructure in the subregion to address the short and medium term infrastructure gaps; and to coordinate the management of ecosystems and common resources to ensure sustainable development.
Initially BIMP-EAGA included Brunei; Indonesia - west and east Kalimantan, north Sulawesi; Malaysia - Sabah, Sarawak and Labaun; and the Philippines - Mindanao and Palawan. Additional east Indonesian areas were later added - central and south Kalamantan, central, south and south-east Sulawesi, Maluku Islands and Irian Jaya.
BIMP-EAGA currently covers 1 600 000 km , around 46 000 000 people, and a GDP of more than $US32bn. The initial priorities for BIMP-EAGA coorporation were: expanding air linkages; expanding sea transportation and shipping services; expanding fisheries cooperation; and joint tourism developments. Nine other areas of cooperation were identified and added including: construction; agri-industry; capital formation and financial services; forestry; telecommunications; energy; people mobility; human resource development; and environment protection and management.
The Northern Territory was recognised as an interested party from the outset. The Northern Territory has been involved in ministerials, senior officials, working group and other meetings. After some slow progress over the past few years during the Asian economic crisis and due to other regional factors BIMP-EAGA has now been revitalised. Officers of the Department of Asian Relations and Trade attended the recent meeting in Brunei and provided positive feedback as to the continuation of BIMP-EAGA, and the group’s support for the Northern Territory’s continued participation as an observer at these meetings. The BIMP-EAGA area provides opportunities for Territory business which the government is keen to pursue. The region has significant and growing industrial resources, opportunities exist in downstream activities related to the above areas, or in joint development and marketing of resources. Prospective sectors with possibilities for Northern Territory based businesses to win work include: mining, oil and gas projects and support services; tourism projects; agriculture and agribusiness; defence support; transport services; infrastructure and construction expertise; communications equipment and services; education and health services; professional services; and governments administration.
Whilst a number of impediments remain to fully exploit the potential of the region, areas where the Northern Territory has already achieved success include transport, communications, agribusiness and service provision. The Northern Territory will continue to participate with BIMP-EAGA to maximise the opportunities the grouping provides for mutually beneficial links for trade, economic development and job creation. The continuing benefits to the Territory from participation include: stronger links with participating governments and better access to wider trade and investment opportunities; early identification and access to two-way trade and investment opportunities; better ability to convert these opportunities; and a greater understanding of regional and market trends affecting existing Northern Territory trade and investment; opportunities to promote the Northern Territory especially rail, port, two-way trade flows, oil and gas, tourism, agriculture and other investment opportunities.
This government is continuing to continue to support this key regional grouping and I am happy to report further progress back to the House as we move forward.
Mr BURKE: A point of order, Madam Speaker! A point of clarification in terms of these ministerial statements. I understand that there is no opportunity for the opposition to debate each minister’s as they produce their statement. I wonder if a motion is about to be put to these statements - is there any opportunity for the opposition to comment on any of the statements that have been made? I give the example of the last statement from the Minister for Resource Development where he has made a number of comments with regards to the future potential of BIMP-EAGA. Certainly, I have a point of view on that issue. I certainly have some concerns with the positive outlook he puts on BIMP-EAGA. There was certainly continuing opposition from major countries of not only, in particular …
Mr STIRLING: A point of order, Madam Speaker! I think the Leader of the Opposition has made his point. He is now debating the report whether he likes it or not …
Madam SPEAKER: The Leader of the Opposition has the floor.
Mr BURKE: … the continued involvement of the Northern Territory.
Madam SPEAKER: Before you continue on with your statement about that report, I am advised that the only way you could possibly do it, is to seek leave to move that the statement be noted, and then in that debate you could do it. I think it might be appropriate if the Leader of the Oppostion and the Leader of Government Business get together and discuss this particular point that has been raised a number of times about debate in the House, and the opportunity to respond, rather than have the debate at the moment, that would obviously be defeated. I just believe it needs to be clarified.
Mr BURKE: Madam Speaker, if I could - just for a moment - I am not trying to cause a disagreement. I am simply saying that perhaps the minister, in this sort of instance, could give an undertaking to the House that he will bring forward these statements with a full ministerial statement in the near future. There are opportunities for comment and debate – constructive - and this forum gives not only no opportunity for the opposition to comment, but certainly no indication that the House will ever have an opportunity to debate these types of initiatives in any shape or form.
Mr STIRLING: Madam Speaker, in response to the point of order, I am happy to meet with the Leader of the Opposition on these matters. There are, of course, opportunities for the opposition to respond to these either by bringing them up at Question Time at 2 o’clock, by Matter of Public Importance …
Mr Burke: What, in adjournment?
Mr STIRLING: Or by adjournment. There are those options available and, of course, on the General Business day, the Leader of the Opposition as a minister in this House, has the floor for half an hour without response from the government under the sessional orders as they currently stand. I am happy to meet with the Leader of the Opposition and work through these issues. His other option, of course, is to take suggestions through standing orders.
Madam SPEAKER: I believe that you and the Leader of the Opposition should get together and come to some resolution on this matter because it has been a question that has been raised a number of times throughout these sittings.
Reports noted pursuant to Sessional Order.
SUSPENSION OF STANDING ORDERS
Take Two Bills Together
Take Two Bills Together
Ms MARTIN (Chief Minister): Madam Speaker, I move that so much of Standing orders be suspended as would prevent bills entitled Government Owned Corporations Bill 2001 (Serial 21) and Power and Water Authority Amendment Bill 2001 (Serial 22), (a) being presented and read a first time together and one motion being put in regard to respectively, the second readings, the committee’s report stage and the third readings of the bill together; and (b) consideration of the bills separately in the Committee of the Whole.
Motion agreed to.
GOVERNMENT OWNED CORPORATIONS BILL
(Serial 21)
POWER AND WATER AUTHORITY AMENDMENT BILL
(Serial 22)
(Serial 21)
POWER AND WATER AUTHORITY AMENDMENT BILL
(Serial 22)
Bills presented and read a first time.
Ms MARTIN (Chief Minister): Madam Speaker, I move that the bills be now read a second time.
These bills are a major and essential step in repairing the Territory’s finances. Professor Percy Allan’s recent report on the Territory’s financial position recommended that government trading enterprises be corporatised with a view to lifting their efficiency and ability to contribute to the budget. Professor Allan also recommended that training enterprises be moved off budget and be made subject to a Government Owned Corporations Act as the appropriate performance and accountability framework for them. With the Government Owned Corporations Bill the government is addressing these recommendations.
The bill will put in place a shareholder model of corporate governance to apply to key Territory businesses. This involves firstly, replicating as far as possible the shareholder disciplines that apply to private sector businesses - for example, a board of directors that exercises corporate control and which reports to shareholders; and secondly, changing the accountability arrangements from those that are appropriate for budget-dependent agencies to those suited to off-budget government-owned corporations.
The Power and Water Authority, the Territory’s largest trading enterprise, will be the first government-owned corporation. It will come under the framework this financial year as soon as all prerequisite steps are completed. This change of status will assist PAWA in best responding to the regulatory frameworks now applying to the electricity, water and sewerage industries, and to competition in the electricity market.
The government-owned corporations legislation framework has several key elements:
- 1. Corporations that are established under their own acts but which are governed by the new overarching
legislation to encourage improved business performance.
portfolio minister with broad policy responsibilities in the relevant area of government.
accountable to the shareholding minister.
4. An annual performance agreement between the shareholding minister and the Government Owned
Corporations Board known as the Statement of Corporate Intent.
This replaces the accountability provisions that currently apply to budget-dependent agencies.
The central objective of the Government Owned Corporations Bill is to provide a basis for improved performance by government-owned businesses under continuing public ownership and for greater sustainable financial returns to the Territory on its investment in those businesses. Consistent with this, the objectives of government-owned corporations will be to perform at least efficiently as any comparable businesses and to maximise the sustainable return to the Territory on its investment. The government-owned corporations framework provides for distinct and separate responsibilities for the various parties including the shareholding minister, the portfolio minister, the commercial board of directors and the chief executive officer.
The shareholding minister will have a role similar to that of a large investor in a private corporation and will focus on receiving maximum sustainable returns from the business. As the shareholder, the shareholding minister’s responsibilities will include recommending appointment of directors to the commercial board and, in conjunction with the board, the chief executive officer. Other key responsibilities will be to approve the Statement of Corporate Intent and major investments, including the establishment of any subsidiaries.
The shareholding minister will also have a power to direct the government-owned corporation. This will apply in the event of agreement not being reached with the board on, for example, the threshold for ministerial approval of capital works and financial investments. Given the focus on financial issues, the role of shareholding minister is most appropriately undertaken by the Treasurer.
The portfolio minister, in contrast, will continue to administer the government-owned corporation’s own legislation. The portfolio minister will be responsible, in consultation with the shareholding minister, for community service obligations. The portfolio minister will also remain responsible for relevant industry-wide policy issues. Under the existing framework, the chief executive officer is accountable for the performance of government businesses. In contrast, under the new framework board accountability will replace chief executive officer accountability in line with private sector arrangements, and reflecting the commercial nature of the corporation.
The board of a government-owned corporation is to be accountable to the shareholding minister for the financial and business performance of the corporation. The board of a government-owned corporation will also explicitly be a decision-making body rather than an advisory one. The administrator will appoint directors, with the shareholding minister recommending the appointments, with due regard to the expertise necessary for the corporation to achieve its objectives. The shareholding minister will also select one of the directors to be chair of the board. Under the government-owned corporations framework, directors’ duties will be consistent with Corporations Act requirements. However, directors will have some additional responsibilities due to the public ownership of government-owned corporations. These additional responsibilities include maintaining relationships with both ministers and keeping the ministers informed of material events.
Unlike general agencies, government-owned corporations will not be accountable through the existing budget approval and parliamentary scrutiny process. The legislation, nevertheless, ensures that government-owned corporations will be fully accountable for their performance. The bill provides for an annually negotiated performance agreement between the shareholding minister and the board of the government-owned corporation. Covering a three-year period, the Statement of Corporate Intent will set out what the shareholder may expect in terms of performance, particularly financial performance; any material risks faced by the corporation; and the corporation’s business strategies to achieve the financial targets and minimise the risks. It will also include the government-owned corporations capital investment program.
The Government Owned Corporations Board will provide an annual report against the objectives and financial targets of the statement of corporate intent to the shareholding minister and the portfolio minister. Reports will include commentary on specific factors affecting performance, risks and strategic and other issues. The shareholding minister will table a statement of corporate intent in parliament and also the report on performance. This report may be included in the corporation’s annual report. The statement of corporate intent framework will provide a robust mechanism for monitoring the performance of the government-owned corporation and ensuring the board is accountable for the corporation’s performance. The framework will encourage improved performance.
Consistent with existing arrangements applying to government business divisions the Auditor-General will audit the financial statements of government-owned corporations. The Audit Act will apply to government-owned corporations just as it does to agencies, but with audit reports to be provided to the board rather than to the accountable officer before being sent to the shareholding minister. The shareholding minister may also request the Auditor-General or, alternatively, another auditor to undertake special audits. Special audits may relate to any aspect of the government-owned corporations accounts, performance or systems.
Turning to financial arrangements, the shareholding minister will approve capital works and financial investments above a threshold level. The threshold is to be agreed by the board and the shareholding minister or, alternatively, established by the shareholding minister’s direction. As statutory corporations, government-owned corporations will undertake their own banking arrangements separate from the public account. Under the bill the Treasurer’s guarantee will not apply to the borrowings and other liabilities of government-owned corporations. This is to ensure a level playing field with the private sector.
A guarantee would only be available in special circumstances, for example, in cases where a government-owned corporation is required to undertake an activity outside its normal functions. Similarly, government-owned corporations will not have Crown immunity protection from the operation of legislation of the Territory or the Commonwealth. However, transitional provisions will preserve Crown immunity in respect of matters that arose before the business became a government-owned corporation. At this stage, government-owned corporations will continue to borrow and invest with the Northern Territory Treasury Corporation. They will continue to pay a margin on top of the Territory’s borrowing rate, in recognition of the fact that the Territory’s cost of borrowing is lower than a comparable private corporation in place.
To ensure they are not unfairly advantaged by public ownership, government-owned corporations may also be liable for a competitive neutrality fee if, and when, they are approved to borrow externally. Consistent with existing arrangements applying to government business divisions the bill provides for government-owned corporations to make annual dividend payments from after-tax profits. The bill also provides for government-owned corporations and their subsidiaries to make income tax equivalent payments.
Since 1 July 2001, PAWA has been subject to the national tax equivalents regime for income tax administered on behalf of the states and territories by the Australian Taxation Office. The Territory’s tax equivalents regime has also been extended to include local government rate equivalents payments, pending removal in due course of the exemption from rates that currently apply to the Power and Water Authority. Tax equivalents payments from government-owned corporations and dividends, together with the community service obligation funding provided to government-owned corporations, will continue to be included in the Territory’s budget.
The bill also requires government-owned corporations to have in place a procurement policy that is consistent with the principles of the government’s procurement arrangements. The portfolio minister would approve this policy. Government-owned corporations will also be able to tender for government-funded projects.
I turn to the Power and Water Authority Amendment Bill. The Power and Water Authority Act is to be amended to establish PAWA as a government-owned corporation. The amendments will also ensure that the Power and Water Authority Act is aligned appropriately with the provisions of the Government Owned Corporations Bill. PAWA’s establishment as a government-owned corporation will mean that its existing commercial board of directors will become directly accountable for performance rather than the Chief Executive Officer as currently.
Under the bill, PAWA’s functions will be altered by removing those provisions which could be interpreted as placing commercial objectives secondary to non-commercial ones. The bill also provides for PAWA’s existing board to remain in place but with the government owned corporations act rather than the Power and Water Authority Act to govern its operation and all future appointments. However, the terms of the current appointees to the board are unchanged. PAWA’s Chief Executive Officer will also continue on a similar basis.
PAWA’s existing employment arrangements involving an enterprise agreement under the Public Sector Employment and Management Act will remain in place. This framework should continue to provide PAWA with significant flexibility to achieve its commercial objectives. The Public Sector Employment and Management Act will therefore continue to apply with limited changes as set out in the bill. In particular, under the Public Sector Employment and Management Act, the Commissioner for Public Employment delegates his powers directly to the Chief Executive Officer of an agency. In order to ensure involvement of the board in employment matters, the Chief Executive Officer will be required to have regard to any recommendation to the board when exercising employment delegations. The Power and Water Authority Amendment Bill will come into affect as soon as PAWA’s Statement of Corporate Intent is completed and approved in the near future.
Madam Speaker, the government-owned corporations legislation provides an essential step in lifting the business performance of the Territory’s government-owned businesses and, in the first instance, that of the Power and Water Authority. This legislation presents a key part of the action needed to restore the Territory’s finances for the benefit of all Territorians.
Madam Speaker, I commend the bills to the Assembly.
Debate adjourned.
SUSPENSION OF STANDING ORDERS
Pass all stages
Pass all stages
Dr TOYNE (Attorney-General): Madam Speaker, I move that so much of Standing orders be suspended as would prevent the Validation (Chief Magistrate) Bill 2001 (Serial 18) passing through all stages at this sittings.
Motion agreed to.
VALIDATION (CHIEF MAGISTRATE) BILL
(Serial 18)
(Serial 18)
Bill presented and read a first time.
Dr TOYNE (Attorney-General): Madam Speaker, I move that the bill be now read a second time.
The purpose of this bill is to ensure that the administration of justice in the Territory is not adversely affected if the appointment of the Chief Magistrate made on 27 February 1998 is declared by the Federal Court to be invalid.
The bill validates in separate provisions the appointment of the Chief Magistrate made on 27 February 1998; the determination of remuneration and allowances and the terms of conditions made on 27 February 1998; and the actions of the Chief Magistrate. Any one or all provisions can be commenced upon the Federal Court decision being handed down. The bill will ensure that the actions of the Chief Magistrate since his appointment on 27 February 1998 are valid and recognised as enforceable at law.
Madam Speaker, I commend the bill to honourable members.
Debate adjourned.
LOCAL GOVERNMENT AMENDMENT
BILL (No 2)
(Serial 10)
BILL (No 2)
(Serial 10)
Bill presented and read a first time.
Mr VATSKALIS (Local Government): Madam Speaker, I move that the bill be now read a second time.
This bill was previously introduced in the House on 5 July 2001 by the former Minister for Local Government. Upon the change of government in August this year the bill lapsed. The government has considered the lapsed bill and has agreed that it should be reintroduced.
The purpose of the bill is twofold. Firstly, to allow for new names of local government councils in the future. Secondly, for the avoidance of any doubt, to confirm retrospectively the title chosen by the Tiwi people for their new local government body when it was established on 12 July 2001.
Under the Local Government Act, the name of a council must be include the words ‘city’, ‘town’ or ‘shire’ or the words ‘community government’. Up until recently this description has satisfied communities in respect of all councils established under the act. It is true the title for organisations, and the image they present, can be significant not only to the members of that organisation but to others who relate to the organisation. The Tiwi people recognise that their new council is more than the sum of three community government councils that it has replaced. This three council were established at Nguiu, Pirlangimpi and Milikapiti. A new title was warranted for the new entity.
A second reason behind the change to titles is that some groups of communities, including the Tiwi, want to amalgamate their existing councils into a new style of local government that will have more of a regional vision and role. They will be more sustainable local governments with more encompassing responsibilities. The term ‘community government’ is not appropriate for such organisations and clearly was not appropriate for the Tiwi Islands. For these reasons, the Tiwi people chose a new title for their council, namely the Tiwi Islands Local Government, when it was established last July. That title is included in its constitution.
It is proposed in the bill now before the House to amend the Local Government Act so as to permit the Minister for Local Government to approve titles for new councils other than one of the four options that I have already mentioned. I have undertaken to consult with the Chief Minister about proposed new titles for councils prior to their approval under the act. To ensure that there can be no doubts about the Tiwi title, the effect of the bill will be retrospective to 1 July 2001, thus covering the establishment of the Tiwi Islands Local Government. No known detriment would be caused to any person or organisation by the retrospectivity.
Madam Speaker, I commend the bill to the Assembly.
Debate adjourned.
PUBLIC SECTOR EMPLOYMENT AND MANAGEMENT BILL
(Serial 14)
(Serial 14)
Bill presented and read a first time.
Mr STIRLING (Education, Employment and Training): Madam Speaker, I move that the bill be now read a second time.
The purpose of this bill is to amend Schedule 1 of the Public Sector Employment and Management Act to remove reference to the Office of the Commissioner for Public Employment from that schedule. This will enable the functions and staff of the Office of the Commissioner for Public Employment to be merged with the Northern Territory Employment and Training Authority to form the Department of Employment and Training.
Madam Speaker, you will be aware, one of the election promises of Northern Territory Labor was to establish a Department of Employment and Training to train the Territorian workforce to take advantage of the future jobs growth in the Northern Territory. This proposed amendment clears the way for the department to be properly integrated by allowing the functions of the Office of Commissioner for Public Employment to be vested in the department by an administrative arrangements order. I commend the bill to honourable members.
Debate adjourned.
ADDRESS-IN-REPLY
Continued from 23 October 2001.
Madam SPEAKER: I remind members that this is the member for Barkly’s maiden speech and accordingly, I request honourable members to extend the appropriate courtesy to listen in silence.
Mr McADAM (Barkly): Madam Speaker, allow me to acknowledge the traditional owners of this piece of country upon which this Assembly is built, the Larrakia nation. May I also pay tribute to their resilience over time and their capacity to be innovative and creative in growing this great Territory. I would also like to take this opportunity to congratulate all members of the House on their recent success, and I look forward to healthy and robust debate in the interest of all sectors of the Territory.
I particularly wish to congratulate the member for Arafura, Marion Scrymgour, the member for Millner, Matthew Bonson, the member for Karama, Delia Lawrie, the member for Sanderson, Len Kiely, the member for Johnston, Chris Burns, and I wish them all the very best. Also, to the member for Nightcliff, Jane Aagaard, and the member for Casuarina, Kon Vatskalis, I extend my sincere congratulations on your appointment to your respective ministries and I wish you both well. As indeed I do, in respect to all ministers of the first Labor government in the Northern Territory. Your collective responsibilities will be enormous and your tasks, at times, will be both challenging and all-consuming. On this side of the House let it be noted that you have our full support.
Best wishes also to the member for Nelson, Gerry Wood. To my two colleagues opposite, the member for Araluen, Jodeen Carney, and the member for Goyder, Peter Maley, please accept my best wishes also.
It is both an honour and a privilege to represent the people of the Barkly in this Assembly, and I say to the people of the Barkly I will always try to represent your interests in a fair and equitable manner, and without fear or favour. The people in the Barkly are truly independent, courageous and determined people, with a great capacity to work together and get things done. We are always respectful of each other’s social, cultural and political differences, and we recognise that these qualities have served us well in the past, as they will well into the future.
Other than the construction of the railway, we have been doing it tough over the past few years, with the downturn of the regional economy and its associated impact on the local businesses and communities in the Barkly. However, I am confident that, with the principles of good governance and a commitment to redress the previous government’s lack of vision south of Katherine, the Barkly, over time, will once again become a dynamic, viable and cohesive community, underpinned by a sustainable economy based on partnerships with interest to all people in the Territory.
Madam Speaker, allow me a little indulgence to showcase the potential of the Barkly and its capacity to contribute significantly to the economy of the Northern Territory, Australia and globally. As mentioned previously, the lack of a working mine has contributed significantly to the lack of business and community confidence in Tennant Creek. But I am pleased to advise that the Warumungu traditional owners have entered into two indigenous land use agreements in respect to mineral exploration in and around Tennant Creek with Giants Reef which, no doubt, will bring long-term benefits to all. To this extent the Chariot Mine should kick in by mid next year with up to 70 to 80 jobs coming on line. It is important to note that this mine will not operate on a fly-in fly-out basis, and that all employees will reside in Tennant Creek. I also applaud the Warumungu traditional owners, the Central Land Council and Nick Byrne of Giants Reef, for their commitment and their no-nonsense and mature approach to getting down to business and growing the Barkly.
The pastoral industry is also a very important component of the economy in the Barkly, with approximately 500 000 head of cattle, with a turn-off rate of about 180 000 for export and for the Australian market. The challenge for this government is to grow this place by being creative and facilitating the indigenous landholders and the land council in developing viable properties to be brought on stream as producers, thus enhancing employment opportunities and economic growth to all indigenous people and the region in general. This will be a challenge and I will work hard with all sectors of the industry to bring this to fruition.
The recent spate of bush fires have set back the pastoral industry and, indeed, the relationship between indigenous people and the pastoralists. I use this matter by way as an example only. Sometimes, reports in the media, fueled by the politics of division, tend to concentrate on the negative as opposed to the positive strategies. This very serious issue was heading that way. I became concerned enough to phone Ross Peatling, the manager of Alexandria Station, and the President of the NT Cattlemen’s Association, to discuss the possibility of all stakeholders getting together to develop strategies instead of debate by the media. To Ross’s credit, this occurred. I thank Ross Peatling, the Central Land Council, the government agencies and the minister, for sitting down and working towards resolving this issue. That is the way to go - sit down, enter into full and frank dialogue, develop strategies, and implement them in the interests of all.
Tourism opportunities also abound in the Barkly, and I will be working hard to build on the good work of the previous government, and the hard work of the Barkly Regional Tourist Association. It is important, again, that we be creative, innovative and inclusive and include the indigenous people as part of this overall strategy. I will also be pushing hard to include the Power Creek Telegraph Station and the Longreach Waterhole, west of Elliott, as new destinations. They may not sound important, but I believe that they have the capacity to provide options in our area. Also included as part of my commitment, is to develop new marketing strategies in respect to the Davenport Ranges and the Limmen Bight area.
The proposed Nyinkka Nyunyu interpretative centre in Tennant Creek will be an important new tourism development and I pay tribute to the perseverance of the traditional owners and the Julalikari Council for their vision. Everyone can be assured that this particular development will stand alone as one of the real attractions in the Northern Territory. In our region, development tourism is also important. We need to be aggressive in identifying new products, particularly to attract tourists who will access the passenger train service, as well as the drive and the bus market. I will work hard with all involved to try and achieve these outcomes.
The same applies to the fishing industry, both commercial and recreational. In Borroloola recently, I represented the Minister for Primary Industry and Fisheries in respect to a recent spate of dugong deaths. Again, we sat down with all parties and came away with some strategies to prevent these unnecessary deaths. The discussions were frank and in the interests of all. I thank the traditional owners, the Mabunji Aboriginal Corporation, the Northern Land Council, the Amateur Fisherman’s Association of the Northern Territory, the Seafood Council, and many others who were present. I just cannot stress enough the importance of taking this approach. Sometimes the confrontationist approach just does not work. I must also acknowledge that, obviously, by having the capacity to sit down we are going to have some blues and we are going to have some differences, but I think it is probably the best option.
Also in respect to Borroloola and that region, I am relieved that we, as a government, have committed to building a bridge across the McArthur and upgrade the major crossings to the Queensland border. Of absolute importance also is the upgrading of health services in the region, culminating in a community-based health service at Borroloola. It is important that we, as a government, provide every support and assistance. Congratulations to Dr Peter Fitzpatrick and Maria Pyro, and the community, for working so hard to achieve their outcomes. They will have my full support, as they will of the government.
I also applaud and thank this new government and the Minister for Health, for their commitment to establishing a renal dialysis facility in Tennant Creek. May I also pay tribute to Anyinginyi Congress for their dedication in pursuing this very important facility for the Barkly. Again I must emphasise, like most initiatives in our region they have broad community support. Indeed, the service clubs have raised approximately $16 000 for this much-needed facility, and I thank them on behalf of all the people in the Barkly.
Education in the bush and across the Territory remains a real issue. Our attendance and retention rates are excessively poor. There is no high school outside of Tennant Creek and our residential facilities cannot meet the demands of indigenous people wishing to access secondary school in Tennant Creek. It is critical that we be innovative and flexible in responding to the education needs of our young people. Quite honestly, we have lost two generations - perhaps even three - and we all need to address this issue in a bipartisan manner. I seek assurances from the opposition that we will all work together to overcome the disadvantage of young people in the bush.
The issues that I have spoken about previously are dear to me, as they are to many people in the Barkly, and I pledge that I will engage all people in an inclusive way to improve our social, cultural and economic position.
May I now take this opportunity to thank a whole host of people who assisted me over the past few years. To the members of the community of Elliott, where I was born, I would like to thank Mark Raymond, Rosemary Raymond, Kevin Neade, Roy Avery, Harold Dalywaters and my brother, Pompey Raymond. When times got tough I always new I could go there and there was a shoulder to lean on, so I thank them very sincerely. To the people at Ali Curung – Marjorie Limbiari, the Rankine family, the Shannon family and many others - I thank them, and congratulate them for their law and order program. It is probably one of the better law and order strategies in the remote communities. I do pay tribute to the previous government who were instrumental in that. I would like to think that we, as a government, can also have a look at developing those types of strategies in some of the other communities.
To Tara down near Barrow Creek; Uncle Tommy; Vincent and Sonny, who were also always on hand as required; to the people at Canteen Creek, and, in particular, Kenny Philomac, Millie Mick and her family, thank you so much. Also to the people at Epenarra - Mr Beasley, Nelson Casson and his wife Shirley; at Kalinjarri - Michael James and his family; to Borroloola - Graham Dingwall, Ahmad, BJ, Maria Pyro, Jack Louis, Thelma Douglas, Roy Hammer, and a whole lot of other people; and also to the Robinson River community - Tony Jack and his family. In Tennant Creek - Gerry McCarthy, Nigel Rush, Chris Shaw, Noni Nelson, Digger, Gummo, Daryl Fitz and family, Pat Braun, Tim Rankine, Rick, Raelene Brown, thank you very much for your support.
I would also like to extend a very special thanks to Sharon Kinraid, my campaign manager, for a very professional and disciplined campaign. Sharon, as those of you who know her will be aware, keeps everyone on her toes, and on this occasion it was no exception. Also to Steven McVay who put in the long hours and provided a sense of humour which is so necessary during these periods; to Kerry Gardiner, my dear friend who was always available when needed; to the member for Fannie Bay and Chief Minister, Clare Martin; to the member for Stuart, Minister Peter Toyne; the member for Arnhem, Minister John Ah Kit; and the member for Nhulunbuy, Minister Syd Stirling, thank you all for sharing your time and coming down during the last two years. I can assure you it was much appreciated and we invite you all down in the next few months.
I would also like to pay a tribute to Maggie Hickey, the previous member for Barkly, who was a source of inspiration and a wonderful mentor, who gave of her time so unselfishly. We had some wonderful times together travelling the electorate and those of you who know, maybe you will understand what I mean when I say that. Maggie, again, thank you, and I am certain that all the Assembly today wish you well in your future endeavours.
Members: Hear, hear!
Mr McADAM: To my beautiful partner, Barb Shaw, thank you for your patience and your love and support. To my three children, Ngara, Adrian and Alira, I thank them as well.
I would like to dedicate this occasion to a number of people. Firstly, Max Smith, a mate of mine who was working out at Kurundi Station and was burnt during the spate of bush fires that occurred in that area. Max has lost all the fingers on both his hands as a result of fighting these fires. Max used to travel in on 350 km of dirt road to come to meetings, to come down and say: ‘G’day’, and he was a great support to me. So to Max, our thoughts and prayers are with you and your family and I know that you will be back in Tennant Creek pretty soon.
I would also like to dedicate this to John Hickey, Maggie Hickey’s husband, who was a source of inspiration and someone whom I could rely on for unbiased, straight-to-the-guts advice. Also to Ross Alley who has also passed on. Ross was my brother-in-law, a very kind, gentle person, a real believer, and I thank him and his family for their support. Finally, to my parents who, incidentally, are both deceased - Dorcas Wesley and James McAdam.
In conclusion, let it be known that the push for the bush is on. I know the people of the Barkly will not let me rest, and nor will I.
Mr BALDWIN (Daly): Madam Speaker, I, too, rise to make my contribution to the Administrator’s address and this Address-In-Reply. I congratulate the member for Barkly for making his maiden speech in this parliament, as I do all of the new members in the parliament for not only their election, but for getting their maiden speeches over and done with. It is not an easy thing to do, so it is great to see that they have completed those. I congratulate all members of this House who have been re-elected. Like the member for Barkly, I, too, hold a rural seat and it is great to hear that somebody else is pushing for the bush. I am sure there are a few others in this House who are glad to hear that as well.
I take the opportunity to place on the record my thanks to all those people in the electorate for their support leading up to, and during, the election. It is been a great honour to have been elected to the seat of Victoria River twice, and now - probably a little piece of history and, indeed, a very great honour to have been elected to that seat, now called the seat of Daly - for a third time. It is a point of interest that there has not been a member who has consecutively held that seat for more than two terms in the entire history of self-government in the Northern Territory. So, it is indeed a very great honour that the people of that previous seat of Victoria River, now called Daly, have put their faith in me and re-elected me for this third term. I certainly thank them, and I would like to assure them that I will be acting very faithfully to raise their issues and concerns in this next term of government, as I have done over the last seven years.
The issues for all bush electorates are, of course, very diverse. The large electorates like the electorate of Daly - and others, like the member for Barkly’s electorate - have diverse issues to grapple with, not the least of which is, obviously, capital infrastructure in terms of access and roads and health and education facilities and all of the social issues that go with it. That is what makes them very interesting, that they are so diverse. There are different issues out there compared with urban issues. Obviously, we all deal with the bigger issues.
At the local level we do not get constituents coming to us complaining about the guttering on suburban roads and the dogs barking next door. We get much greater issues concerning things like bituminising 250 km of road and new health clinics. They are very substantial issues that take a great deal of work and are a great challenge - exciting, actually – to achieve. I am certainly glad that I have been able to achieve a number of those kinds of initiatives in that electorate of Victoria River, and now Daly, over the last seven years, and I certainly look forward to doing that again.
The new electorate of Daly, when you look at the demographics, is still a very diverse electorate in terms of its make-up, predominantly an Aboriginal vote out there. Aboriginal residents still hold the proportion of numbers in the Daly electorate. It still has a great make-up of pastoral properties and freehold mixed farming properties and includes, obviously, a number of communities such as Port Keats, Daly River, Peppimenarti, Palumpa, Amanbidji, Timber Creek, and includes now some new communities, those of Batchelor, Adelaide River and Pine Creek. I certainly look forward to working with those newer communities in those new areas both at the local government level and the business and individual level. They are not altogether new to me, having lived in Batchelor for a number of years, about seven years. I am very familiar with the Bachelor/Adelaide River area and, obviously, now living in Katherine, I have an affiliation with the people of Pine Creek. Since the boundary redistribution, I have lost some areas and obviously picked up some others, as we all did. It has been great that the transition into those new communities has been a good one and one that I am sure has been well received.
Looking to the future, contributing both inside and outside of this Chamber is going to be very interesting, particularly in my new shadow ministerial portfolio areas. Having been responsible for the portfolios of lands, planning and environment, Department of Primary Industry and Fisheries and, of course, racing, gaming and licensing, I have been taking note of ministers’ deliveries in this first two weeks of parliament, certainly looking as to what direction they may take these portfolios in the future. I say once again that, in those areas, I am very proud of the achievements that I was able to contribute to in the former government, in my term as minister over four years. One of those achievements, in the area of lands, planning and environment, was the implementation of the new Planning Act. I note that the new minister has begun an internal review of that and it will be very interesting to watch where that goes. My understanding is that the review will take into account a number of areas.
One area I would urge the minister not to tamper with too much is the implementation of the integrated planning scheme right across the Northern Territory. That is going to provide a consistent and coherent scheme that everybody will come to understand will have the same kind of attributes no matter where you go in the Northern Territory, particularly in the areas of zoning and so on. That is something that I initiated under the new Planning Act and, in fact, instructed the department some time ago to start implementation. When we were in government, there were a lot of workshops, a lot of briefings to the opposition and, obviously, to local government and business groups and communities around the Territory. I would urge the minister to make sure that that part of the act is implemented so that we do have that consistency, particularly to business right across the Territory and, of course, to families and individuals.
I note also that in his planning review the minister is talking about third party appeals. Whilst the member for Nelson may not agree with me, I would urge him to seek some advice from those down south who have the third party appeals and tread very carefully. Third party appeals are not good news for investment in the Northern Territory. If you talk to developers who have had experiences down south with third party appeals, then they will tell you straight from the horse’s mouth, that they are certainly not good in terms of wanting to invest in a jurisdiction where third party appeals can cause major delays and added costs.
I think it was the Minister for Lands who mentioned that the use of regional agreements and indigenous land use agreements will be enhanced and used more in the future under this new Labor government. That is going to be an interesting exercise to watch. I note that the new Western Australian Labor government has made an agreement on the Ord River scheme as far as native title goes. I think that was at a cost of some $40m. That is something that is going to be interesting to watch as far as the Northern Territory is concerned on its participation in stage 2 of the Ord River scheme.
The other area is the extensive work that the CLP government has done on the Darwin Harbour and the planning that was going on, and is currently going on. That is leading, of course, to a plan of management. I am happy to see that that is going to continue, obviously incorporating a strategic plan under the beneficial uses of the Water Act. That will be something that I look forward to seeing culminated, because there has been a lot of work go into that and a lot of community consultation over more than a year by independent consultants who have carried out that work. It will be great to see that be finalised.
I also look forward to participating in primary industry and fisheries issues. I thank the minister for his briefing the other day with his department people. That was very interesting. As a minister prior to this, I have not had direct involvement in that sector of the department. Obviously, with my background, I have a wide range of experiences in the primary industry area, but it was certainly very good to get that briefing and get the overall picture. I am sure as issues come up there will be many more of those occasions and I will look forward to those.
On that, the work that is being done in areas like the Douglas Daly/Katherine Daly basin, the Stray Creek release of land, the Ord River scheme that I have mentioned, the Ti Tree area and Owen Springs and Pine Hill have been promoted and developed by the former government to assist in the development of agricultural opportunities for the Territory. They are areas that are going to come under - and other areas similarly - increasing pressure environmentally under the national environmental plans that are around. It is going to need a fine balance when it comes to development in the Northern Territory, something that we were working on, something that will be a challenge to the future. I look forward to participating in that because we will have to ensure that the balance is right.
The Northern Territory is a large jurisdiction with very little development in comparable terms to any other jurisdiction down south. I think something like 0.003% of the Northern Territory is cleared and that includes urban clearing and all pastoral and freehold clearing. We are a developing jurisdiction. There will be more pressure on us in the future - in all tropical and sub-tropical areas of the world in fact - to produce more and more food and particularly agricultural products that are used to supply those areas in need. We have to ensure that we do not lock ourselves down into a no-clearing policy so that these things cannot occur, because the pressure will certainly be on us to open up some more of these areas and allow them to be developed, to use our natural resources in the right way, environmentally responsibly, but to utilise those vast water resources and land and soil resources that we have.
Speaking of those kinds of resources, I would just like to raise the issue of Owen Springs Station and urge that the government make sure they proceed with this. This was bought for a number of reasons. It was bought at a market price that was provided to us in advice from the Australian Valuation Office. It is a good investment for the future of the Northern Territory, particularly for the Alice Springs region, of course. It is not only suitable for the unfettered expansion of Alice Springs into the future but it also provides some real benefits, immediate benefits, in terms of the Park Estate, adding to that the West MacDonnells and so forth down there, to make that more attractive to tourism and bring financial benefits and jobs to that region. It also provides opportunities for horticultural land to be turned off where suitable. It also provides opportunity for recreation and tourism use on a great piece of land that is very valuable. Keep in mind that this land, whilst it was bought at a cost of $3.6m, will return far more than that in terms of benefits and jobs into the future. If you want to add it up and try to calculate it on a cash basis, well you can go for it. But on the basis of a $3.6m sale, even the sale of the land for horticulture in the future and probably for things like industrial expansion of Alice Springs, will provide a return on that land in terms of cash and, obviously, the balance of that property can be turned back to the pastoral estate once the other uses are defined and taken up.
The process that was going on there was that there were expressions of interest that had been received from all kinds of people interested in utilisation of that land. They should be pursued and brought to book and dealt with in the proper manner. The departments were working on - and it should be in the minister’s hands by now - a plan for the future development and future needs for that area. I would urge you to continue with that program that will bring many benefits economically and socially for the future of the Territory and Alice Springs in particular.
In the area of racing and gaming that I have shadow responsibility for, I certainly enjoyed my role as minister for that area. It is certainly an exciting area to be in, one that I was proud to be involved in, being at the cutting edge in terms of things like Internet gambling, sports betting, and the sale of the NT TAB. It was one area that I was proud of, and the CLP government had a proud record of a cautious policy towards the introduction of community gaming machines. That has turned out to have worked very well. I just hope that the Labor government continues to be proactive in this area because it is an exciting area that obviously needs balance as well, but an area that is full of opportunities for investment into the Territory.
I was involved in things like the kava licensing, another exciting area. I am sure the new minister responsible will get to know that, very, very quickly, and go and visit a few of those people and get both sides of the story. It is a complex one, and the member for Nhulunbuy will be able to certainly give you a briefing on all of the background of that. That legislation is now in for the licensing of kava sales and, whilst not everyone agrees with it, we all recognised that something had to be done, and it was, and I hope that turns out for the best.
The next term of parliament will be a very interesting one. The members opposite, like ourselves, have a new set of roles and we will all be developing those as we go along. As we have said on this side of the House, we will certainly be a very honest and very strong opposition, and we do not shy away from that in any terms whatsoever. We know that is our role and we will carry that out with a great amount of dignity and a great amount of strength. I certainly wish members on the other side of the House my best wishes and, as I said, I will be watching with interest, as I am sure all Territorians will be, during their term of government.
Speaking of performance, while I have some time left, I would like to raise the issue of government promises. I do not think these promises have appeared anywhere, but I am just putting them on the record so they get added to the list of promises that go on everybody’s fridges out there. These are actually on fridges in my electorate, and I am sure the government’s had some correspondence on some of these already. For the sake of my constituency, it is something that I will be making sure does not get shoved under the carpet, so to speak, and to make sure that they are on the record.
The first promise - and these were promises made leading up to and during the campaign - was a promise by the now Chief Minister for power to the Wooliana Road area, some $1.5m promised for reticulation of electricity down the Wooliana Road at Daly River. That is something that they are looking forward to hearing about, perhaps in the mini-budget. A little mini-capital works would be a nice thing. So $1.5m there. $0.5m additional to that for the upgrade of the power supply in that area, which is supplied from the community of Nguiu.
The second one is a promise to the people of Palumpa, who are building a rodeo ground. It is a local initiative, and it is a great initiative, being a cattle station that has been in production for some 19 years now as a proprietary limited company. Palumpa Station is a great testament to an Aboriginal owned and controlled business. Because of their stock skills and stockman skills, they want to build their own rodeo arena to keep those skills honed and to provide recreation. So they are building a rodeo arena, and there has been a promise, that has been authorised during the campaign, of a commitment of an additional $15 000 to the rodeo ground and they would like to see that.
Dr Toyne: Applications due in November. Tell them to get it in.
Mr BALDWIN: No, no this is a promise. I am not going to tell them to get it in. They are waiting to get this money.
Dr Toyne: Just to get it into our funding.
Mr BALDWIN: Just to pick up on the interjection, I am just alerting you to the fact that you have commitments that have been made and people are expecting some action. So $15 000 there goes on the record.
The other one is very, very important and needs to be placed on the record, and needs some urgent attention, in fact. I do not know whether it comes from the Sport and Recreation Minister or who it might come from. The previous government gave a grant of $300 000 to the Wadeye community for the construction of a pool. Now they are ready to go with that, we have done a lot of raising of funds: there is $300 000 from the former government; there is $300 000 from the local store there; the schools contributed some money; Murin Association has contributed some money; the Kardu Numida Council has contributed some money and will do work in kind through CDEP and so forth; and in total there is upwards of $800 000 sitting ready for the beginning of that pool. But, they would like the additional $300 000 that has been committed.
This commits, as I said, an additional $300 000 towards the Port Keats swimming pool – ‘Labor will look after Wadeye people’. Well, I am glad to hear that, and the people of Wadeye will be very glad. I am sure they have written to whoever the respective minister is, to alert them of that and ask they keep that promise, because they would like to begin that as soon as possible. That is a major infrastructure project that has been locally thought of, locally developed and the funds put together on a local basis between all of the organisations, and to begin to reach their goal of cash, the $300 000 would be very well received out there. I have given the people of Wadeye an undertaking that I would pursue that matter on their behalf and that is why I have put it on the record today. So that would be nice if those promises could be kept and you could add those promises to your fridge, if you have not already done so. I am sure you were alerted to those because they would not have been endorsed without your say so. So there is an amount of a couple of million dollars that I would like to see committed to, in terms of real cash.
Finally, I thank all those people who helped me during my campaign at a personal level. I would also like to thank the Country Liberal Party for their support over the last seven years, especially under the stewardship of Suzanne Cavanagh and Charlie Taylor. I take this opportunity to thank my lovely wife of 28 years, and my children, who are now almost adults, for their support and standing by me over these last seven years and, hopefully, over the next four years, as I have been fulfilling my political aspirations. It has been a great pleasure, as I said, and an honour to have represented the seat of Victoria River, and it will be a great honour and an exciting challenge to represent the people of Daly River over the next four years.
Dr TOYNE (Stuart): Madam Speaker, I begin by also acknowledging the Larrakia people, the traditional owners of the land on which this House stands. Equally, I would like to acknowledge the Warlpiri, the Anmatjere, Gurindji, Alyawarra, Kaytej, Ngaringman, Wardaman and Mudbura people, whose land encompasses the seat of Stuart which I represent. In acknowledging the traditional owners, I would also like to acknowledge all the people of Stuart of non-indigenous background, whether they be in jobs within our public service delivering public programs to the communities in my electorate; in the private sector, in things like the gold mines up in the Tanami province; the tourist operations around the area; and, of course, the pastoralists throughout my electorate.
I am constantly reminded, during my trips through the electorate, of how much quality work is going on, how much commitment there is out there, not only to the work that each group is undertaking but to each other. I think that the spirit of community in our remote communities is still very strong and alive today. We used to see it very clearly when the short wave radio network was there, and you could actually hear what was going on around the district, around what is now my electorate. You could see just how close people were to each other, how supportive they were when it came to the crunch. We might have our stoushes over particular issues at times, but when it came to the crunch when someone was in trouble, there were always people, from all kinds of backgrounds, there to help.
I am first and foremost the member for Stuart, and I am very conscious of my responsibilities to properly represent the people of Stuart. I believe a member of parliament should be a leader who serves, someone who provides leadership on issues, but serves the people they represent. I think the penalty of not going back and listening to the people you represent and carefully acting on the concerns that they bring forward to their representative, is that you will lose their support - and quite rightly so. I certainly feel that it is a great honour to represent the seat of Stuart. In previous debates in this House we have pointed just how difficult an electorate it is to represent.
We are trying to be clever about how to provide people with the contact with their local member, and with government, that they need to get their needs properly responded to. It is not easy because of the electoral changes that were brought in under the last redistribution. It made the seat of Stuart extraordinarily disparate. It created a seat where the affairs of people in that electorate were being brokered through all major urban centres of the Northern Territory. We are seeing offices in Alice Springs dealing with Stuart, offices in Tennant Creek, office in Katherine, offices in Darwin. So, for the local member it makes it a very, very difficult job indeed. On winning government, obviously we have now got access to additional people and resources to try to respond to these needs. I believe that we will put a plan together that will give the people adequate representation, but under difficulties, I must say.
I owe a lot to the helpers who presented me with the honour of entering this House for a third time. It is something that I will never forget - the work of the volunteers. I seek leave to incorporate a full list of the well over 100 volunteers who worked in Stuart during the campaign.
Leave granted.
Thea Toyne Billy Tommy
- Karl Hampton Mick Pierce
Clarrie Robinya Robert Knight
Pamela Lynch Ned Hargraves
Elaine Quinn Claire Meney
Isobelle Hagen Jimmy Langdon
David Stafford Doug White
Ron Hagen Susan Heffernan
James Marshall Caroline Fallon
Violet Marshall Brett Walker
Robin Granites Anne Wood
Alma Granites Ros Frith
Otto Simms Sean Heffernan
Valerie Martin Hoppy Mick
Neville Poulson Billy Bunter
Warren Williams Michael Paddy
J.J. Spencer Justin Paddy
Lindsay Turner Duncan Brown
Jenny Green Fiona Gibson
Robert Hoogenraad Sandra McBrady
Peter Gunner Willy Johnson
Kenny Kunoth Martin Johnson
Robyn Freeman Cecil Johnson
Norman Alexander Rex Patterson
Margaret Turner Jimmy Robertson
Lena Pulla Mary Rockman
George Club P.R. Rockman
Don Morton Mick Rankin
Gilbert Pulla Peter Hooker
Motorbike Paddy Norbert Patrick
Lennie Jones Geoffrey Barnes
Greenie Purvis Robyn Johnson
Freddy Jones Tracey Patrick
Billy Morton Elizabeth Ross
Banjo Morton Billy Campbell
Wally Morton Alex Kruger
Kingi Ross Michael Paddy
Charlie Morris Richard Lesiak
Hilda Napaljarri Doug Campbell
Peter Brooke George Campbell
Eileen Bonney Billy Campbell
Cigarette George William Colwain
Wilma Morton Joy Campbell
Frank Wheeler Brian Pedwell
Matilda Holmes Colin Campbell
Mandy Russell Lorraine Johns
Johnny Barber Richard Nancy
Tony Jeffreys Mick Arundel
Vince Walker Geoff Shaw
Reggie Nelson Big Billy
Jackie Marney Betty Carter
Roy Rusty Clem Pultara
Nugget Smith Cookie
Sean Wickham Steven McCormack
Maxie Ray Alan Riley
Afshin Parkes Freddy Williams
Shirley Turner Clark Morton
Jeanie Marney Lady Napaljarri
Robin Nixon Ada Dickson
Debra Woodman Margaret Reilly
Dr TOYNE: Thank you very much. It is important that these names are in full in the Hansard record because these people have worked for democracy. They have worked whether we won or whether we lost, and they were out there doing the job, making sure everyone had the ability to vote in the election in a proper way.
I would like to make special thanks to my wife Theadora. Thea is a political wife and no one says that the partner of a politician has an easy time. It is a life of constant separation when I am travelling, and I have never lost sight of the contributions Thea has made to my life and to my career here, and I love her very much. I would like to also to acknowledge Margaret Reilly who was my campaign director. Margaret put together a very good campaign. The list of volunteers and the amount of detail that had to be brought together for such a broad campaign was just huge, and Marg did a great job. Doug White and Susan Heffernan came up especially from Victoria to help keep the details of the campaign going while we were all out bush trying to cover the booths.
I would like to talk a little about some of the key areas in my portfolios. I think with six ministries it is hard to go through the whole lot in a short speech. But I would like to start with the most important to me - one of the two most important - and that is the Ministry for Central Australia. I want to publicly state here my commitment to dismantling any effect of the Berrimah line in my time in this ministry. It is a difficult task given that the centre of government is in Darwin. There is always going to be a tendency for decisions to be made up here without proper recourse to the opinions of people in Central Australia. Wherever it is humanly possible, I will make sure that Central Australians’ priorities, their opinions about public policy, are properly represented in our processes. That is a very difficult task, but it is one that I have been committed to for the last 20 years. The further you get away from this centre of government the more likely people are to feel that they are not fully in contact with our processes. It is something that requires total, on-going vigilance to make sure that we are considering things properly when decisions are being made. I am sure that issues will come up, as they already have, that do require strong input.
I am very proud of the fact that the Martin government has established a much more powerful ministerial office in Central Australia, the Office of Central Australia, which has seven people working in it, and has direct contact to our ministries. As that structure beds down and we get a strong discourse going between the Darwin offices of each minister and that office, I think we are going to see a much better meshing of the priorities of Central Australia to the decisions made by our government. The early responses of Alice Springs and the region to that office have been very positive. People are saying that is a spot where you get your concerns listened to and acted on. We certainly will be working very hard to bring that structure into its full fruition as we go forward in government.
My other major portfolio - and not to mention that the other portfolios are important as well - but certainly, it is a great honour to be the Attorney-General of the Northern Territory. I have a particular view of the role of Attorney-General. As the first law officer I am responsible for defending the integrity and reputation of our legal system. I strongly believe that this role carries with it the duty to defend the court system and protect it from undue influence from the political processes. As first law officer, I also have a duty to uphold two fundamental principles - the rule of law and the separation of powers. These principles are vitally important to the operation of our modern democratic system.
The rule of law provides that no individual regardless of race, wealth, religious or political beliefs - no individual whatsoever - is above the law. It provides that the law must apply equally to all members of our society. The separation of powers relates to the traditional arrangements that exist between the parliament and politicians, and the courts and members of the judiciary. It seeks to confine the exercise of each of the three powers - legislative, executive and judicial - to the respective roles and institutions.
These principles find no better expression than the statement put forward by the delegates of the NADA Legal Forum which was held at Gukula in August this year. They stated:
- Justice and fairness in the Australian legal system depends on the protection of full judicial discretion,
the separation of powers and other long-valued mechanism for ensuring justice from the vagaries of the
political system. There are times when the interests of politicians and the interests of the legal profession
will be in conflict. However, lawyers and politicians each have a role to play in our democratic system and
the separation of powers requires that these roles be recognised and respected.
I intend to foster a climate of mutual respect between the parliamentary system and the legal system. I am intending - and my government is intending - to be careful guardians of the independence of the judiciary and the judicial system.
Mandatory sentencing has been repealed, and the time for this unjust and ineffective law is over. Discretion in sentencing has been restored to the courts. Concurrent with the repeal, the first elements of my government’s crime prevention strategy have been enacted. My government knows that the safety and security of people …
Members interjecting.
Dr TOYNE: Settle, settle!
Members interjecting.
Madam SPEAKER: Order! Member for Drysdale, will you resume your seat.
Mr Dunham: I am just going to …
Madam SPEAKER: Resume your seat for now because I have something to say to you. You know for one thing you do not walk out of this House talking. If you have any comment to make you make it in your seat. You may leave now if you wish.
Dr TOYNE: Thank you, Madam Speaker, that is a lot better. My government knows the safety and security of people in the Territory is of paramount importance. It is committed to safeguarding both people and their property. There will be no soft approach to crime or to those who commit crime. Under our crime prevention strategy it is very clear that, unless there are extenuating circumstances, it is the intention of parliament that property offenders serve time in gaol. My government will monitor sentences and request the Director of Public Prosecutions to contemplate appeals where it considers the intention of parliament has not been achieved. This, and not inferring with the operation of the courts, is the correct role for the Attorney-General.
Our efforts to prevent crime will not stop there. My government’s crime prevention strategy represents a comprehensive and coordinated approach to crime which confronts the real issues, the underlying causes of crime, and criminal behaviour. National and international research consistently demonstrates the link between factors like unemployment and drug abuse and criminal behaviour. We know that drug abuse is a major cause of property crime in the Territory. We know that mandatory sentencing has not worked as a deterrent for that motivation or any other. We know that the CLP’s blank refusal to acknowledge the impact of drug abuse on our community has contributed to the problem.
These issues must be addressed, and they must be addressed in a careful and considered manner, if we are going to truly implement a crime prevention strategy. We will adequately equip our courts and communities to deal with the problems that exist. Drug courts, staffed and supported by experienced people, will manage both punishment and rehabilitation and work to reduce repeat offending. The expertise built up within drug courts will maximise the apprehension and conviction of those behind the industry.
Victims of crime deserve to be helped and to be heard. That is why our Labor government is committed to providing assistance to victims of crime to clean and secure their homes. It is also the principle guiding our policy, now law, that victims’ wishes will be taken into account in the sentencing process. Victim/offender conferencing is a highly empowering process for victims of crime, often allowing more meaningful resolution than the traditional court processes. We will work with victim organisations and those skilled in the area of mediation and conciliation to make this process available through community mediation centres.
Consultation and cooperation must become the focus of our approach to dealing with these issues that affect us all. The views of the community, and in particular the legal community, will be an important element of my government’s approach to law and order. My government looks forward to building bridges with the Territory legal community and creating a relationship of trust and mutual respect. I have had, since my appointment as Attorney-General, the opportunity to meet with members of the legal profession, and I thank them for the time they have taken to talk with me about the key issues they consider we are facing in the Territory.
As law minister, I also have responsibility for the administration of justice and operation of the legal system. I have already signalled my intention to return to the protocol governing the appointment of Queen’s Counsel - or perhaps to be called Senior Counsel - which leaves this decision firmly in the hands of the Chief Justice with the assistance of the legal community. I will be seeking to review this protocol to ensure that the possibility of political interference is removed, regardless of who is in the role of Attorney-General.
Through the Office of Courts Administration I will work to ensure that the courts meet the needs of the community in the way in which legal services are delivered. I have already sought from the Commonwealth government a guarantee that it will continue to fund the Aboriginal Interpreter Service and the diversionary programs. I will promote the innovative use of technologies to bring courts closer to the community. In addition, a magistrates court will be established in Palmerston to allow local support programs to be more effectively delivered, and allow for mediation and victim/offender conferencing to take place in the local community.
Significant changes will be brought in the area of land rights and native title over our first term. The High Court’s decision in Mabo recognised the prior ownership of Australia by indigenous peoples. It is from this foundation that we will proceed in our negotiations. We do not want to see a return to the politics of division or disharmony which was so harmful to the Territory community. We look forward to resolution, not litigation, and to the creation of true partnerships between Aboriginal people and government. We know that all Territorians benefit from economic development on Aboriginal land. A change in focus is required from delaying and defeating this development for political ends, to facilitating practical and constructive regional land use agreements.
The Labor government is committed to a new era of openness and accountability. The Labor government believes that good government requires informed community debate and open discussion of public affairs. Freedom of information legislation is one of the building blocks to achieve these aims. In every other jurisdiction of Australia, debate and discussion is encouraged by freedom of information legislation. It is now the Territory’s turn to reap the benefits that such legislation will bring.
I have tabled a draft freedom of information bill in these sittings, drawing on the best FOI legislation nationally and internationally, along with the best of the privacy bills. It aims to provide the right of access for all Territorians to information on government and on government decision making. Our legislation will enhance the operations of government and improve decision making. It serves to constantly remind and reinforce to government decision makers - the politicians and the public servants - that they are responsible to the community and that the decisions they make are for, and on behalf of, the people of the Northern Territory.
Our draft bill seeks to build trust and confidence in government and its use of information. It recognises a vast array of personal and commercial information that may be collected by government agencies, and on which important decisions are based. The draft legislation provides that members of the community have a right of access to this material and, where necessary, to update and correct it. We know that disclosure of some information held by government may be prejudicial to personal and commercial interests. This is why our draft legislation strikes a balance between the right to access and the right to privacy. It proposes to prevent disclosure where it would prejudice the personal or business affairs of a member of the community.
The information scheme we propose also seeks to protect the community against improper use of personal and commercial information held by government. It will place constraints on the use of such information for commercial purposes, and provide an opportunity for an independent review where someone believes that improper use has occurred. The introduction and operation of our information and privacy scheme is a major undertaking. The input of members of the community is crucial to its success, and I strongly encourage Territorians to read the draft and accompanying discussion paper, and have their say on the final bill.
My Department of Corporate and Information Services will be actively involved in implementing the information and privacy scheme adopted by the Territory. DCIS is established to centralise corporate and information technology services across agencies, and is the agency responsible for the whole-of-government record management system. It will play a key role in developing the policies and systems to ensure all agencies are equipped to fulfil their information and privacy obligations.
DCIS has another important role to play in the development of the Territory. The effective adoption of new technology is essential to the delivery of government services to all Territorians. DCIS is working with information technology specialists in a move towards e-government and the provision of government services online. The business community, in particular, will benefit from the introduction of online tendering procurement services and bill paying facilities. The harnessing of the new technology will also transform the delivery of services in remote communities. The needs of regional and remote communities have too long been overlooked. The services provided to Territorians in remote areas, in communities and on cattle stations, are of a significantly lower standard than those taken for granted within urban settings.
From 1990 to 1994, I was involved in the establishment of the Tanami Network, a satellite-based video conferencing network that enabled the isolated communities of Yuendumu, Lajamanu, Willowra and Kintore to have access to face-to-face visual telecommunications. The network linked those isolated communities with each other and with services in Alice Springs, Darwin, Sydney and beyond. The Tanami Network demonstrated, in a pioneering phase, the huge potential of these technologies to allow enhanced services to be delivered to the most remote places of the Northern Territory. It refocused attention not on the systems, but on the people who use them. DCIS will play an important role in ensuring that all government agencies have appropriate and reliable access to the Internet, video and teleconferencing, and telemedicine facilities, amongst others.
I have spoken today about the consultation and cooperation in areas of law and order and native title. This emphasis on consultation will characterise my approach to other portfolios. Labor is committed to bringing together recreational fishing representatives, Aboriginal traditional owners and commercial fishing interests to establish access agreements over Aboriginal land and waters. The Amateur Fishermen’s Association of the Northern Territory is the peak body for recreational anglers in the Territory. Representatives from the Tiwi Islands have established an effective precedent for these agreements by negotiating access for recreational anglers to specific points on the island. Meetings with AFANT are already assisting in the development of a model of negotiation and cooperation for use across the Northern Territory. These regional or site-specific agreements will be supplemented by rolling capital works programs for the construction of ramps, jetties and camp grounds.
It is a simple fact that Territorians love to fish. It is an activity that Territorians have embraced like no other group. and it is an activity that we want future generations to enjoy. The Labor government knows that recreational fishers are concerned about the future of Territory fish stocks. They want to see - and my government will ensure - the protection of our fishing resources through scientific research, inter-fish numbers and preservation of our harbours. The Territory has a unique environment and it offers natural resources of unsurpassed quality and pristine ecosystems which have abundant species of marine fish.
I would like to also give an assurance to the commercial fishing industry that in our allocation of fish stocks through these agreements, we are very mindful of the important place that the commercial fishing industry plays in our economy. We are very committed to seeing that industry’s place in our economy continues and expands through greater knowledge. What we are saying is that the allocation of fish stocks and other marine resources should be based on maximum consultation per locality, and maximum consultation with the major interest groups, and wherever possible - and in fact almost exclusively - it should also be based on a solid base of scientific research.
The Territory government will establish a marine park in the Bynoe Harbour area. The marine park will not restrict recreational fishing. It will, however, protect an environment prized by many recreational anglers. There will be no damming of harbour tributaries. Let me say that again - rivers and creeks leading to the Darwin Harbour will not be dammed under a Labor government. Fish nurseries will be protected and I look forward, along with Territorians, to enjoying the harbour and all that it offers well into the future.
The Northern Territory primary industries are another of my responsibilities. They make a major contribution to the Territory’s economy and regional employment. The rural industries are a vital source of export income and provide the basis for much of the economic activity in regional areas. My government will create a new economic environment in which these key industries will continue to grow and prosper. We will actively support opportunities to expand our export markets. Supply chain problems, which potentially have had a negative impact on the delivery of Territory mangoes to interstate and overseas markets, must be addressed. Our recent trial shipment to Hong Kong is one of the many activities that we are undertaking to improve the infrastructure, the supply chain, and the market development for this important aspect of our horticultural industry.
Our live cattle and buffalo exports, despite fluctuations in international currencies, have remained our major export earner and the position of this valuable industry will be sustained. In fact, I am intending to go to the Philippines in the near future to talk about that very subject with the Filipino government.
We will also promote opportunities for the emergence and expansion of new rural industries. Particularly exciting for the Territory are developments in the area of aquaculture and agriculture. Government funding over four years will assist our fledgling peanut industry to become self-supporting. This funding will support the industry to purchase the expertise and equipment necessary to boost production and processing, in line with our newly-found guaranteed supply arrangements with the Peanut Company of Australia.
The government recognises that where primary producers invest their time and money in research, development, training and infrastructure, the Territory government should invest in them alongside. The result is a better outcome for all Territorians. High quality research and advisory services will identify and capitalise on the opportunities for industry development, broaden the Territory’s production base, and ensure our economic growth. In partnership with Aboriginal land owners, land councils and the Indigenous Land Corporation, the government will implement programs to provide pastoral, horticultural, agricultural and aquaculture development opportunities on Aboriginal land.
I come now to my final portfolio area which is sport and recreation. The involvement in sport, whether as a social activity or at an elite level, contributes to the health and well-being of both individuals and the community. Young people, in particular, need appropriate recreational and community activities - activities which promote self-esteem and focus on healthy lifestyles. Sports provide an excellent vehicle for these aims. Sport can also be a source of unity, bringing together the diversity of Territorians. Almost 60% of Territorians play sport or regularly participate in an organised recreational activity, putting our levels of participation above the national average. Young people in the Northern Territory have wholeheartedly embraced organised sports, with the NT having the highest rate of youth participation in the country.
Activities of the Department of Sport and Recreation are diverse, covering a range of services for Aboriginal communities, and support for established community youth and recreation organisations throughout the Northern Territory. These activities will be expanded over coming years with the establishment of a remote area sports development network. The government has already committed $150 000 to fund additional recreation offices in remote areas. We will progress partnerships with organisations such as Kickstart, the AFL’s skills development program, and programs such as Soccer in the Outback, to further expand the sporting and recreational activities for our remote area kids.
I will be working with my colleague, Hon Syd Stirling, Minister for Education, to revitalise competitive sports in schools. Both sporting and academic pursuits have a role to play in the creation of healthy, young Territorians. The exposure of children and young people to sports in schools encourages their future participation in clubs and sporting organisations. It also provides an opportunity for young people to develop leadership and life skills and to interact with other young people in a scene which is safe and encouraging.
Facility development remains a high priority. A combination of capital works and organisational grants will support the expansion of Territory sporting facilities and the sporting groups and activities available to all Territorians. Many Territorians now compete at the highest level in their sport and I wish them well into the future.
I wish all members well in this Assembly and I congratulate them all on being elected to the House. I hope, where possible, we can work in a bipartisan manner on issues that are of importance to the Northern Territory and, if we have our stoushes, let us maintain respect for each other.
Debate adjourned.
MEDIA ARRANGEMENTS
Madam SPEAKER: Honourable members, I wish to advise you that I have given permission for Dani Gawlik from the NT News and David Hancock, on behalf of The Age and Sydney Morning Herald, to take photos during the motion relating to the separation of families. I also advise members that I have given permission for TOP FM, Karu, ABC, Channel 8, Imparja Television to broadcast, with sound and vision, the motion relating to the separation of families.
MOTION
Stolen Generation – Apology
Stolen Generation – Apology
Ms MARTIN (Chief Minister): Madam Speaker, I rise to present the following motion:
- That this Assembly:
(a) apologises to Territorians who were removed from their families under the authority of the
Commonwealth Aboriginals Ordinance and placed in institutional or foster care;
(b) acknowledges their belief that such removals represented the implementation of a government
assimilation policy without regard to individual welfare circumstances;
(c) recognises the profound sense of loss and emotional trauma suffered by both the removed children
and the communities from which they were taken, regardless of the existence or non-existence of any
valid welfare reason for removal in any particular case;
(d) recognises that in the great majority of cases the removed children received inadequate care, guidance,
and education, and that the Commonwealth government of the day failed in its obligation to facilitate
reunions between the removed children and their Aboriginal communities once any purported welfare
objective had been achieved; and
(e) calls upon the Commonwealth government to make a formal and specific apology to all those persons
removed pursuant to the Aboriginals Ordinance, acknowledging that the Commonwealth failed in
discharging its moral obligations towards them.
Let me begin this afternoon by welcoming members of the Stolen Generation and their families to this House for this very, very important parliamentary motion.
Like other parliaments in this country, this House has engaged in debate on the issue of an apology to the Stolen Generation before. That debate was brought on in 1998, three years ago, by the then Leader of the Opposition, Maggie Hickey. It was noted by Maggie Hickey at the time that most other jurisdictions had already moved a motion of apology to members of the Stolen Generation and their families.
What followed Labor’s proposed motion was a four-hour debate that included some of the most ignoble statements and sentiments ever uttered in this House. Ultimately, a motion was passed. It was a motion of regret that spoke more of the activities of the CLP government than of the effects on Territorians of past policies of forcibly removing indigenous children from their families. It was a motion that did not include an apology. It was a motion that was not supported by the opposition.
Today, the Northern Territory’s first Labor government seeks bipartisan support for a motion of apology to members of the Stolen Generation and their families. I ask members opposite to join with government members to express their sorrow, show their compassion and apologise for past wrongs in order that we can move forward together towards reconciliation. I ask members opposite to examine their consciences and support this very worthwhile motion. I believe that parliament, as the supreme representative institution of the Territory body politic, must play a leadership role.
I appreciate that there are some people in the community, in our community, who cannot bring themselves to apologise to the Stolen Generation. To them I say: if you cannot, then this apology may anger you. I urge you, though, to read this debate when it appears in Hansard and listen to the accounts of members of the Stolen Generation and their families. I urge you to do this in the interests of providing an opportunity for possible closure for the Stolen Generation and their families. I urge you to do this in the interests of moving on and beginning work on the critical issue of genuine reconciliation. I ask Territorians to support at least the concept of an apology, if not this particular motion. After all, it will be by our actions as a community rather than by our words that future generations will judge us.
In the Territory, more than any other jurisdiction, issues relating to the Stolen Generation are prominent. More than a quarter of our population is indigenous. It is unlikely that a single indigenous Territorian family has not been affected in some way by the past practices of forcible removal of indigenous children. Members of the Stolen Generation are alive today, are with us today. We do not have to look too far back in history to see the effects of this heartless and misguided policy. The profound effects upon those who were removed continue to be felt in subsequent generations who have inherited a history that is forever affected by institutionalisation, of not knowing family life, of not knowing their ancestry and all that entails. Thousands of Territorians continue to bear the scars of those practices.
The issue of an apology to the Stolen Generation is not new in Australia. Indigenous people have been calling for appropriate recognition of their history for decades. They have been fighting for changes in government policies and practices that will allow them to turn around the outcomes we presently see in education, employment and health.
In 1997, as the President of the Human Rights and Equal Opportunity Commission, Sir Ronald Wilson presented the report Bringing Them Home - National Inquiry into the Separation of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Children from their Families. In what will be forever one of the most important inquiries undertaken, and one of the most important reports ever written, tragic and terrible moments in Australian history were chronicled, state by state and territory by territory. As noted in the report, indigenous children have been forcibly separated from their families and communities since the very first days of European occupation of Australia.
The chapter on the history of the Northern Territory is all the more distressing for knowing that the people whose story is being recounted are prominent Territorians and, in many cases, friends. The chapter commences by quoting the patrol officer whose responsibility included the removal of Aboriginal children. In 1949, he wrote:
- The removal of children from Wave Hill by MacRobertson Miller aircraft was accompanied by distressing
scenes the like of which I never wish to experience again. The engines of the plane are not stopped at Wave Hill
and the noise, combined with the strangeness of an aircraft, only accentuated the grief and fear of the children,
resulting in near-hysteria in two of them. I am quite convinced that news of my action at Wave Hill preceded me
to other stations, resulting in the children being taken away prior to my arrival.
He went on:
- I endeavoured to assuage the grief of the mothers by taking photographs of each of the children prior to their
departure, and these have been distributed among them. Also, a dress length was given to the five mothers. Gifts
of sweets to the children helped to break down a lot of their fear and I feel that removal by vehicle would have
been effected without any fuss.
That account happened here in the Northern Territory, in 1949.
The chapter goes on to note that in the Northern Territory, as in other parts of Australia, indigenous people were brutally dispossessed. Forced off their land, they moved to pastoral stations or the edges of non-indigenous settlement. They were barely paid subsistence wages, in the knowledge that they had few other choices.
By the 1890s, the report notes, the presence of pale-skinned indigenous children within the Aboriginal communities and the sexual exploitation of young indigenous girls by non-indigenous men, were matters of public concern. In response, the government sought to take these children away from the communities in which they were living and place them in care of missions. It should be noted, too, that children from around Australia were also removed to these missions.
In 1912, the Chief Protector of Aborigines, Professor Walter Baldwin Spencer wrote that:
- No half-caste children should be allowed to remain in any native camp, but they should be withdrawn and
placed on stations ... even though it may seem cruel to separate the mother and child, it is better to do so,
when the mother is living … in a native camp.
Spencer argued that in town areas, compounds should be established to contain all the Aboriginal people. Kahlin Compound was established outside Darwin in 1913. In 1914, an iron shed called The Bungalow was constructed in Alice Springs next to the police station. The practice began of removing light-skinned children from Aboriginal camps and placing them in The Bungalow. During the 1920s, the pace of forcible removals increased, leading to severe overcrowding in Kahlin Compound and in The Bungalow.
The Methodist Missionary Society indicated it was prepared to take the mixed-descent children from the Kahlin Compound, where they still had some possibility of contact with their family, to its mission on Goulburn Island.
In evidence before the inquiry, a man who had been removed to Kahlin Compound at three years in the 1930s, and subsequently placed in The Bungalow stated:
- There’s where food was scarce again. Hardly anything … night time we used to cry with hunger, y’know, lice,
no food. And we used to go out there to the town dump … we had to come and scrounge to the dump, y’know,
eating old bread and smashing tomato sauce bottles and licking them. Half of the time our food we got from
the rubbish dump. Always hungry there.
The bombing of Darwin saw the evacuation of some of the mission children from the Territory. After the war, the forcible removal of children to institutions recommenced. One of the main homes for children in the 1950s was the Retta Dixon Home here in Darwin. It opened after the war and operated until 1980. The Bringing Them Home report sadly recounts how some former inmates of Kahlin Compound and the half-caste home:
- … more or less voluntarily committed their children to homes as they failed to cope in a hostile social
and economic environment for which their own institutional background had ill-prepared them.
The consequences of the removal policies and practices are vividly and horrifically detailed through the stories of those affected. Who could have read those accounts and not been moved to tears; moved to take action to ensure that such horror would not be inflicted again by governments; moved to apologise to those affected; moved to say sorry?
The position of former CLP governments was that it was not appropriate to apologise, as this parliament was not constituted when the various policies that saw the forced removal of indigenous children were current. The former government believes that the policies were Commonwealth policies, and that the Northern Territory was then a Commonwealth responsibility. That is certainly true, but it misses the point. The current Commonwealth government has refused to apologise on the grounds that the current generation cannot be held accountable for the action of earlier generations. There is a widespread and erroneous view that saying sorry to indigenous Australians will somehow open the floodgates for litigation, that ‘sorry’ will equal ‘compensation’. Not only has time proven this not to be true, but we are all, as Australians, diminished by this inability to show compassion, maturity, and a desire in some way to right such dreadful wrongs. Only the Commonwealth and the Northern Territory have not given a full and frank apology for those affected by the practice of forced removals.
I recall the comments I made in this House in 1998 during that last debate. I said at the time:
- I am proud to be an Australian. I am proud of what we have achieved. However, when I see how the policies
of federal and state governments throughout the country have impacted on a group of people, simply because
they were Aboriginals or Torres Strait Islanders, and what that has done to generation after generation of
Aboriginal people, I want to say sorry. I am not personally guilty … but as a proud Australian, I think the least
we can do is apologise. That does not mean that … I am personally guilty or my children are guilty or my parents
are guilty or that, as members of parliament, we are personally guilty. What I am saying is that, as a country,
Australia implemented practices for more than 60 years that have had a devastating effect on one part of our
community. They have had a devastating impact on our fellow Australians. I think the least we can do, as a first
measure - a measure that is highly recommended in this report and has been carried out by other governments,
wholeheartedly and with agreement from whole parliaments - is to say sorry … to say sorry as a symbolic and
honest gesture, as a gesture for the past and in some cases for our generation, is certainly the least we can do.
Bringing Them Home, through graphic personal accounts and scientific evidence based on comprehensive studies details the effects of separation from the primary carer, institutionalisation, abuses and denigration, separation from the indigenous community and separation from family and community. Using expert evidence, Sir Ronald Wilson’s report lays bare for all Australians the intergenerational effects of those separation policies. On the consequences for the children of those children who were removed form their families, he wrote:
- The impacts of the removal policies continue to resound through generations of indigenous families. The
overwhelming evidence is that the impact does not stop with the children removed. It is inherited by their
own children in complex, and sometimes heightened, ways.
Most forcibly removed children were denied the experience of being parented, or at least cared for by a person
to whom they were attached. This is the very experience people rely on to become an effective and successful
parent themselves.
This effect, within families and between generations, is appalling. Let us not forget though, the wider effects on so many people who have been violently dislocated from kin and culture. Indeed, let us remember it. Let us have it in the forefront of our minds when we look at indigenous health outcomes, education outcomes, indigenous performance in the business sector, and the unacceptably high unemployment figures for indigenous people. Let us not forget the effects of forced removal policies when we initiate urgent action to address all these areas, when we develop government policies, and when we deliver government services. We must acknowledge the pain and ongoing grief of those affected by the removal policies, and we must take steps to ensure that such practices will never occur again.
In addition to the motion of apology, this government is well underway to introducing freedom of information legislation to the Territory. This will fulfil not only Labor’s important election commitment, but will fulfill recommendation 26 of the Bringing Them Home report. This government makes a commitment to strive towards redressing the situation for those affected by the policies of forcible removal of indigenous children. In so doing, the emphasis is very much on healing - healing for subsequent generations, as well as those directly affected as removed children. The submissions made by the Top End and Central Australian Stolen Generation groups to the Senate Legal and Constitutional Committee Inquiry into the Stolen Generation will be revisited by this government with a view to identifying gaps in appropriate government support.
Yes, the policies were Commonwealth policies. Yes, the Northern Territory government had not yet been formed, but these people are our own - these people are Territorians. The Stolen Generation and their families are incredibly important members of our wider community. They have made, and continue to make, a significant contribution to the Northern Territory, and this government wants to see those who are still suffering the trauma of separation heal.
I note again Sir Ronald Wilson’s words:
- We cannot really celebrate the triumphs of our history if we are also not prepared to acknowledge the shame
of our history.
Members: Hear, hear!
Mr BURKE (Opposition Leader): Madam Speaker, this is an important debate. It is a debate in which I begin my comments with a great sense of responsibility, particularly as I look around this Chamber and see that there are so many people who will be affected by anything that is said in this Chamber today. I guess it is one of those occasions when, as an individual, you realise the deep responsibility you do bear as a politician in this Chamber. I do say this most sincerely to everyone who is gathered here today - most of whom will most likely disagree with what I say - that one thing you can be sure about me, is that when I speak and say something, I say what I mean and I stand by what I say.
When I first entered politics one of the phrases that struck me, that I came across one day, was that Disraeili, a Prime Minister of Great Britain towards the end of the 19th century, once said: ‘There is no honour in politics’. That is a really sad statement - that politics, as a calling, has been so degraded over time by the actions of politicians, that a prime minister would make that particular observation. It has always been a personal point of view of mine to check myself all the time, and be able to look at myself in the mirror and square off with the person I see because, as my mother always said to me: ‘The only person, really, at the end of the day, you have to convince is the face that stares back at you from that mirror’. There are occasions because of the different responsibilities one bears and jobs that we have, that each of us have to reconsider that particular position.
So, if today, in that context, is a time for apologies, I would like to begin with an apology of my own. I apologise to all those who were led to believe that the new Labor government would apologise to Territorians who were removed from their families because of past Commonwealth policies. I apologise because what we are witnessing today is a sham and it is, quite frankly, a deception. It is a deception against very decent Territorians. It is a sham because the government cannot even agree itself, whether to apologise or not, nor how to do it. It is a deception because this motion that we have before us now was not what the government wanted to debate today.
Today, and in countless debates on this subject, we hear stories of personal hardship and heartbreak. These are harrowing stories - stories of separation and trauma that we all empathise with, and no one could not adopt that point of view. They are also stories of triumph against the odds, stories that we can all admire, stories that exemplify traits of courage, determination and honour, characteristics that we as politicians should all look up to.
But what courage do we perceive in our Chief Minister and her colleagues? What honourable traits do they demonstrate to us with this motion today? Weakness and dishonour are the traits and the clothes that they wear in this debate. Weak, dishonourable and led into this Chamber by our new Chief Minister, our new Chief Minister who plays with deep emotions and the scars of separation as a cat plays with a mouse - carelessly. Once again, our new Chief Minister demonstrates her callous disregard for others in her search for political opportunity, for that is what this debate has eventually settled down to be all about - a chance for political gain regardless of whose feelings are affected.
However, the saddest thing is that. in this debate no one is satisfied, not even our new Chief Minister, because of the hopeless botch-up she and her colleagues have made in bringing this motion forward here today. For the members opposite in this Chamber, I have no sympathy. This mess is your own making. For those Territorians who expected some dignity and honour from our new government through this parliament, I am sorry you have been subjected to such deception. As members of this Chamber are well aware, 24 hours ago the government brought forward another motion as their motion for debate in this Chamber. It began with these words:
- That this Assembly express its heartfelt sympathy, sorrow and condolence to those senior Territorians who
were removed from their families under the authority of the Commonwealth Aboriginals Ordinance and placed
in institutional or foster care.
The Chief Minister spoke forcefully that this parliament was the only parliament in Australia that had not made such a gesture. She said an apology motion would be one of the first initiatives of her government. Now, for a government whose intent was genuine, whose motives were pure, deciding the words for such a motion should have been a very simple task. The Chief Minister herself said in this Assembly on 18 February 1998:
- I think the least we can do is apologise. I think the least we can do, as a first measure, is to say sorry.
She told The Australian newspaper yesterday - it is in today’s The Australian newspaper:
- Ms Martin said she did not have to apologise because there was not a Territory parliament during the time
when the Aboriginals Ordinance allowed for the removal of mixed race children from their mostly Aboriginal
mothers and said the onus was on the Commonwealth to apologise.
Those sentiments have a familiar ring to them but, of course, that was only her firm position at one time yesterday. She has now changed the first paragraph of her motion to read:
- That this Assembly apologises to Territorians who were removed from their families under the authority of the
Commonwealth Aboriginals Ordinance and placed in institutional or foster care.
What has happened to heartfelt sympathy, sorrow and condolence for those senior Territorians? Those words are gone. Or has your heart gone completely out of the exercise? And why are you so explicit, I ask, about naming the Commonwealth Aboriginals Ordinance? No other parliament, that I am aware of, is so specific. Are you only apologising to the members of the Stolen Generation who were directly affected by this ordinance and this ordinance alone? Are there no members of the Stolen Generation who suffered or were affected under any other law or action? Or are you so sincere about this whole exercise that you have carefully chosen your words to limit any possible liability?
How can you expect anyone to believe you are sincere in your actions after this fiasco? How can anyone believe you really meant it? How can those here to witness this debate be expected to believe now, that this apology is anything more than a cynical political manoeuvre? No one doubts this is a very emotional issue, a very sensitive issue for those people involved, but amongst the community as a whole, the formal offering of an apology is a divisive issue. This government has added a totally new element. It has turned it into high farce.
Back in 1998, the member for Fannie Bay castigated the CLP government for its attitude to an apology motion. She said:
- I thought what we were asking for was something simple and straight forward.
So simple and straight forward that, when she gets her chance to do it, she makes a complete mess of the exercise. The Chief Minister has ditched her principles, her beliefs, and she has dumped on the people who have come to witness her actions.
Exactly what did happen yesterday? What happened at the urgent caucus meeting late yesterday? What happened to make the Chief Minister change her mind yet again? Was she rolled yesterday or was she rolled in the first wording of the apology? One thing we do know is that the Chief Minister has been overruled by her party in this tragic comedy of errors. Or was it a case of the whole Territory parliamentary Labor Party being rolled by the federal member for the Northern Territory, Labor’s left wing enforcer, Warren Snowdon? Perhaps the Chief Minister could tell us just who the honourable member for the Northern Territory rang, and what did he say to get her to roll over.
Yesterday, we had the spectacle of the Chief Minister holding a press conference explaining that her original motion was an apology. More than that, she said the original motion was just what the members of the Stolen Generation wanted. Given the comments of members of the Stolen Generation in the media yesterday, one would have to ask with whom the Chief Minister consulted to get her approval for her original motion. However, notwithstanding the fact that the original motion was, according to the Chief Minister, an apology, and notwithstanding the fact that, according to the Chief Minister it was satisfactory to members of the Stolen Generation, within hours she was back explaining she was changing her motion to include the actual word ‘apologises’. One has to ask, what does she really believe, and what do the individual members of the Labor caucus themselves believe?
We heard in the media yesterday that the motion had to be ‘negotiated’. How many factions are there amongst 13 members that you have to negotiate and renegotiate? Obviously, it was renegotiated in a hurriedly called caucus meeting when they realised - or were told from on high - the huge gaffe that they had made. They then buckled under pressure. One thing for sure is that, from the series of blackflips on this issue, the Labor Party is divided on whether to formally apologise or not, perhaps as divided as the community is on this particular issue.
For example, we now know that the member for Arnhem is adamant there must be an apology. He has said so in this Chamber on a number of occasions. What did he think of the original motion put forward by the Chief Minister? The new member for Millner was savage on Monday about the need for an apology, telling those who may disagree to ‘get used to it’. I wonder how he matched up his comments then, with what his leader gave notice of in this parliament yesterday. However, the new member for Araluen takes a different view. She said in her maiden speech to this Assembly last week that the issue of seeking an apology from the Commonwealth is one that she will make it her business to pursue. She went on and I quote …
Members: Arafura.
Mr BURKE: Arafura, my apologies. She went on:
The Northern Territory government was established long after the events that impacted on my father, and
bears no responsibility for those events.
She was quoted on ABC radio yesterday as saying that people get too hung up on the word ‘sorry’. She was trotted out yesterday to support the original motion to show that it was supported by the Stolen Generation groups, only to have everything she said to the media totally overturned a few hours later. I will be interested to hear her contribution to this debate and how she feels about being totally hung out to dry. But her views do reflect those put to the Senate committee that reported on the Bringing Them Home report. In chapter 4 of the Senate report it says:
When asked to assess the Northern Territory government’s response to Bringing Them Home and the fact that this
response extends to not accepting responsibility for matters that occurred prior to the Territory coming into existence
as a self-governing territory, the Northern Australian Stolen Generation Aboriginal Organisation and the Central
Australia Stolen Generation and Family’s Aboriginal Corporation stated:
- They are quite right. They were not responsible for the many years we were under Commonwealth rule.
Usually when we wish to develop a project that may not be specifically Northern Territory government
design or whatever, the Northern Territory government is very responsive in assisting us in finding
resources or in-kind support to develop those projects.
The Senate report also noted that the two Stolen Generation organisations believed that an apology concerning them could only come from the Commonwealth government, not the Northern Territory government.
On this issue my colleagues and I cannot speak for what the Commonwealth government or parliament should do in this matter, nor do we believe we can speak for Territorians on this issue. I can stand here, as an individual, and say I am sorry for what happened to many of these people. I regret the misguided policies that caused such trauma and sadness, not just to those taken away but also to the mothers who were left behind. I can and do say that emphatically on my own behalf. But I cannot, and will not, pretend to say it for others. That is for them to decide.
I certainly do not believe it is my right, or the right of anybody, to apologise on behalf of the Territory government or the Territory parliament - or even more importantly, by default - on behalf of all Territorians. That is something for each and every Territorian to decide.
I do know that we have always taken the position, like the members of the Stolen Generation groups, the member for Arafura, and sometimes, the Chief Minister, that the Northern Territory as a political entity did not exist and had no responsibility for any of the policies that produced the Stolen Generation. It is, therefore, illogical for it as an entity to apologise. That position remains unchanged. However, it is the responsibility of the Northern Territory government to do all it can to help and assist those Territorians.
As the Senate committee report I previously mentioned noted, the CLP in government did exactly that. As far back as 1978, the CLP government in one of its first acts, amended the child placement policy to incorporate the principle that ensured Aboriginal children up for adoption for whatever reason would first of all be placed with the families or extended families. Amongst other forms of ongoing support, the CLP government sponsored the Going Home conference at Kormilda College in 1994. The CLP government gave both cash and in-kind support to the Territory Stolen Generation Reference Group to prepare their submission in 1994 and 1995. The CLP government provided grants to set up an office for the group in 1996 and 1997, and the government made grants to enable Danila Dilba to provide counselling services for those affected by the discredited policies that produced the Stolen Generation. In 1997, the CLP government put in place a protocol to enable easier access to any Northern Territory records that could help those members of the Stolen Generation researching their family histories. The CLP government acknowledged the existence of the Stolen Generation, it repudiated the policies that had caused it and it did all it could to help whenever assistance was called for.
It is worth remembering that this parliament did pass a motion in 1998 endorsing actions of support to those Territorians who were adversely affected by the previous policies and practices of Commonwealth governments under which children were separated from their mothers and their families. The motion recognised the valuable contribution many of these victims of Commonwealth policy had made to the social, economic, and political development of the Territory, and acknowledged the personal trauma which many have suffered.
However, the motion we have before us today has been so degraded by the internal politics of the Labor Party, that I do not believe anyone will be able to walk away from this Assembly believing they have received a sincere and heartfelt apology of some sort. While we have maintained that it is a divisive issue within our community to offer a formal apology on behalf of all Territorians, we acknowledge the hurt felt by the members of the Stolen Generation. Today, I believe, that they have been further hurt by the insincere, cynical, and farcical way they have been treated by this Labor government. They are not political play things, they deserve better than this. I believe they have endured enough.
Disraeili said: ‘There is no honour in politics’. Perhaps it is past time we all search for some. Today, in this Chamber, the government has been found wanting.
Madam SPEAKER: Before we go on, I wish to remind guests in the gallery that it is convention in this House to listen in silence. It is also the convention to remain seated. If you do not wish to remain seated then I suggest you leave the gallery. Remember, it is convention and courteous to treat the Chamber in this way.
Mr AH KIT (Transport and Infrastructure Development): Madam Speaker, before I start my contribution to the debate in the paper I have to present, I cannot resist taking issue with the Leader of the Opposition and the comments he made. To me, it was a very dismal performance and one expected better. This former Chief Minister, the Leader of the Opposition, knows very well that there are mechanisms in this House for him to move amendments to motions. He stands here and criticises our Chief Minister and our government but he is not prepared to do anything …
Mr Burke: It is your motion, your action, not ours.
Mr AH KIT: I will ask the Leader of the Opposition to hear me in silence and provide me with a bit of courtesy, as I did him.
He knows that there are mechanisms in this House to move amendments to the motion. If he feels strongly about it, he should not stand up there and criticise. Get your busy heads going, the whole 10 of you, and put up an amendment and make it stronger if you so desire. We know what you said on the radio, that your members will not be supporting this motion in this Chamber today. I just heard you again - you contradict yourself again. You say: ‘Well it is up to each individual’. I certainly hope some of the members of the opposition take advantage of that and speak out truthfully on how they feel about this particular debate.
Seven years ago, hundreds of the Stolen Generation held a conference in Darwin called Going Home. Among other things, they called for the simple justice of an apology from the governments of Australia. Many of those who attended are here today, and you are most welcome. Sadly, many passed away before this Northern Territory parliament - the second last in the nation to do so - finally brought itself to listen to that plea.
As a young Warramungu girl living on her traditional lands north of Tennant Creek, my mother was rounded up and sent to The Bungalow in Alice Springs. She was given the name Stella Tennant, a lifetime reminder for her of the place she was abducted from. It was something she never spoke about. She never talked to us about her Warramungu heritage, her language, or her culture. It was something I always wondered about as I was growing up and coming to terms with my Aboriginality. It was something I thought deeply about as I tried to work out what my heritage was and where my people came from.
Life as a young man for me then was like a huge jigsaw puzzle, but some pieces just did not fit. It was not until many years later, when I went off to study and started to learn about history and politics, that some of the pieces of the jigsaw finally started to fall into place. It was not until then that I became comfortable about my heritage and understood for the first time the terrible things my mother must have gone through. Of all the acts of inhumanity that have faced our people since our land was taken from us, the deliberate government and church sponsored policies of the abduction of our children must rate as the single worst policy choice of the last 200 years or so.
I doubt there is a single Aboriginal family in the Northern Territory that has not had at least one of their relations stolen. I doubt there is a single family which has not been scarred and damaged by those church and state policies. So, where does this leave the kids and their descendants who were abducted from their traditional lands? For those whose connections with land are two or three generations and hundreds of kilometres apart; for those whose language and culture were, in some cases, flogged out of them by church and state; or for those who have been unable to find a link with their lost families; it leaves us now with the power of knowledge. We know we are Aboriginal people and we are proud of it. Through the power of knowledge we have learnt to reject the notions of assimilation. These ideas were sponsored by sections of the media and, in part, at least, by the former government.
With our own knowledge, we have rejected the notion that there are real Aboriginal people - those of us living and working out bush - and gammon Aboriginal people - those of us in the towns and cities. We have also learnt to reject the politics of exclusion that tried to tell us that there are real Territorians who believe in progress and the rest of us, usually black fellows, who stand in the way of progress.
The election of the Martin Labor government shows that people of the Northern Territory want to move on. We know it is time to move on from the politics of exclusion, to embrace the opportunities presented by inclusion. That is why we are making this parliamentary apology today. It is not - I repeat, not - an appeal to guilt; quite the opposite. It is a way of saying to the whole world that the Stolen Generation of Aboriginal people refuse to be considered as just victims of historic injustice. It is our way of telling the world that the Stolen Generation will have some control over our histories and create their own futures. It is a way of saying that the Stolen Generation have a real and continuing connection with the families and country that were alienated from them by the policies of past governments, and the hope that those links will be restored in the future.
As Barbara Cummings wrote some years ago: ‘There are mothers all over the Northern Territory waiting for their kids to return’. This parliamentary apology is a dedication to those mothers and a memorial to the families who had their children abducted from them. The consequences of this apology will not be seen this week, or even this year. They will be achievements that will not be fully realised until the healing process, begun by this apology, can be appreciated by our children and grandchildren. And it is the children and grandchildren of all Territorians who will ultimately benefit from this apology.
In years to come, it is when our children and grandchildren have cause to refer to this day, they will understand the simple justice of it. They will understand we have apologised and moved on. We have recognised and acknowledged the past and grown stronger together because of it. It is only then that we will have brought simple justice back home to this parliament. When members opposite vote on this motion, I would ask you to consider this. Think of all the great words that describe grandmothers - respected, loving, wise, nurturing, caring. It is a long and deserving list.
Because my mother was taken, I do not know who my maternal grandmother is, and I will never know. In these difficult times that we now face in the world, let today stand as a moment of tolerance and togetherness, in a world that surely needs as much tolerance and understanding as it can get. Let us cross the line and walk together.
My final call today is a personal one, and is from the bottom of my heart. I appeal to all members here, let us all support this motion and understand that we can bring all Territorians together, that is what matters today. I am deeply sorry that the Stolen Generation had these terrible things happen to them. I am sorry for my family, and I am sorry on behalf of this government. To all the people and their families gathered here today, and also to those families who are unable to be here with us, this parliament will apologise when the motion is passed. It is a great day for me and my family, and it is a great day for all Territorians.
I was deeply moved when, in April last year, our champion footballer, Michael Long, published a letter on the front page of The Age newspaper in response to the federal government’s attacks on the Stolen Generation. I want to read that letter out and then table it. There is a part of the letter that I find where the language is a bit strong and I will not be able to read that out, obviously. But I will, with your indulgence, read out the letter for the record because I find that this letter is quite to the point:
- How do I tell my mother that Mr Howard said the Stolen Generation never took place? How does he explain
to me why none of my grandparents are alive?
How do I explain to my mother who was the most loved, trusting mother figure to all who knew her, that
Mr Howard is just the same as the people who were in power back then, cold-hearted … .
How do I tell my mother that her grandchildren were never affected by the Stolen Generation, that they don’t
know their aunties and uncles, their people?
Does Mr Howard understand how much trauma my grandmother suffered? It ripped her heart out, what she
went through. Even when she died, her baby was never returned home.
If you put yourself in their shoes - I have three children - and people come knocking at my door, grabbing
my children, putting them in the back of a truck, yelling, screaming. Over my dead body, Mr Howard.
Back then my mother had no choice but to go. It was wrong. It did happen. It was government policy.
My mother was taken when she was a baby, taken to Darwin and put on a boat - she had never seen the sea
before - screaming and yelling, not knowing what was happening and then crying herself to sleep. I call that
trauma and abuse. I am so angry anyone could do this to a child just because their skin was a different colour.
Mr Howard, I can’t tell my mother because she has been dead for 17 years. Who is going to tell her story, the
trauma and lies associated with her people and their families? Mr Howard, if you just walked in their shoes you
would understand.
I am all for reconciliation, Mr Howard. I am part of the Stolen Generation. It’s like dropping a rock in a pool of
water and it has a rippling effect, so don’t tell me it affects only 10%. No amount of money can replace what
your government has done to my family.
Michael Long,
Essendon Football Club.
I seek leave to table that.
Leave granted.
Ms SCRYMGOUR (Arafura): Madam Speaker, I already outlined in my maiden speech last week the background to my own personal commitment to this issue. Since last week I have been trying to get some factual information, because it is very clear that there is a real lack of understanding about Stolen Generation matters.
Firstly, I do want to say to those members of the Stolen Generation that I am sorry if it was construed or seen in any way that myself or this government, in terms of the apology, is not genuine. It is genuine. If you guys can sit there and think that there is no emotion and there is no genuineness in saying sorry - I will say sorry to them because I think that the way it was handled was appalling, but it was taken all out of context.
Going to what the Leader of the Opposition said - and it makes me a bit angry because I am having to defend myself in relation to claims that the version of the motion that we distributed yesterday constituted an embarrassing backdown. What utter nonsense! I challenge anyone in this Chamber to look me in the eye and accuse me of backing down on my quest to seek justice for my father and his contemporaries.
Last night, there was a story on ABC television news which featured a very short and selective extract from an interview with me. The extract stated we should not get too hung up on the word ‘sorry’, which the Leader of the Opposition had pointed out. The context of what I was saying, which included my concern about ensuring the responsibility was sheeted home to the Commonwealth, was inexplicably left out. Naive? Yes, very naive - lesson learnt. If we stop to think that we have got no lessons to learn in this life, well, let us give up. I have learnt a lesson in this. It is a shame though, that all too often the detail and the balancing in reporting - and when we talk about indigenous issues all the time - that this is always sacrificed for the sake of an emphasis on perceived conflict and contentiousness.
What I still want to do is actually point to a number of facts in terms of where we were coming from, in terms of the Aboriginals Ordinance official policy documentation and archival material. In relation to the period between 1918 and 1940, it revealed that children were removed - and this is what the Chief Minister highlighted in her statement - because of the colour of their skin. The aim was to prevent them from absorbing the culture and the language of their Aboriginal families and to try and assimilate them into the non-Aboriginal population.
Secondly, in the period after the World War II, up until the significant amendments that were made to the ordinance in 1953, patrol officers tasked with the implementing of the removals policy started questioning. Their concerns are reflected in memorandum correspondence of the time.
Thirdly, I am not a lawyer and I do not profess to be a lawyer, but in my view, the way the Commonwealth was let off the hook in all of these cases – Alex Kruger and others, Lorna Cubillo and Peter Gunner - is what I call getting off on a technicality. Finally, although we are debating the motion, we should not be debating on the removals under the Aboriginals Ordinance - there should be full support from both sides of government. To answer the Leader of the Opposition, we have not forgotten that which was enforced between 1918 and 1957.
I also want to make the point - and something that we have not forgotten - that the more subtle, but equally destructive, assimilationist child welfare practices did continue - and they continued under the Commonwealth administration of the Northern Territory - right up until self-government. Many of the parents affected had themselves been removed and institutionalised under the Aboriginals Ordinance, and the fostering out or adoption of their own children perpetuated a pattern of loss and dislocation that has extended through two or three generations.
Before I sit down and hand over to the next person, I have to say that what the opposition has failed to bring up with a lot of this is, for the first time in the history of the 26 years of this parliament, the people have spoken. Indigenous people have said: ‘We do not like what is happening’. We have listened. Clare Martin has probably shown more leadership than any Chief Minister in your government. We are inclusive and we are showing that.
Mr BONSON (Millner): Madam Speaker, I stand before this House today a very humble man because I look around and see many friends and families in this gallery today who have shown a lot of character and leadership when listening to the ex-Chief Minister give an explanation of his weak stand on this issue to do with an apology. The character and class that you have shown today shows me why people have survived. I cannot stand here today without thinking of the opportunities I have been given, when compared to the Australian people known as the Stolen Generation. I note the member for Arnhem’s struggle for Aboriginal identity and I understand where he is coming from. I now know my ancestry. I look around today and see many faces that I know who are descendants from the Stolen Generation. Welcome, one and all.
I will give a speech based on Stolen Generation experiences. I would like to use material contained in the document Between Two Worlds, which extracts I will table. I believe this will help explain the history behind this issue. I cannot speak for all the Stolen Generation, only some. However, I hope today to show leadership. I hope to outline in words my thoughts on this matter. I do not want to blame any person who, through their deeds and actions, participated in the removal of Aboriginal children. What I do hope to do is recognise that throughout the last century, many Aboriginal people over many generations were affected by the policy of removing children.
For many people of the Northern Territory the Stolen Generation means many things and an apology has many different consequences. The fact is, an apology will be given and the only real change to people has been symbolic. That symbolism is important to healing old wounds that run deep throughout Australia. I firmly hope this is another step towards healing and reconciliation. The following paragraph is taken out of the preface of Between Two Worlds, and this paragraph I hope will assist in being a description of what I hope this apology will achieve:
- One of the main objectives of Between Two Worlds is to contribute to the process of reconciliation between
Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal Australians. By providing an opportunity for all Australians to learn about
what happened in the past, we hope to increase the understanding of the issues affecting Aboriginal Australians
today. Our aim is not to condemn those responsible for the removal of Aboriginal children, but to explain how
and why a practice which today seems so brutal could once have been acceptable to the majority of white
Australians. We also explore the impact of the removal on the lives of Aboriginal people in the Northern
Territory, and consider some …
Some of those who share their stories in the exhibition fondly remember the camaraderie of life in the homes.
Others, who hold much harsher memories of childhood, are still very bitter about losing contact with their families
and their culture. The whole issue of the removal and institutionalisation of Aboriginal children is very complex,
one with far-reaching implications.
‘No half-caste children should be allowed to remain in any native camp’, Baldwin Spencer, Chief Protector of
Aboriginals (1911-1912).
- Officials such as Baldwin Spencer believed that because they had some ‘white blood’, these children could be
‘civilised’. If removed from the Aboriginal camps and raised away from other Aboriginal people, they could
become like whites.
A report by the Parliament of the Commonwealth of Australia, author J W Bleakley, 1928:
- Two suggestions have been put forward, viz:-
(a) Complete separation of half-castes from the aboriginals, with a view to their absorption
by the white race;
(b) Complete segregation from both blacks and whites in colonies of their own and to marry
amongst themselves.
- Past experience, however, has shown that the half-caste, with few exceptions, does not want to be separated
from the blacks, in fact is happy amongst his mother’s people. He is not wanted by the whites, nor does he want
to be pushed into a society where he is always an outcast. He should certainly be rescued from the degradation
of the camps and given the benefit of education and training, but will he be happier if raised to this civilisation
in company with the young aboriginals of his own generation.
‘It wasn’t fit for a dog …’. Emily Liddle ...
I would like now to read a letter that my grandmother, Daisy Ruddick, wrote in 1938:
- His Honour the Administrator Northern Territory
Dear Sir,
I the undersigned do hereby make complaint that I have citizen’s rights, am 23 years of age, have been in
medical service seven years, but am now subject of being locked up in the girls home. I whole heartely
(sic)resent this treatment, as I am engaged to be married and I am quite responsible for my own actions.
Trusting you will do something for me. I am your obedient servant.
Miss Daisy Cusack.
Chapter 13, Coming Home:
‘Then we went back to Wattie Creek. When the car pulled in, my two brothers were there. They hadn’t seen
me for sixty years, but they knew. They said ‘Hello my sister’. Daisy Ruddick.
- When you went out to work you went out to work for your living. I don’t remember that I was thinking
about wanting to go back and try and find my mother, or see her, or see the country. I’m not bitter for
what I got out of it: civilisation, education. But I always just regret that I didn’t go back earlier to see
my mum. That’s the only thing that I am just sad about today, not seeing my mum. But that’s the only
regret I have now, I never seen my mum. If only I could have seen her face. If only we went a bit earlier,
you know, if my daughter got married a bit earlier. When we went back and I wanted to see my mother,
they said: ‘Oh, she died a couple of years’. I just missed out. People say she was a wonderful lady.
- I often thought to myself now, why did they take me away? Like after I grew up and that, I said, I often
thought to myself, now why did they take me away. Like it’s not to educate me or anything, they took me
away to be a slave for the European station owners.
I seek leave to table these documents.
Leave granted.
___________________________
DISTINGUISHED VISITOR
Madam SPEAKER: I would like to advise honourable members of the presence in the gallery of Senator Aden Ridgeway. On behalf of honourable members, I extend a warm welcome.
Members: Hear, hear!
__________________________
Mr McADAM (Barkly): Madam Speaker, I rise to support the motion. I wish to acknowledge the members of the Stolen Generation from the Barkly who have travelled a long distance from Tennant Creek to be here for this historic occasion. I especially acknowledge Annie Lane; Annie Phillips and her daughter, Ruth; Agatha Liddy; Dora Dawson and her daughter, June; and Nellie Waddel, who are all here today. Special thanks to Colleen Aplin for driving the people up here. Joyce Schroder Naparula, unfortunately, could not be here today as she is in Adelaide, and also Vera Doran, who is in Port Hedland. She wanted to be here but could not make it. I also want to acknowledge Lorna Cubillo who was taken from her family at Phillip Creek in my electorate. Lorna has fought as hard as anyone to secure justice for the Stolen Generation.
These women I have mentioned were forcibly removed from their families, community and culture. They went on to overcome adversity and accomplish great things. However, nothing can give them back the childhood they were denied, or the experience of belonging - belonging to their mothers, belonging to their fathers, belonging to their brothers, belonging to their sisters, and belonging to their wider extended families. They have spent a lifetime of regret of what could have been. They were told they were not wanted and that nobody cared. They endured stresses of unacceptable magnitude. Their wounds are evident and their self-esteem tested beyond belief. Many had children who had also spent time in institutions, as this was their family history or what they were familiar with. Their parenting role model, if you like - they had no measure of family. This background only exemplifies their great achievements, the achievements of showing resilience in the face of incredible adversity. Most have returned to the Barkly where they have drawn on the strengths of one another, where they have grieved together, to begin their own healing.
These women and their families have shown an extraordinary capacity to survive and pass on their love and warmth to family and to the community, and for that I congratulate them. I also pay tribute to them for their fight for justice on this critical social issue. For us, they teach us. They make a powerful statement about Australia’s shared history and lessons for future policy-makers. I am advised by the Stolen Generation members that the healing process, so important to them, cannot occur without an apology, without the acknowledgement this motion provides, without the story of this abhorrent history being publicly known.
I urge members opposite to support this motion, because whilst there is a political culture of denial and a sweeping of difficult issues under the carpet, then these people will have no opportunity to rest their suffering and move on. Nothing can give them back what was taken, but with this motion we can begin to help them forward.
Members opposite should be aware that we are seeing a new maturation in the Territory community - a leaving behind of the entrenched, failed positions, a new beginning where, hopefully, members opposite can work with the government, and we with them, in a climate of bipartisan cooperation for the benefit of all. I congratulate the Martin Labor government for having the political courage to take on the difficult issue of the apology to the Stolen Generation, and I call on members opposite to join us in supporting this motion.
Mr WOOD (Nelson): Madam Speaker, there was a wise old fellow in the Old Testament who once said we should live justly, love tenderly and walk humbly. What I have to say today I hope encompasses these words, because the motion put before us today by the government is one that requires such a response. This will be my response as I believe I cannot speak for others. It comes from the heart, and it comes from what I know personally and what I have been told by others. Although some may not agree with what I say, nevertheless to speak otherwise would be dishonest.
History is a strange thing. Some regard it as a science, philosophy, a memory, an opinion, a tool, or just a useful piece of information used to support a viewpoint. History can be ancient or modern or recent. History can be confusing, opinionated, imprecise, judgmental, omissive and, occasionally, speculative. History can be the truth for some and a lie for others. For me, that is the difficulty I have when dealing with this whole debate. Much of what I say today is about history and how that history has been interpreted. It is what we remember and how we are affected today by those memories. You can judge for yourself about my interpretation.
So, where to start? Perhaps an abridged story about myself. It was Melbourne in 1970, and I had studied horticultural science and felt the need to use that knowledge to help Aboriginals. Why I had that desire may have had something to do with my religious upbringing, but who knows? After all, I was enjoying life: footy, tennis, and girls were interesting, too. I was also wondering if my number would come up for a trip for Vietnam. I felt there was more to life than just doing what everyone else was doing, and before I knew it, I was at the Daly River Mission, now known as Nauiyu Nambiyu As the song says: I was only nineteen.
The shift from a white, comfortable, middle-class background with the modern amenities of the day, to a lonely outpost, hot, humid, mosquitoes, snakes, a Sidney Williams hut, no electricity, no TV, little sport, Slim Dusty and Charley Pride, and a people whom I had never seen except for Lionel Rose, was sudden and dramatic. I could have been on another planet.
I met my wife there, Imelda, a Wagait, who was born at Channel Point near the mouth of the Daly River. Her mother was a full-blood Aborigine and Dad, who is still alive today, was part-Aboriginal and part-Chinese. Her grandfather was called Mr Morgan, and he sailed a sampan around the coast, something I only found out last night.
Imelda was declared an Aboriginal, and here is her certificate to prove it under the Declaration of Persons as an Aboriginal:
Harry Morgan, the father of Alda (Imelda) Morgan, six years of age, has requested me to declare Alda Morgan
an aboriginal within the meaning of the Aboriginals Ordinance. Harry Morgan has made his request in writing
and in it states that Alda Morgan is of part aboriginal descent. I believe his statement to be correct. In accordance
with the provisions of the ordinance I consider that a declaration would be in the best interests of Alda Morgan
for the following reasons:
She is part aboriginal;
Her mother is a full-blood aborigine, she resides at Delissaville;
She has always been a subject of the ordinance prior to it coming into operation as ordinance 9 of 1953;
Her social standards are primitive;
She associates with full-blood aboriginals and she seeks them out for companionship.
- I consider she needs the care and control of the ordinance until she attains the age of 18 years.
Signed the Acting Director of Native Affairs.
She had come to Daly River Mission with her father and brothers and sisters because their mother had leprosy and could not be cared for at Delissaville, now Belyuen. Her mother, Kitty, died from that leprosy. She was cared for by the sisters, and one of the Territory’s greatest humanitarians, Dr Hargreaves, at East Arm.
My main work at the Daly River was growing fruit and vegetables during the day, and looking after young Aboriginal boys from the cattle stations during the evenings and at weekends. At one time, I looked after 30 boys. We had many great experiences - movies and boxing at night, with Friday night left for the band, which specialised in Elvis Presley music. Hunting and fishing were the norm on the weekend.
In 1973, I married Imelda at the mission, but was told by the Bishop that because of that, I could no longer live there, and had to find another place to live and work. I eventually moved to another community on an island, but there, I had to get approval from the elders, because by now we had our first child who was of mixed race. It is interesting to note that 20 years before I was married, if I had lived with my wife without being married I would now have a criminal record, because I could have been sentenced to three months gaol or 100 fine or both. This law applied up to 1953.
Imelda and I have been married for 28 years, we have three daughters. Angela is now the manager of DEETYA in Kununurra. Caroline trained as a ringer at Mataranka Station as part of a Katherine Rural College course, and became, perhaps, one of the first female ringers ever to work at Wave Hill Station. She married a ringer and now has three children, and I suppose you could call them all dead ringers. She now works at Batchelor Institute. My last daughter, Joanne, works at computer desktop publishing, also at the Batchelor Institute.
I would like to also detail a number of other stories related to me by my family and my friends. There is an Aboriginal lady who used to work with me in the garden at Daly River who, when young, had a child by a local worker. On the day the child was born everyone was excited, including my wife and her sisters. A nun took the child, and when they asked where the child was, they were told it had died. In fact, it had been put on a plane that day. It was not until a few years ago that the boy found his mother, who still lives on the Daly. The nun has since personally apologised, and her order has also said: ‘We sincerely and deeply regret any hurt, however unwittingly caused, to any child in our care’.
My nephew on my wife’s side, born about 30 years ago, has an Aboriginal mother and an unknown white father. He was also born on a nearby island community, but the traditional owners would not allow the child to stay there. My brother-in-law adopted him and he was raised on the Daly River. Again, there is a case of twins being born to an Aboriginal family on the same island. It was not acceptable to keep both, one of the twins was left to die on the beach. One of the nuns heard about it, found the child, and both children are alive today.
My friend Ungunmeer at Daly River had her sister taken away - same mother, white father. The law said a white person could not cohabit with an Aboriginal. Part of the punishment was likely to be the removal of the child, and so it was. There is a lady at Howard Springs called Marjorie, who said she is glad she is adopted. She does not like to be called Aboriginal, she says she is coloured or half-caste, and she is adamant about that.
I have also listened to the stories from my friends on the government side, the honourable members for Arafura and Millner, from Arnhem and from Barkly. I have listened to what they had to say, but I make no comment about the rights or wrongs of all these stories. I use them to highlight the fact that history is not straightforward. There have been many things which today we would say were wrong. They were done in the context of the thinking of the day. Today’s standards are different, today’s thinking is different.
Therefore, shouldn’t we also be careful that in saying sorry to one group of people in an effort to right an injustice of the past, we do not create an injustice to other groups that also should be recognised as part of a stolen generation? For instance, there were others who were affected by a period in our history when the removal of children was a common practice in attempts to solve a perceived problem. I speak here specifically of those mothers whose children were removed by subtle pressure, based on the stigma of bearing a child out of wedlock. It was not the done thing to have a child when you were not married; it was a shame job. How many of these women were grief-stricken at the loss of their child? Those people deserve an apology, too.
There were others, too, who were not accepted by their own communities and had to live elsewhere - should we not say sorry to them? Then we have the British children who were sent to Australia after the war. Many of these young people never saw their parents again. Their homes were far, far away and they were stolen, too. Should we not say sorry to them? I think so.
To me, to say sorry without also recognising the good that many people had in their hearts, and showed by example through their deeds, is simply wrong. Of course, not everyone acted properly, because we are all humans and have our faults, but let us neither forget nor condemn those who did their best to help Aboriginal people. Whether they were missionaries, patrol officers, welfare workers, policemen, government officials, it is wrong to judge and condemn them for all the wrongs of the past. Many of these people thought they were doing the best for the child.
From my own experience, there were good and bad people in these days, just as today. I would be remiss if I did not at least remember those many people like Sister Marita and others who lived their whole lives giving. They worked tirelessly under very poor conditions, with a love for Aboriginal people that had no bounds. If we say sorry to the Stolen Generation without recognising their contribution, it is a selfish, self-centred sorry. If we recognise them for what they were, and what they tried to do, with all their faults, then it is a just sorry. After all, to say each child was removed for exactly the same reason is simplifying the facts without understanding the individuality of each case. To say, as this motion says, this was due to the implementation of the assimilation policy, is just too general and too simplistic.
I believe there are others who should say sorry: the land councils who did not always protect the traditional owners, as in my wife’s case, but support those who are noisy, clever, articulate and pretend to have a claim; some of the Aboriginal clans that still have a long-standing and deep animosity towards one another, sometimes reflected in violence; those people who do not accept native title and have very little understanding of the fact that Aboriginal people owned this land not so very long ago - does anyone ever recognise that the estates of Dundee and Channel Point were Wagait land within living memory?; and those people on both sides who have a big racial chip on their shoulders and cannot get rid of it.
In summary, this whole issue is not simple, it is not straightforward. I will say sorry for the things that happened, even though I am personally not to blame, especially to the Stolen Generation. My apology will be also directed to all those mothers, fathers and children, Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal, who suffered because of the policies of the day. After all, pain and sorrow has no racial bounds. I will, at the same time, recognise the good people who tried, and are still trying, to help Aboriginal people, not for any self-centred satisfaction, but because of a genuine desire to help fellow human beings.
I hope that my 14 years of working with Aborigines at Daly River and Bathurst Island, and my support for indigenous rights, and for the Darwin Harbour through the concept of native title, at least, are partly recognised as a practical and genuine concern. I would be remiss if I did not recognise the work the previous government has done in assisting and helping with the Going Home conference, counselling, office space and other assistance.
We cannot dwell on the past. If we say sorry, so what? We might get a warm feeling, but if that is all this is about today, if there is no moving forward after an apology, if there are no practical goals set by both sides to obtain real outcomes in education, health, housing, employment, respect for elders, tolerance and a spiritual yearning, then everything said today is just hot air. This motion before us does not lead on to a new era, it dwells on the past. For me, in saying sorry or giving an apology, there must be a forgiveness by the party to which the apology is extended and then together, move on. Words are useless if there is no change.
I have agonised for the last few days over this motion. I have read books, I have spoken to many, many people. In fact, I have probably done a little extra praying. I thank my friend here for his assistance as well. I have spoken to people on both sides of the House and I thank them for their advice. I will neither vote for this motion nor oppose it; I will abstain. The government has tried to do its best and I recognise that, and there are people in the government who are very genuine in what they are trying to do, and I applaud them for that.
I cannot support the motion. For me, there are generalisations and rhetoric in this motion that I would dispute, and to generalise can create more injustice. There is no recognition of the people who did their best for the benefit of Aboriginal people. There is no statement of moving on, the motion is about the past. Perhaps I should have feelings of injustice, but I do not hold anything against the Bishop of Darwin for asking my wife and I to leave Daly River, or those elders who sent my nephew away from his island home. My wife is now an assistant teacher, my children are making a success of their lives. They are moving on, and so should we.
Neither will I oppose this motion, because this motion has good intent and a total rebuff just panders to those - and I am not here referring to members on this side who oppose this motion; I am referring to those who do not understand, never want to understand, or simply cannot understand. I do believe that the Leader of the Opposition is genuine when he says he is sorry.
To oppose this motion would also send out the wrong message, because I do care. In hindsight, perhaps this whole issue may have been handled better if we could have let this motion sit on the table to be debated by the people, and then to see if all the sides could have come up with an acceptable motion which addresses the concerns of all. This may have been a good opportunity for reconciliation.
So, I abstain. This is my way. It is not avoiding this issue, it is the only way I can honestly express my independent view. But I do have one last apology. I mentioned before that I looked after 30 boys in the dormitory at Daly River. They ranged in age from about nine to 16. Before they reached the age of 21, half of them had died because of alcohol. They would have been in their 40s today. One generation missing; a culture if not destroyed, crippled for life - that is my Stolen Generation, and for that I will always be deeply saddened and very sorry. I hope I can help do something in this parliament to stop that happening again.
Mr STIRLING (Leader of Government Business): Madam Speaker, I do not wish to dignify the Leader of the Opposition’s lack of support for this motion with a detailed response of my own, other than to say and put on the record my very clear disappointment of both his, and the opposition members’, inability to reach inside and find the compassion necessary to support a motion such as this. Second, I want to put on the record my view that it is hypocrisy in the extreme to accuse this government of not going far enough with the motion. No matter what form it hit the desks of this Assembly, it was never going to be supported by the opposition, and you do not get any more hypocritical than that. The third point I wanted to make was, whilst I commend the former government for their financial support of the Stolen Generation and their work in the Northern Territory, it was, in fact, Commonwealth money delivered to the Northern Territory: it was incumbent on them to pass that money on to them.
In relation to member for Nelson, and what I found to be a very powerful and moving testimony of his own experience, I say to him that it is genuine attempt on behalf of this government to say sorry. It is a genuine attempt to facilitate and help those to move on and find closure, with an acknowledgement by the government of the Northern Territory, that it is so, that this Assembly is able to say sorry for those who can, at that level, find closure. We would hope it will move relations on to the new era that you believe in your own heart should have been embodied in this motion. I totally agree with you and totally support you in what you are saying, but I do not believe that those other areas ought to have been part of this motion today. I thank you for your very moving contribution.
After the war, the forcible removal of Aboriginal children in the Northern Territory recommenced. Patrol officers were required to report on the presence of children of mixed descent living in Aboriginal communities, and make arrangements for their removal to settlements and mission homes. The Northern Territory Stolen Generation submission to the National Inquiry into the Separation of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Children from their Families, included this description:
- Some of the mothers have said that the day the patrol officer and a woman missionary arrived to remove them,
they were told that the children were going on a picnic, something they were used to. … ‘We were tricked’, one
mother said afterwards, and others agree. Sixteen children, all related in one way or another, were removed
from the mission on a day Julia has never forgotten.
- The version presented by the woman missionary years later was that, at the request of the Native Affairs Branch,
she gained consent of 16 or 18 mothers of the same number of children, and implied that two children were not
taken solely because their mothers did not consent. However, as she - as well as the missionaries based there - did
not speak any Aboriginal languages at all, and the mothers did not speak English, it is simply not credible that any
form of informed consent was obtained.
The assembled children were loaded onto the truck very suddenly, their things thrown after them. The suddenness,
the suppressed air of tension, shocked the mothers and the children and they realised something was seriously
wrong. … Children began to cry, the mothers to wail and cut themselves … The tailgate was slammed shut, bolted
and the truck screeched off with things still hanging over the back, with mothers and other children running after
it, crying and wailing.
We are all moved by the stories told in the Bringing Them Home report. We are all touched too, by the many stories told to us by our neighbours, our work colleagues, our friends - fellow Territorians - who are forever affected by these past policies. In the Northern Territory, members of the Stolen Generation and their families are sporting heroes, businessmen and women, community leaders, volunteers and fellow workers. They may also be people who are having difficulty reconciling the past that robbed them of family experiences for no other reason than their descent. The issue of apology is one that enables parliament to fully and frankly express our sorrow to those people who live in our midst, who make up the community to which we all belong.
My own experience of working with and knowing people affected by the removal policies, is that many have good jobs, have contributed much to our community, and make it the place that we all love living in so much. But all would have preferred to have remained with their parents, despite the fact that in terms of income, employment, and levels of education attainment, they may have been better off than if they had remained with their families all those years ago. Their hurt, their sense of loss, is not dissipated in any way by the various successes each have made of their lives.
There are those who say that an apology is an empty gesture. They may say that it is meaningless, but clearly, it is important to many of those who remain affected by the policies of forced removal. It is important for us all, as a community, to acknowledge that there were such policies; that this tragedy occurred; that the suffering has continued to be felt through generations. It is particularly important for parliaments, as the people’s representatives, to formally recognise that these injustices were perpetrated under misguided government policies, instead of trying to pretend that it did not happen.
Why should it be parliaments in particular? Listen to the words of one of those affected:
- Our life pattern was created by the government policies and are forever with me, as though an invisible anchor
around my neck. The moments that should be shared and rejoiced by a family unit … are forever lost. The stolen
years that are worth more than any treasure are irrecoverable.
In 1996 Sir William Deane said:
- It should, I think, be apparent to all well-meaning people that true reconciliation between the Australian nation
and its indigenous peoples is not achievable in the absence of acknowledgement by the nation of the wrongfulness
of past dispossession, oppression and degradation of the Aboriginal peoples. That is not to say that individual
Australians who had no part in what was done in the past should feel or acknowledge personal guilt. It is simply
to assert our identity as a nation and the basic fact that national shame, as well as national pride, can and should
exist in relation to past acts and omissions, at least when done or made in the name of the community or with the
authority of government …
The personal plight, in terms of health, employment, education, living conditions and self-esteem, of so many
Aboriginals, must be acknowledged as largely flowing from what happened in the past. The dispossession, the
destruction of hunting fields, the devastation of lives, were all related. The new diseases, the alcohol and the
new pressures of living were all introduced. True acknowledgement cannot stop short of recognition of the
extent to which present disadvantage flows from past injustice and oppression …
Theoretically, there could be national reconciliation without any redress at all, of the dispossession and other
wrongs sustained by Aboriginals. As a practical measure, however, it is apparent that recognition of the need
for appropriate redress for present disadvantage flowing from past injustice and oppression is a pre-requisite
of reconciliation. There is, I believe, widespread acceptance of such a need.
It is a tremendous honour for to be Minister for Aboriginal Affairs in the first Labor Territory government. I have a strong personal commitment to lasting and positive change for indigenous Territorians. This government’s path is set on being inclusive of all Territorians. As much as we celebrate the richness and uniqueness that indigenous Territorians bring to our community, we recognise, at the same time, the pressing and urgent need to redress the disadvantaged, which too many years of misguided policies and practices have resulted in. This government is committed to this goal. We are committed to real and lasting reconciliation between indigenous and non-indigenous Territorians. This motion is just one first, but important, step towards that goal.
As the Chief Minister said, the government will soon introduce freedom of information legislation. We will revisit the submissions made by Northern Territory Stolen Generation groups to last years Senate inquiry, and we will do whatever we can to assist in the healing process. I can say, as well, that if a reparations tribunal and associated funding comes about federally, this government will support the concept of control resting with Stolen Generation groups.
This government, the federal government and all other jurisdictional governments are the body politic. They are the only authorities that can issue an apology to the Stolen Generation. That is why the Chief Minister has presented this motion. That is why everyone of us in this Assembly should be supporting it in its entirety.
Dr TOYNE (Attorney-General): Madam Speaker, the motion before us is a very simple proposition: do we or do we not offer an apology to the Stolen Generation? I will begin by responding to that proposition. I am sorry for what happened to the people of the Stolen Generation. I am sorry, very personally, to the people in this House today. I congratulate you on your survival, and I feel absolutely no hesitation in offering an apology to you.
This motion is about being human, of having resolved feelings, a place of belonging, a place in the community that cares - in short, a secure identity. We either stand on a secure identity or we spend our lives searching for one. Those of us who stand outside the families of the Stolen Generation can only imagine the depths of their loss. For me, the story of my close friend Peter Gunner symbolises the cost.
Peter showed enormous courage in joining Lorna Cubillo in a class action aimed at testing the claims of the Stolen Generation. I saw the terrible cost to Peter, of recalling and relating the traumatic experiences of his life as he gave the evidence. For Peter, the case offered no closure, only painful recollection. He remains, he prevails, supported by the sympathy of his rediscovered kin in Utopia, but separated from them by the lack of a shared upbringing and heritage.
It feels entirely right to say I am sorry today, because today I am saying sorry to Peter for what happened to him as a result of a tragic and misguided policy. In offering this apology to Peter, I am offering it through him to all the members of the Stolen Generation. To support someone else is to be more human yourself.
Madam Speaker, I support the motion.
Mr HENDERSON (Industries and Business): Madam Speaker, to say sorry is difficult. It requires courage and principle, empathy and understanding. We usually say sorry with the benefit of hindsight. It is not often that we deliberately make mistakes. To know that you have made a mistake, to admit it to yourself and others, and to offer an apology is the right thing to do. It is the mature thing to do, and our Legislative Assembly has matured very quickly during the first sittings of the Ninth Assembly.
The members of the Legislative Assembly who are here today did not make any decisions regarding the removal of children from their families during the years of the lost and neglected generation. However, part of the honour and privilege of being elected members of parliament is the responsibility we have to the present and future generations - as well as to the past - recognising what happened in the past. I support the Chief Minister’s motion of apology to people who were removed from their families as an appropriate, necessary and important part of the healing process.
On 18 August, the Northern Territory decided to move forward. We are moving away from guilt and blame, emotions that should not be part of this debate, and we are moving towards a more mature society - an open and inclusive society. Part of this movement forward is the painful and necessary process of saying sorry - painful because it often brings up unwanted memories and emotions; necessary because we were one of the few places in Australia where the lost generation has had a palpable impact, from our red heart to our tropical north.
The Northern Territory is blessed for its cultural diversity. We value highly our bright and vibrant community which provides the Territory with such a distinct identity. We are blessed that we have so many members of the Aboriginal family within our borders, contributing to our community. It is essential that everybody feels welcomed and valued within our society. Our apology today is an important issue for many people, but it is of tremendous importance to our Aboriginal people.
It has been my pleasure in my 20 years in the Northern Territory to befriend many people within the Aboriginal community. Today I will talk briefly about Hilda Muir - Aunty Hilda to all of us on this side of the House - someone who is very special and has contributed so much to this debate. Her family and friends love her dearly, and there are many hundreds of them in Darwin and the Northern Territory. For me, she is one of the reasons why my heart tugs when I talk about the lost and neglected generation. Aunty Hilda has been able to join us, she is in the gallery today. I have asked her permission to tell some of her story and I hope I do not embarrass her. I am quoting from Hilda Muir’s reminiscence:
- My birth was a proper bush birth for my mother in our country near Manankurra. Bush birth means the exact
year and month of my birth was never registered. As a bush child, life was happy and carefree, relatives all
around. Every day learning more about the land and survival, speaking language and being little Yulama.
I lost all this when I was taken away. Now, I can only survive within the corner shop or the supermarket.
When I look at maps now, I am amazed at where we must have walked. I was not more than seven years old
and I am confused in my mind as to when we were running away and when we were coming back.
Vanderlin Islands was one of my favourite places. Out there, where we went in season for food and ceremonies,
there were little soldier crabs and we used to chase them, playing games chasing the little crabs. There was lots
of variety in the bush those days, but it was a hard way. Aboriginal people always share what they get. This is a
very strong custom. If you think you have got enough, well that’s enough. The main thing was always survival.
I do not remember playing with any half-caste kids. I only played with Aboriginal kids, children from my relatives.
They were all my kin. I never knew no half-caste kids, only Aboriginal kids I used to play with. We did not think
we were anything, just a big mob of kids. Not thinking what colour we were, not thinking: ‘I am not as black as
that one there or this other one’. I speak my mother language. In my life, when I lived with my people, I spoke
the lingo like one happy little Aboriginal girl.
We just enjoyed life and played, all Aboriginal, all Yanjuwa. And our mothers, they all love us, and aunties and
uncles and nannas, too. One big loving family. Then there was my sister, Jessie, a full-blood girl, then another
brother, also a full-blood and his name was Henry. As far as I know, I was the last in my family.
I can’t remember now, being with my mother just before I came away to Darwin. Maybe that was before we
went to Vanderlin. Remembering back over 70 years to something you are never supposed to remember, after
they took you, is hard.
I reckon most people remember things that happened when they were little kids because friends and relations
remember things and they keep checking up on things, talking over and over about them. It was April 16, 1928.
I was eight years, three months old and I never saw my little mummy again.
Aunty Hilda is understandably upset that she never saw her mother again. Hilda holds no bitter feelings towards anyone, she is one of the sweetest people you could ever meet. She does have regrets, though, and it is always the small things that are the most palpable, the words you do not get to say. Hilda would like to go back and see her mother, to hug her mother and say: ‘I love you very much and I am sorry if I was naughty’. I hope that today, Aunty Hilda, this motion in our parliament gives you some measure of comfort. Hilda is a very wise woman, and I appreciate immensely her opinion on how and why we are here in the Chamber debating this motion today. Hilda described today’s motion and our Chief Minister as ‘compassionate, wonderful and mature’.
Saying sorry is about acknowledging the past, about healing the wound, about moving on. The Territory, and this Assembly, have a great opportunity to move forward on many issues in many areas. We have been given a mandate for change, for a breath of fresh air. While everything we do in the Assembly is important, today’s motion will probably have a greater emotional impact on some people’s lives than anything else we will do in this parliament. This Assembly, our government, is committed to working in partnership with the people of the Northern Territory to build a better Territory. Partnership is more than a message or a theme, it has real substance.
The best chance for the Northern Territory, and all of us who live here, lies in our working together. Today, saying sorry costs us nothing, but it has real substance for the people who were affected.
Mrs AAGAARD (Health, Family and Children’s Services): Madam Speaker, I feel privileged to be part of a government that is formally recording an apology to those among us who have been so affected by the policies and practices of Commonwealth governments in the past. Perhaps, in the Northern Territory, this motion has more resonance than anywhere else in Australia, as we live together with the knowledge and results of these measures. I support the motion of an apology wholeheartedly as a public expression of sorrow and regret for actions that have made such a significant impact on the lives of our people here.
I suppose the first time I ever heard anything about young Aboriginal children being taken to missions and other institutions throughout Australia, including the Northern Territory, was as a child at Sunday school in Brisbane, and later as a student at a church school. My family, along with many families from all the different Christian denominations, gave generous donations to missions who were caring for Aboriginal children. I am sure many members of this House, on both sides, would belong to families who did the same.
I remember seeing brochures of beautiful young Aboriginal children who were in the care of the church missions, and thinking that I was happy that my family supported such projects. It was my understanding at the time, bearing in mind I was very young, that the children had been abandoned by their parents or orphaned. I really did not think much more about this until I first heard about the Bringing Them Home report, authored by Sir Ronald Wilson, a friend to many of us on this side of the House, and I am sure to many in the public gallery today; and Mr Mick Dodson. I remember thinking could these stories be really true? Had all those young Aboriginal children my family, and so many other families, had supported through church missions really been treated like that? It seemed incredible to me.
In October 1997, I attended a sorry ceremony between the Uniting Church - the church which encompasses the previous Presbyterian and Methodist Churches in Australia - and the people who had been children at Crocker Island Mission which had been a Methodist Mission from 1941 to 1967, at the Nightcliff Uniting Church. The Uniting Church, even though it was not the church at the time of the events, acknowledged complicity in the government policy of the day - that is to assimilate Aboriginal children into mainstream society. It also accepted that this policy was both inherently wrong and that it occurred at the expense of ensuring family, community support, and language and cultural heritage. It also recognised the damage done to children by separation from mothers and family, and from their own community, and a sense of Aboriginality of the children, including, for some, the loss of sense of personal identity. It also apologised for the fact that the care provided to the children was not always of the quality, love, generosity and compassion that the church would always want to provide.
After the ceremony, those of us present stayed to listen to the stories of the senior Territorians who had lived on Crocker Island - stories of such hardship, cruelty and sadness. The only light in the whole saga was that they had each other. They also relayed the remarkable story of what was described as 95 part-Aboriginal children aged from one to 18 years travelling 3000 miles by boat, truck and train transport across Arnhem Land during the Wet Season to escape the bombing of Darwin. They were led by the missionary, Margaret Sommerville. It should be noted that they were only alerted to the possibility of raids on 13 February 1942, just prior to the raids on the 19 February. I understand that non-indigenous women and children had been evacuated in late 1941.
The apologies of the Uniting Church have been added to by those of the Catholic and Anglican Churches, and by state governments. The argument that this generation should not apologise for things that happened in the past is a very odd one, I believe. I have also heard people say that Stolen Generation people should simply put it behind them and get on with their lives. As Australians, we meet every year and say ‘Lest we Forget’ for our ANZACs, and I am proud to be someone who upholds this respect for our servicemen and women. In the same way, we need to acknowledge that something happened to our Aboriginal Territorians, so that it cannot happen again. We must remember.
Public apologies for past wrongdoings are not unusual. In recent years there have been many public apologies. The United States Congress has apologised to Japanese Americans for imprisoning them during World War II, and to native Hawaiians for helping to overthrow the Kingdom of Hawaii a century ago, as well as apologising for slavery. Other countries have also apologised. Britain’s Prime Minister apologised to the Irish people for failing to relieve the 19th century potato famine. East Germany apologised for the holocaust. Japan’s Emperor apologised for atrocities in Korea, and in recent years many religious leaders including his Holiness the Pope, have apologised for significant earlier events.
An apology provides the foundation for a new beginning and is the first step on the journey to genuine healing and reconciliation. I commend the motion to the House.
Dr BURNS (Johnston): Madam Speaker, I rise to support this motion on an apology to the Stolen Generation. Perhaps the best way I can do this is to tell a life story of one of my constituents, Mr Luke Morcom who lives in Jingili and, tragically, I know that there are many others. The story I am about to tell is essentially the one that Luke has told me.
Luke was born in Borroloola on the banks of the McArthur River on 14 June 1951 at a place called Mabunji or Rocky Creek, outside the old Borroloola store under a mango tree. His father, Albert Morcom, ran the store and registered him at birth as Sidney Morcom. His name was changed a week later to Luke Morcom when he arrived at the Catholic Mission at Garden Point. Another baby arrived that day at the mission, and his name was changed from Hector John to Mark Casey. Changing children’s names was common practice.
Luke’s mother died a week after he was born. Her name was Yima, the daughter of Banjo McKinnon, an Elder of the Yanyuwa people. Luke’s mother had previously suffered the removal of Luke’s older sister, May, three years before. She had been placed on the Crocker Island Mission but was moved to Garden Point after months of protest from her father. May had her name changed to Florence.
When Luke was nine, his father died at the old Darwin Hospital and was buried in the McMillans Road Cemetery. Neither Luke nor his sister attended the funeral. Some months later, Florence was adopted by the Guy family in Adelaide and left Garden Point Mission, leaving Luke all alone. When Luke was 12, he was adopted by Jack and Maimi Smith in Adelaide. When he was 21, his foster parents encouraged him to return to the Northern Territory to find his Aboriginal family. He found many uncles and his grandfather living at Borroloola. Luke has lived in Darwin since 1972, and I am sure he is known to many people who are here today. He has worked for the Commonwealth and Northern Territory Public Service for more than 30 years. His sister, Florence May Morcom, currently works as a nurse in Saudi Arabia and visits her brother and friends in Darwin every year.
Luke has three children and their maternal grandparents, George Paul and Louise Campbell, were also part of the Stolen Generation. Luke has written here what I think is beautiful poetry to express the feeling of profound loss experienced by many Aboriginal people from the Stolen Generation. I would like to read some extracts from Luke’s poem, A Mother’s Comfort:
- Mother I need your comfort
Can you hear my plea?
My life is in turmoil
Please come for me.
Didn’t want to leave you
Did not have a choice.
Federal Government had a policy
Aboriginals then had no voice.
Sorry I could not return
But Welfare ruled the day
Sent to an island mission
I was again taken away.
…
You are my inspiration
Thank you for my birth
One day we will be together
comforted by mother earth.
Mother, although they stole me
And tore your world apart
I know where to find you
You dwell within my heart.
Luke Morcom and his family are fine Territorians who have borne much sorrow through the Commonwealth Aboriginals Ordinance.
I know this is a complex issue, but it is also an issue of the heart. I have always been taught that if hurt is given, whether by a design or inadvertently, even with the best intentions, then an apology is the honourable thing to do. It also establishes respect. So, it is an honour for me to support this apology motion to all those Territorians who were removed from their families and suffered under the Commonwealth Aboriginals Ordinance.
Ms LAWRIE (Karama): Madam Speaker, I rise today to say sorry. Sorry to the families and individuals affected by the very wrongful actions perpetrated under the Commonwealth Aboriginals Ordinance that resulted in the separation of Aboriginal children from their friends, their family, their community and their land.
As the member for Karama, I say sorry, too. I say sorry to my constituents in Karama and Malak, some of whom are here today who have borne the very real ill-effects of being separated from family. As a young girl growing up in Darwin, I had the very great privilege of being taken into local Aboriginal families who were in Darwin because they were brought to Darwin, removed from their parents, removed from their homeland and put into Kahlin Compound. These people have given me the very great honour of being able to call them family, and Nanna sits here today. Nanna, I acknowledge you.
In 1984, I was a 17-year-old cadet on the Northern Territory News, the only daily newspaper we had in the Territory. I was given a call from my family who said: ‘Come on, sister girl, there is a gathering, there is a reunion. Come and talk to these women. Come and tell their story’. This is in 1984, before the term Stolen Generation was even conceived or reported. I have that article here today. It is an article that tells a story of eight sisters. With your indulgence, I will quickly read it into the Parliamentary Record because it begins to tell just a glimpse of a story of a couple of the sisters:
- Daisy Ruddick still remembers the day 49 years ago, when she was taken from her weeping mother from
Labunya Station, 500 km south of Darwin. It was a traumatic experience which will always remain fresh in
Daisy’s mind. On Friday she recalled those bitter memories under far happier circumstances. With seven
other women, forced to go through the same ordeal, she held a reunion of Kahlin Compound inmates.
Kahlin Compound was set up by the 1925 federal government and run by the then Native Affairs Department.
The compound was home for nearly 100 children, forcibly taken from their parents because the government
of the day decided they would be better off away from their tribal situation. The official version had it that
they would receive better schooling and a higher living standard. ‘Nothing could have been further from the
truth’, Ethel Buckle recalled. ‘We hardly had any food, mainly bread and jam, and we got what we could from
the bins. We had no family, we became like sisters’.
Daisy and her seven sisters told how they would pass time playing in the Aboriginal camps, resigned to the fact
that they would never see their parents again. Ethel Buckle was playing in the Katherine Police Station when
she was taken by the authorities in 1927. ‘There were no goodbyes or last words, I was just taken away’,
she said. ‘Generally the police just came and rounded up the children and took them to the Kahlin Compound’,
said Eileen Sambono, who was at Newcastle Waters when she was taken.
- Daisy Williams, Hilda Muir, Pearl Graham, Suzie Markham and Evelyn Baird all had very similar stories to tell.
Now, as time passes, the sisters have decided it is time to keep in closer contact and rekindle the strong bond
that existed between them in their early years. Their reunion was the first of what are intended to be regular
meetings and, hopefully, the sharing of many more memories.
As a 17-year-old girl in Darwin, I thought to myself: ‘I could not bear the thought of having been taken away from my mother’. Now, as an adult and a mother myself with two daughters, I cannot bear the thought, as a mother, of having my children taken from me. It is a very small thing to do in this Chamber today, to apologise, to say sorry. I call on all members of this House to look deep into themselves and understand that there are a people who have been affected by past actions.
Those people have asked for an apology. It is a very small thing, indeed, for us to tender that apology. It is of symbolic importance; it is a beginning of, hopefully, actions that we can take as a government to heal some of the hurt of the past. The past actions were wrong - they were wrong, wrong and very wrong - and they require an apology. That is why I have the strength and conviction to support my government in saying sorry. I will close with the words of the Australian Reconciliation Council, of their vision:
- A united Australia, which respects this land of ours, values the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander heritage
and provides justice and equity for all.
Mr KIELY (Sanderson): Madam Speaker, I rise today in support of the apology motion. I have been very moved by the stories, and the strength of the Stolen Generation. I would also consider this apology a sign of strength, a sign of support for the people and what they have been through, and a way to go forward.
I admire the strength of the people sitting here today for what they and their families have endured. I believe it is incumbent upon all of us to recognise that, and to recognise the past. I know that with this motion, and with the genuine feeling from this side, in the hearts of this side - certainly around us, in the streets of Darwin, in the streets of Alice Springs, in the bush, in the communities - I feel that today is sending a strong foundation for us all to go forward together.
Mr VATSKALIS (Lands, Planning and Environment): Madam Speaker, I rise to support this motion. I must admit I have not prepared any speeches and I am not going to read anything. I am going to speak from my heart.
I came to Australia in 1983, and I was amazed to find out that Aboriginal people only acquired full citizenship rights in 1967. For me, Australia was heaven. Parts of my family came here in the 1960s, and when they were coming back to Greece they were well-fed, well-dressed, with a lot of money. We thought: ‘This is a fantastic place, this is unbelievable, it treats its people with respect, it gives opportunities to people.’ You can imagine my amazement when I found out the original inhabitants of this place were not full citizens and they only became citizens in 1967.
From Perth, I moved north and northwest to Port Hedland, and later to Darwin. I was equally amazed when I found out that until 1958-59, kids were removed from their families for the simple reason they were half-caste, as they were called, under the pretext of welfare and education. The reality was the authorities wanted them to be assimilated into the mainstream of Australian society.
I can understand the bitterness of these people because all of us have our own experience. We had a Stolen Generation in my country. My mother and my grandmother were part of the Stolen Generation in Greece. In the late 1940s, in the middle of the civil war in Greece, my mother was taken from her family by one part of the people we were fighting. She was taken away from her mother, her father, her family, the place where she was born, to another country. She was well-fed, she was educated, they looked after her, but she was taken away. Not only that, my grandmother was taken. She was taken away for eight years. She did not see her kids, she did not see her husband, her relatives for eight years. When my mother was taken, she was 14 years old, when they met again, my mother was about to get married.
I recall last year, when I went back to Greece to visit my family, that was the first time my mother ever spoke about those days. She had never spoken about what happened. As a matter of fact, she was trained to fight and she fought, and she was lucky to survive. One thing she said to me is: ‘Why did they take us away; why did they do that to us? I did not see my mother for eight years. Why? And the worst thing is that nobody came to say sorry for that, nobody apologised for it’. I recall the bitterness in her voice, and the same bitterness I have heard from the people in the Stolen Generation, because I had the privilege to work for an Aboriginal medical service, an Aboriginal organisation.
As a member of this parliament, as a member of this government, as an individual, and as a Christian person, I say sorry. I will always work to make sure this will never happen again.
Ms MARTIN (Chief Minister): Madam Speaker, I would like to thank all members in this House for their contribution to this debate. It has been one of very strong emotion, but I do not think any of us should feel embarrassed that we have had people near to tears because of their contribution to this debate. There is no shame in that. It is a very emotional and a very tragic issue for Territorians. It is a very healing process to go through, that members of Parliament feel so strongly about this that it does bring them to tears. We have all very strongly felt the emotion of this afternoon.
The personal stories are the ones that I think will stay with us, the personal stories of fathers, mothers, grandparents and friends for many of us. Just the impact on lives of those policies that we now cover under the Stolen Generation. Very sadly for this parliament, there has been a strong contrast to that from the very cynical politics of the opposition. To hear just one contribution - and that a very cynical one simply concentrating on questioning motives, on trying to demean - is very sad for this parliament. My government is a new government. We are determined to move the Territory forward, we are determined to find the points of healing. There have been divisions in our community - this is certainly one. The only contribution from the opposition is one that is heartless and cynical. There is no understanding of the important symbols, and all we heard was excuse after excuse, but no leadership, sadly. It is very sad for this parliament, and personally saddens me deeply.
I would like to thank everyone for coming today. It is a very important event for the Territory. I would like to thank all members of the Stolen Generation for being here, for being part of this important event; for their families and their friends being here; and those who simply support the need for a motion like this.
The motion is a quite complex one. It apologies; it acknowledges the hurt that was done; it recognises the profound sense of loss; it recognised that, for many hundreds of Territorians, they received inadequate care, guidance and education and had a very tough time under the guise of the Aboriginals Ordinance. This motion does call on the Commonwealth government to make that formal and specific apology to all those who were removed, and to acknowledge that the Commonwealth failed in discharging its moral obligations towards them. So, it is a five-part motion. What it does say, the bottom line of it, and what I am proud to stand here now and say is that - and shared by this side of the House - that I am sorry, the other members of my government are sorry, that this government is sorry, this new Labor government in the Territory is sorry, and this parliament, by majority vote, is sorry.
So let us, as a community, move on. Let us hope this debate contributes to the healing. I say, proudly, to all indigenous Territorians that this new government treasures and celebrates indigenous Territorians. Certainly, I hope you recognise that from our hearts, and that we are strongly supporting this motion. Thank you for being here.
Motion agreed to.
Mr STIRLING (Leader of Government Business): Division, Madam Speaker!
Madam SPEAKER: No, the motion was passed in the affirmative. We are going on with the next business of the day. Those people in the gallery, I thank you for your patience, and to all members of the House and members in the gallery who listened so quietly. That was very good.
MINISTERIAL STATEMENT
Ansett Collapse - Impact on Tourism
Ansett Collapse - Impact on Tourism
Mr STIRLING (Tourism): Madam Speaker, I rise to make a statement on the collapse of Ansett and the impact on the Northern Territory tourism industry. As honourable members would be aware, Ansett accounted for approximately 43% of domestic passenger capacity, some 9300 seats per week across the Territory. In terms of air freight and, in particular, perishable produce, Ansett Air Cargo consigned approximately 60% to 80% of the market share and had the equipment, expertise and experience in moving perishable goods. Ansett was also involved in providing a number of regional services to Gove and Groote Eylandt, through contract operations under Air North and Flight West.
It goes without saying that Ansett was a significant operator in the Territory in terms of services provided, and employment generated. All Australians have felt the loss of Ansett, and none more so than here in the Territory, which relies so heavily on air transport to overcome isolation, breakdown and tyranny-of-distance factors that hamper Territorians in their daily approach to business and family life. I say, unequivocally, that this government would love to see Ansett back in Territory skies and, indeed, wants the 147 Ansett jobs back in the Territory community.
Since this government came to power, we have worked to reinstate air services into and out of the Territory. Even prior to the collapse, this government was in contact with Ansett because, along with many others, we were hearing rumours of instability and threats to services. We were being assured by Ansett senior management that the airline was not in trouble, and would certainly be there for the long haul. As members would appreciate, despite that information, the collapse of Ansett did still come as a shock. The government reacted quickly and decisively to counter the impact of the collapse on both inbound and outbound passenger movements, freight capacity, as well as resolving issues of intra-Territory regional services.
Government became aware of the Ansett collapse at around 3 am on Friday, 14 September, and a high-level task force was established and met at 9 am the same day. Its task was to comprehensively assess the full impact that the loss of air services would have on the Territory. The task force, of which I was a member, met daily and continues to meet when required to monitor the situation and develop appropriate strategies. In addition, a joint industry government air transport task force was formed to enhance communication channels between industry and government, and allow specific concerns to be quickly addressed by government. The task force comprises representatives from the Chamber of Commerce and Industry, Qantas, regional tourist associations, NT Airports, Australian Air Express, Air North and relevant government agencies, and first met on 20 September. Passenger capacity, freight, and regional services continue to be the focus of this task force.
An immediate priority after the collapse of Ansett was to increase supply to meet demand. This simply means more, or bigger, aircraft servicing the Territory. At this point, may I make special reference to Qantas and their locally-based staff for their endeavours to ensure the backlog of passengers in the Territory was dealt with quickly and efficiently, a job well done that underlies their professionalism, their commitment to the aviation industry and, most important of all to us, their commitment to the Northern Territory. I also point out that it was, indeed, this government that facilitated the attainment of federal government approval for international airlines such as Royal Brunei and Malaysia Airlines, to carry domestic passengers and freight within Australia. This approval greatly enhanced capacity to move the travelling public, the upshot being that through a coordinated and well-managed approach, the backlog of stranded Ansett passengers was cleared by 19 September, some five days after the collapse.
The task force was able to work with Qantas to secure additional services to increase capacity. On 25 September, Qantas announced additional flights between Sydney/Alice Springs/Ayers Rock and Sydney/Darwin. On 28 September, Qantas announced 15 additional return flights per week on top of those already scheduled. Government continues to work closely with Qantas to ensure reinstatement of services equivalent to those enjoyed under a two-airline operation. Qantas has further announced schedules that represent approximately 80% of the previous total seating capacity - that is Ansett and Qantas previously together - that will be effective as at 28 October 2001. In essence, this will cover 100% of last year’s demand to Darwin, 80% to Alice Springs and approximately 60% to Gove. Given the circumstances, and to put it in context with other areas of Australia, particularly northern Western Australia, this provides a solid platform fairly quickly after Ansett’s collapse. The government is not satisfied that this is enough, and will continue to work with the federal government and private operators to resolve those constraints still on Alice Springs.
Additionally, we are still continuing dialogue with Virgin Blue to determine the commencement of operations in the Territory. It will mean further passenger capacity, as well as an alternate service provider into and out of the Territory. As a low-cost airline, I would think it would be welcomed by Territorians because they will be coming into the marketplace with much cheaper fares.
My government has also been communicating with the Ansett administrator requesting Ansett #2 services be established to the Territory. It is a great pity that the administrator required full underwriting by this government, rather than being prepared to accept an arrangement similar to the Virgin operation, where the government takes up 50 seats and sells them through its Tourist Commission. I would also like it noted that the government applauds the approach of the Ansett staff in Darwin and their endeavours to secure the return of Ansett services to the Territory. It is very much the Territorian way of never giving up and always having a go, and this government is happy to support their activities, and have worked with them for some weeks.
I last met with a delegation of Ansett employees on Monday 22 October, and I will continue to assist them and work with them. Arrangements are being established with the Employee Assistance Service to provide additional counselling and training assistance through the Northern Territory Employment and Training Authority. We thought that it was necessary to take that additional step, given that some of the staff members have gone along to Centrelink, and because they had a spouse working full-time, there was no capacity under Centrelink’s guidelines to help them with forms of training. You can appreciate their skills are customer service operator based in terms of the aviation industry. They are a little specialised along those lines. It is not that easy for them to simply walk out and get similar jobs. In fact, those jobs do not exist. Whatever we can do in terms of the Northern Territory Employment and Training Authority - and we will continue to work with Centrelink as well, because we think that those guidelines that they act with, ought to be lifted in times of exceptional circumstances where we have 147 dedicated airline staff with suddenly no jobs. They ought to be able to employ a bit of flexibility with their guidelines and work with us, if necessary, to help those people gain other skills. Many times, it would only be complementary skills, not new skills.
In terms of freight, there were also difficulties - particularly in the first two weeks after the Ansett collapse - for shipments of Territory perishable produce. However, it is understood from Australian Air Express, the cargo agent for Qantas, that their freight sheds are now cleared and all goods consigned uplifted within 12 to 24 hours. After 28 October, the new Qantas schedule will include the provision of 14 wide-body 767 aircraft from Darwin to Sydney and Brisbane per week. This will reflect a real increase of approximately 11% of freight capacity on that previously enjoyed with the two airlines operating in the Territory.
In relation to regional Territory services, the government quickly facilitated the federal support package under the Rapid Route Recovery Scheme, to reinstate full services to Groote Eylandt by Air North. That service had previously been under contract to Air North by Ansett, but is now conducted by Air North in their own right. That was, of course, a service that went off the route immediately Ansett collapsed, and was eligible …
Ms CARNEY: A point of order, Mr Deputy Speaker! The minister is deviating from his Ministerial Statement and I ask that he not do so.
Mr HENDERSON: Just speaking to the point of order, there is no Standing Order that says that the minister cannot deviate. He is talking generally to his statement and he should be allowed to continue.
Mr DEPUTY SPEAKER: Member for Wanguri, I will take advice on this. Minister, I would ask you to keep your comments in line with what you are reading there.
Mr Reed: You have called points of order on this yourself, Syd, if a minister has deviated. You know what the rules are.
Mr STIRLING: Mr Deputy Speaker, I will go back to the speech. I would not have thought I would have ever seen a Ministerial Statement read word-for-word from the copy in front of us. And in fact, responding to interjections, additional information from the minister …
Members interjecting.
Mr Reed: Are you questioning the Speaker’s ruling?
Mr DEPUTY SPEAKER: Order! Member for Katherine.
Mr STIRLING: No, I am not. I am simply correcting yourself. Maybe I should not be doing that, I should be going through the Deputy Speaker.
Mr Reed: Would you like us to call the state of the House? Get on with the job.
Mr STIRLING: Too cute, Deputy Leader of the Opposition, too cute by half.
Services to Gove have been maintained by Qantas. However, demand for seats remains high. It is, with pleasure, that I tell honourable members that we were successful in negotiating agreement with the Territory’s own airline, Air North, to provide Gove and Groote with access to Darwin and Cairns. In fact, that new route, to commence on 28 October, will go from Cairns, Gove, Darwin through to Broome on a four-day-a-week basis, hopefully moving to a daily basis as the service picks up. The government has provided a one-off grant of less than $200 000 to help underpin that new schedule until the end of February 2002. I am confident the community and business support for Air North’s services will ensure that the new schedules will be self-sustaining after that time. I do not wish to go into the area of the honourable Minister for Transport and Infrastructure Development’s comments, because he will expand further on freight and remote air service issues.
In regard to international airlines, the despicable and deplorable acts of terrorism against the United States of America have changed the world as we know it in many ways, not least of which includes the impact on international aviation. Examples such as the 70-year-old airline, Swissair, collapsing and the thousands of jobs lost worldwide, show the impacts of the 11 September attack. I think something like 120 000 jobs have now disappeared from international airlines since 11 September. Whilst the announcement of Malaysia Airlines to withdraw services from Darwin effective 4 February 2002 was not completely unexpected, the downturn in international aviation traffic resulting from the recent terrorism attacks has hastened its withdrawal from a number of international routes. In fact, Darwin was one of 10 international routes that Malaysia was pulling back on. In fact, that was another area of concern to government because it was …
Ms CARNEY: A point of order, Mr Deputy Speaker! I refer to the previous ruling, and I draw your attention to the state of this House.
Mr DEPUTY SPEAKER: Ring the bells. A quorum is present. Minister, continue.
Mr STIRLING: Mr Deputy Speaker, the downturn in international aviation traffic resulting from the recent terrorism attacks, has hastened Malaysia Airlines’ withdrawal from a number of international routes. As I was saying, Darwin was one of about 10 or 11 international destinations that Malaysia Airlines pulled back from. Malaysia Airlines’ service represents some 12% of total inbound seat capacity. We continue to work with Qantas to mitigate the impact of its reduction of daily services on the Singapore/Darwin route from 1 December 2001, to three per week. We are pursuing a positive outcome, being the resumption of daily services by Qantas’ new low-cost carrier, Australian Airlines. Although we do not have a date of commencement yet, we expect it within months.
In regard to Royal Brunei Airlines, I am pleased to announce that, effective from the end of October 2001, Royal Brunei will operate two dedicated services per week to Darwin. This will effectively deliver an additional 348 seats per week from the international market to the Territory’s tourism and business sectors. There is no doubt that there will be continued fall-out in the aviation industry, and some analysts are saying that there will be less than 10 international airlines operating into the future.
It is important that we recognise the challenges Ansett’s collapse has thrust upon our tourism industry. Coming just days after the terrorist attacks in the United States shut down its aviation industry and forced Americans to reconsider their travel plans, Ansett’s demise created chaos on the domestic front. In 2000, 69% of our visitors arrived in the Northern Territory by air. Ansett carried around half of those. This industry is worth $936m to the Northern Territory. Researchers have calculated that the economic activity generated by tourism expands that figure to $1.5bn. The beneficiaries include supermarkets, take-away food outlets, clothing stores, doctors, and dentists. Tourism is everybody’s business and when the industry suffers a blow, everybody feels it.
Let me tell you about the days that followed 14 September. Within hours of the news of Ansett’s demise, the Tourist Commission held crisis talks to map out immediate strategies. Its holiday centre staff began telephoning its clients who had been booked on Ansett, to help them find seats on Qantas aircraft. Clients who had not yet travelled were contacted so other arrangements could be made. Most said they still wanted to holiday in the Northern Territory. In relation to Qantas, they proved a commitment to the Northern Territory and, indeed, to the Australian aviation industry - as there should be as the flag carrier for the country – when they carried 100 000 people for free. 100 000 stranded Ansett travellers got home for free on Qantas flights. The Northern Territory Tourist Commission immediately reviewed its marketing strategies to bring them into line with the industries new reality. As a short-term measure, funds were taken from the international markets and allocated to ramp-up campaigns focusing on the drive market and intra-Territory tourism. Daily communication with the industry ensured that the government’s strategies were known and supported.
The Tourist Commission’s research unit channelled resources into accumulating timely market intelligence which could be shared with industry to help operators plan their way through the new challenges. Problems and solutions came and went daily during the first few weeks after 14 September. We had lost some 50% of our air capacity in 24 hours. As of 28 October, the hard work and magnificent partnership between government and industry, will have seen, and led to the restoration of, 80% of the original air capacity into the Northern Territory. Our efforts will continue.
Mr Deputy Speaker, I move that the Assembly take note of the statement.
Ms CARNEY (Araluen): Mr Deputy Speaker, I rise to respond to the minister’s statement. There are a number of matters that require comment. From the outset, I should say that I have not had a personal briefing, although I did receive a written brief a week or so ago. I do not blame the minister for that, it has just been one of those things. However, it is appropriate that I have put on the record that it would have been of some assistance prior to today.
First, I commend the government on its facilitation with the federal government, that effected Royal Brunei and Malaysia Airlines into Darwin to carry domestic passengers and freight. I am not sure of the government’s exact involvement, perhaps it was the federal government that really did the work. In any event, it was a good outcome and the opposition is pleased with it. I must, however, take exception to the minister’s assertion that the government did all that it could to re-instate air services into and out of the Territory, and that it has been communicating with the Ansett administrator requesting Ansett #2 be established.
This government has written a lot of letters. On 1 October, I called on the government to become more than just a letter writer, and to pursue our proposal that the government offer Ansett a financial package to come to the Northern Territory. At that time, I said that, in the interests of Territory tourism, Territory Ansett workers and the Territory economy, the new government should act urgently to offer assistance to the administrator of Ansett. The Territory government must accept that it shares the responsibility of making sure that regional Northern Territory services continue, in addition to its responsibility to Territory-wide tourism. Those who remember the devastating effects on the Territory during the pilots’ dispute in the late 1980s will know, only too well, what the grounding of Ansett has meant for tourism.
The government put $2m away for Virgin Blue Airline flights, which are not going to happen until March. It is disappointing that the government does that on the one hand and then, on the other, does not offer similar funding to the administrator for Ansett. It is the opposition’s view that the government should have immediately offered the Ansett administrator the same deal as it offered to Virgin, and it will be condemned by failing to do so. Specifically, the government should have underwritten 50 seats daily on a A320 Airbus to get Ansett flying into the Territory again, and they should do that now. This would help Territorians, the tourism industry and most importantly, the Ansett staff in the Territory who seem to have been forgotten by this government.
We discussed the idea with Ansett employees in Darwin, and they were convinced that an Ansett A320 Airbus, or similar plane, operating overnight if need, be would be ideal. Indeed, on 16 October, the union representing the Ansett workers appealed on radio for the government’s help in this crisis. They want this government to offer a financial inducement to the Ansett administrator along the same lines that it offered to Richard Branson.
Had we been in government, we would have grabbed this problem by the throat and got on with it. We would have risen to the challenge, but instead, we saw the government sitting on its hands, backing a foreigner, but not the workers in the Northern Territory. This government must show that it has some initiative and act now to get Ansett back into the Northern Territory. I do not accept that the government has done, or is doing, all that it can.
Again, it has been very disappointing that the government rejected fairly early on, a proposal which would have seen the resumption of regular airline services between Brisbane, Cairns, Gove and Darwin, and Brisbane, Cairns, Ayers Rock and Alice Springs. The proposal, known as the Flight West proposal, would see the Northern Territory government provide indemnity funding for the reinstatement of a regular Flight West F100 jet. The proposal was about the Territory government being proactive and working with others to help regional Territorians in the ailing tourism industry. It was rejected out of hand by the Tourism Minister at a meeting of a meeting of 100 residents in Nhulunbuy on 7 October - out of hand. I am advised that he said that it was a federal government responsibility and that his government would not give 1 to Flight West.
When the announcement was made that Ansett has resumed services into Brisbane, the proposal became more critical. It meant that there were connecting Ansett services along the east coast. This proposal could result in jobs for Ansett and Flight West workers. The Ansett booking system is operating and is able to be used by Flight West. Flight West and Ansett staff will be employed. Again, I say that the Labor government had no problems finding $2m for an English millionaire, however, when it comes to putting up funds to help the Territory’s Ansett workers and Territory travellers, it is put in the too hard basket.
The Territory government must accept that it shares the responsibility of making sure that regional Northern Territory services continue, and that those benefiting from tourism in the Northern Territory are looked after by this government. It is a sober responsibility that this government carries and it has not discharged its responsibility at all well. The fact of the matter is that the government has not come up with practical solutions of its own, but has rejected out of hand proposals put to it by others to assist with this crisis. The Alice Springs Town Council and the Central Australian Tourism Industry Association support the Flight West proposal. It is now abundantly clear that this government is the odd one out. It is astonishing that tourism operators are forced to put this proposal together without the government assisting them in any way. I am embarrassed that it refuses to assist the tourism industry by failing to support this proposal.
The minister referred in his statement to his task force. Well, what does it do? The tourism industry has been left to fend for itself. So too, regional Territorians, and the Territory’s 147 Ansett workers and their families. Tourism operators are wondering what the government’s task force is doing, and I can understand why they are asking that question, and ringing my office with that question. This government wants to help a foreigner, but again, does nothing to assist locals who are being forced to leave the Northern Territory, and it is disgraceful.
Mr AH KIT (Transport and Infrastructure Development): Mr Deputy Speaker, I would like to pick up on some comments from the member for Araluen whilst they are still fresh in my mind.
I put it on record and say quite clearly, that the Ansett administrator was offered the same as Virgin Blue Airlines - this $2m offer - but it was refused. I do not know what she expects us to do - to write the cheque out and send it off anyway, to go out and ram it down their throats. I just do not know. That was offered, but it was rejected. If her party is against Virgin Blue Airlines coming into the Northern Territory earlier than we hoped, then they should go out and tell people in the Territory. Write to Mr Branson and say: ‘The CLP in the Northern Territory is against Virgin Blue Airline. We believe that the Martin government favours you, and you are not welcome’. Go out and do it. I also would ask the member for Araluen: how many letters have been sent off to the Prime Minister since the Ansett collapse - or the Deputy Prime Minister who, I understand, is also the minister for Transport? How much correspondence has flowed backwards and forwards from your office, or the Leader of the Opposition’s office, to Canberra?
Ms Carney: You are the government. We are the opposition. We understand.
Mr AH KIT: It is easy for the member for Araluen, and the members opposite, to lay blame here and to ask us to fix everything straight away, like we can pluck money out of the air. We understand. Over last week and this week there is this black hole. The black hole that the member for Katherine who, in the past, I have called, in this Chamber, the bodgie Treasurer. What I said at the time raised a few hackles up from the CLP government, but haven’t I been proven correct!
And whilst we are on the subject of the Deputy Leader of the Opposition, the member for Katherine, in my six years here, to call a quorum while we have an important function out there, with a couple of hundred of the Stolen Generation people, is just nothing but plain sour grapes. He should grow up, he has been here long enough. We have never, never in my six years, ever called a quorum when there was a function on in this House. We have never called a quorum, and we never showed sour grapes like that which was displayed ungraciously by the member for Katherine.
I support my colleague, the Deputy Chief Minister and Minister for Tourism’s statement on the collapse of Ansett and the impact on freight and regional air services. Firstly, may I reiterate the sentiment of my honourable colleague that this government was both shocked and saddened at the demise of Ansett. I am particularly concerned by the sudden loss of employment for the dedicated staff of Ansett. Some of these staff members have worked for decades for Ansett in the Territory. Every effort must be made to ensure that, at the very least, their full employment entitlements are paid to them. Hopefully, in the future, all of these dedicated staff can be restored to full employment.
In terms of air freight, Ansett Air Cargo consigned approximately 60% to 80% of perishable produce emanating from the Territory. This was mainly in the form of live mud crabs, fish and cut flowers. Ansett was also involved in providing regional air services to Gove and Groote Eylandt, through contracts to other operators such as Air North and Flight West. In terms of freight capacity, it is true that we have lost, at least for the present, an experienced and valued perishable produce air cargo transporter in Ansett. However, the news is not all bad. Having survived the last month, I am pleased to report that overall total air freight capacity outbound from the Territory will actually increase by approximately 11% as of 28 October this year. This is capacity over and above that previously provided by Ansett and Qantas.
This situation has arisen as a result of this government’s close consultation and tireless efforts to work constructively with Qantas to ensure the best possible outcomes for primary producers and exporters in the Territory. In particular, Qantas domestic services alone with provide some 14 wide-body Boeing 767 aircraft a week from Darwin to Brisbane and Sydney. It is true that considerable strains were placed on the movement of perishable produce out of the Territory in the two weeks following the collapse of Ansett. It is also true that goods were offloaded at short notice. But it is also very true that, within a couple of weeks, all goods consigned through Australian Air Express, the cargo agent for Qantas, were uplifted within 12 to 24 hours of receipt. In typical Territory style, the job got done.
May I also remind honourable members that a number of issues relating to the airfreight of perishable products, such as handling, freight rates and cool chain maintenance, existed when two airlines operated. These are industry issues and are not quarantined to the Territory. It is, however, something that this government will continue to address.
If you will indulge me for a moment, I have some very interesting statistics provided by Australian Air Express on the movement of perishables for the week prior to and the week after the collapse of Ansett. For the period 1 to 7 September 2001, prior to Ansett’s collapse, Australian Air Express in Darwin uplifted over 4000 kg of live mud crabs, 700 kg of flowers and 250 kg of fish - a total of almost 5500 kg of perishable produce. In the week following Ansett’s collapse, Australian Air Express uplifted over 21 000 kg of live mud crabs, 5000 kg of cut flowers and over 4000 kg of fish - a total of over 30 000 kg of perishable produce. This represents a remarkable achievement by Australian Air Express. In the space of one week, the freight uplifted by Australian Air Express was increased by more than five times. On behalf of this government, I would like to commend Australian Air Express for their professionalism and commitment to the Territory through these difficult times.
Intra-Territory Freight Services were also previously provided, under the Ansett Air Cargo banner, with a Metro aircraft operating a Darwin/Gove/Groote service four times a week. The Metro has a two-tonne capacity. After Ansett’s collapse, Australian Air Express took over and continued the service. However, Australian Air Express withdrew the service as of Friday, 12 October 2001. Again, this government moved quickly to facilitate the Darwin-based company TNT seeking a federal government subsidy through the Rapid Route Recovery Scheme, to continue the Metro freight service into Groote.
Subject to clarification of demand, the freight service is, in part, being met through the provision of Qantas passenger services into Gove. In regard to regional Territory air passenger services, this government, the Martin government, has acted quickly and decisively to reinstate essential services for Territorians in remote communities. An example of this was the facilitation of a federal support package under the Rapid Route Recovery Scheme to reinstate full air services to Groote Eylandt by Air North. This government had the full Air North services reinstated within two days.
I take this opportunity to also pay tribute to the rapid response of Anindilyakwa Air to the collapse of air services to Groote Eylandt. When Ansett, and hence Air North, ceased operations to Groote Eylandt on 14 September, Anindilyakwa Air took an immediate decision to increase their schedule to ten flights weekly. Anindilyakwa Air had previously operated four Cessna nine-seat weekly passenger air services to Groote Eylandt. Anindilyakwa Air’s expanded service of 10 flights per week represented approximately 50% of the estimated demand. This rapid response was much appreciated by the residents of Groote Eylandt. Anindilyakwa Air continued to provide this expanded service even after Air North services were restored to the island.
Air services today have been maintained by Qantas. However, significant demand for seats above and beyond that service remain, that were previously being satisfied by a Flight West contracted service to Ansett. Let me reassure honourable members that this government heard the concerns of the Gove business community and residents, and we worked hard to resolve this matter. As announced on 11 October 2001, Air North will commence regular services to Gove and Cairns as from 28 October 2001.
I want to clearly state the initiative to restore services to the communities of Groote Eylandt and Nhulunbuy were structured so that this government is definitely not starting an airline business. I would rather provide the private sector with the confidence to take on these services in their own right. This government is not about finding a quick fix at any cost, but rather, it pursued the option that provides the best outcomes for Territorians in terms of cost, flexibility, and surety of service. This is a government that is responsible and sensible in putting in place solutions for the long term and not just responding with knee-jerk reactions.
One other aviation issue that has come to the fore since the collapse of Ansett has been the rationalisation of services provided by Air North to smaller remote communities. Air North has taken a conscious and commercial decision to divest itself of aircraft and route operations requiring less than 19 seats. This has resulted in a number of intra-Territory routes being foregone by Air North. However, Air North has been negotiating with a number of smaller airline operators, in close consultation with the government, for the immediate uptake of operations with equivalent aircraft so that no loss of service or capacity has been inflicted on communities.
A typical example includes Murin Airways, that is taking over the Minjilang and Warrawi routes using nine-seat aircraft similar to Air North’s operation. At this stage it appears that Wimray will be carrying the mail and previously-booked Air North passengers to the Tiwi Islands. Air North will continue the 19-seat Darwin/Maningrida service and for the time being, will also continue the Galiwinku/Ramingining/Milingimbi services. However, honourable members should be under no misconception that, for the immediate to long term people, communities, all levels of government, everybody, need to support the air services where they live or the viability of the service will remain under threat.
I would like to make comment on the establishment of the federal government’s air passenger ticket levy, the $10 Ansett entitlement tax. Let it be perfectly clear that this government fully supports Ansett staff in their endeavours to receive their full entitlements. However, the imposition of this tax on regional services was demonstrably not clearly thought through by the Commonwealth in their rush to implement the levy. It was for this reason that the Territory government lobbied, and was successful in its actions, to have passengers travelling on aircraft with 16 seats or less, exempt from payment of the levy. This exemption will significantly reduce the impost on small operators in terms of the collection and administration costs of the levy.
Finally, some good news for a small number of Darwin-based Ansett staff. As honourable members might be aware, the Department of Defence has chartered from the Ansett administrator a Boeing 146 aircraft complete with flight and ground handling crew, to provide troop rotation movements between Darwin and Dili. It is understood that this charter contract directly engages a number of locally-based Ansett staff for 30 days. This is a long way short of full reinstatement of the 147 Ansett employees stood down in the Territory. I commend the Department of Defence for some small way of easing the pain. I support the minister’s statement.
Mr STIRLING (Tourism): Madam Speaker, we missed you for the short time you were out of the Chair. There seemed to be some making-up of standing orders on the run here, and we missed your wise judgment and counsel in such matters.
I would like to thank members for their comments in relation to this ministerial statement, and thank the member for Araluen for her comments in relation to the lifting of the cabotage requirements on international aircraft. That enabled, of course, Royal Brunei and Malaysia Airlines to pick up in Darwin on their way through - previously outlawed for many, many years. Our predecessors worked very hard on the federal government at different times to try to get those cabotage requirements lifted. Even given the exceptional circumstances that were faced with the collapse of Ansett, and the diminished capacity to move people through, it was still a big ask on the federal government, in terms of them getting around to actually deliver on it. Even then, they only gave it for a few weeks, which was further extended until at least 31 December. So, I do thank her for support in relation to that.
The opposition seems to have a concern with the Virgin Blue package, ie, supporting a millionaire, supporting a foreign-owned company. I will try to put in context. It occurred in the first week of having been sworn in as a minister in this government, so that makes it, sworn in on 27 August, whatever that Friday was, 1, 2 September - it was still 12 days before Ansett collapsed. Now, it was not designed to get under Ansett or particularly get at Ansett or Qantas, it was to bring and acknowledge a low-cost operator into the market, which we recognised would be welcome by Territorians, because that is there game. They are a low-cost operator without the overheads that the larger airlines carry to their cost and, in the case of Ansett, to their demise in total. We think Territorians will welcome a budget-priced operator, a no-frills airline, and we look forward to getting Virgin Blue in. So, in the sense that we were looking at Virgin Blue as low-cost to keep the majors up to the mark in fair play, in terms of discount seats, it certainly was not anyone’s intention - nor was it or course Virgin Blue’s intention - to put the skids under Ansett. The skids were under Ansett well and truly by others, other than Virgin Blue, well in advance of us attracting Virgin Blue here with the offer that we have got for them.
The second concern coming from the opposition was: ‘Why didn’t we do it to the Ansett Administrator?’ Well, the fact is we did, and I do not think you were listening to the statement. We went to the Ansett Administrator. We offered a similar sort of a deal to that which we had sown up with Virgin Blue and, that is, to sell down a given number of seats on a given flight, to commit to purchase; sell them down through our wholesaling arm in the Territory Tourist Commission, and hopefully sell them all down, so that you do not lose any of the money that you have put on the table. That was thrown out the door - kicked out the door by the Ansett Administrator. He did not want to know about it, and wanted 100% underwriting - 100% underwriting of the cost of the flight. Now, we are simply not in a position to do it. In fact, it was a similar sort of ask that was being asked of us in relation to Flight West proposal, $85 000 a flight. You are not going to stay alive long.
Ms Carney: $65 000.
Mr STIRLING: $63 000, $85 000, you are still not going to stay alive long, having to put on the table that sort of underwriting.
We went with our proposal that we can live with and we are confident of, with Virgin Blue. What we wanted of Ansett #2 and the Ansett Administrator was to get back into the Alice and on to Darwin, because it would have fixed up two problems: one, capacity into the Alice that desperately need; and two, the concerns we have with Ansett staff. I might say, after Monday, they are very dispirited. I was saddened by the attitude of the Ansett staff because they have been, in a sense, kicked around for five weeks, six weeks, when they received nothing from the company or the Administrator in terms of comfort. They have now got forms of packages that they have to go and get financial counselling, and see if this is a deal that they can live with. Twelve weeks maximum, I think, is the payout. Some of them should have been looking at 102 or 104 weeks. They do go back into the queue in terms of the final sort-out of creditors, not right at the bottom, but certainly not at the top, either, because they will have had a payout. For some people it is a very, very difficult position to be put in. As long as they do not put their hand up and take the package, they are still regarded as Ansett employees, and put at risk everything if they go and get another job. It is an enormously difficult situation that these staff find themselves in through absolutely no fault of their own.
I do want to go back to this Flight West matter, because the member for Araluen said in the House that the Queensland government has offered to indemnify Flight West. Well, it is simply not true according to the minister’s office that we rang today. She also claimed the federal government agreed to indemnify up to $380 000. Again, not true according to senior officials we contacted inside the federal Department of Transport. She says Nabalco has offered to support the airline. Well, at 2.54 pm today, Doug Grimmond, the Site Manager of Nabalco - he spoke to Don Miller in the last two days - says Nabalco will support any viable proposal to get people in and out but, ‘… we have insufficient information from Don Miller to determine whether it is viable’. Insufficient information to determine whether it is viable. I begin to wonder just how genuine any of these proposals are, given the lack of detail that seems to surround them. The Alice Springs Council, we are told - also by the member for Araluen - is supportive. Well let us go to the letter that I got from Fran Erlich, Mayor:
- Aldermen of the Alice Springs Town Council have been approached by Mr Don Miller to support the
Flight West proposal to link Alice Springs with Brisbane air passenger movements through the northern
loop. I understand the proposal is currently before your government for consideration. It has been proposed
by council at its Finance and Management Committee meeting, held 22 October, that council offer indemnity
insurance of $100 000 …
- … that council offer indemnity insurance of $100 000 to support the venture provided that the validity
of the proposal and federal and Queensland government financial assistance can be confirmed.
In relation to the validity of proposal, no detail. In relation to federal and Queensland governments, no money.
Ms Carney: Queensland is supporting him.
Mr STIRLING: In relation to Queensland government, no money.
- … I am making an assumption that your government has made an assessment of the proposal …
... you may now be in a position to provide me with advice regarding the above. I have, personally, only
received scant information on the proposal and would not be able to make an assessment on this alone.
Ms Carney: Everyone but you. You are the one making Territorians leave the Northern Territory because they’ve lost their jobs, mate.
Mr STIRLING: Table your information, your evidence that the Commonwealth government is going to put $380 000 in here. Table the information from Nabalco that they are going to dig in deep. Table your information, from whoever else you said was going to give in support of this, because it is simply not true. I remind the member that misleading this House is a very serious offence for which one gets sent before the Privileges Committee and has to explain oneself in a very serious matter.
The other point on this, which proposal are we talking about when she says: ‘Are you going to support this proposal?’? Clearly, Alice Springs has a proposal that ties them in. Yes, it does - the Alice Springs Town Council talking about $100 000 to link Alice Springs with Brisbane air passenger movements through the Northern loop. The liquidator’s letter to me, dated 19 October, does not mention Alice Springs. The liquidator in charge of this complete mess that Flight West is now in, in his letter to me, does not mention Alice Springs. We have any number of proposals floating about - these people will put money in if we go there; those people will put in if we go there. Simply not true.
As I said, if the shadow minister has information, if she has a letter from the Commonwealth government, if she has a letter from Nabalco, if she has a letter from the council, if she has a letter from the Queensland government saying: ‘Here’s the dough’, we will have a look at it. But she comes in and makes these spurious claims that we double check in my office. We go back to them and they do not know what she’s talking about. Well, simply, I do not either. I put her on notice that I will be very careful in giving too much credence or too much attention to any claims the shadow minister is going to make in this House, unless she stumps up front with the validation of those claims.
Motion agreed to; statement noted.
ADJOURNMENT
Mr STIRLING (Leader of Government Business): Madam Speaker, I move that the Assembly do now adjourn.
Dr TOYNE (Stuart): Madam Speaker, I would like to talk about a couple of electorate matters tonight. I will start with the Wattie Creek causeway. I think members will be aware of the affect that the Kalkarindji floods had on the Wattie Creek causeway earlier this year. The old causeway was completely demolished by the Wattie Creek as it came down in flood, leaving a totally impassable roadway across the creek.
As part of the flood rehabilitation works that have gone on in Kalkarindji/Dagaragu, a new causeway has been funded by our government to a higher level than was originally planned under the previous government. It contains 20 concrete culverts, all armoured at the upstream side of the causeway. It will be somewhat higher than the level of the old causeway. The engineering advice regarding that structure is that it should do the job of connecting Dagaragu securely to Kalkarindji, even in times of fairly heavy rainfall. I would imagine though, that if we get a 1-in-100-year flood there again, probably people will have to leave it to its own devices for the time that the water levels are really high.
The work is progressing very quickly. The contractors realise the urgency of getting the structure completed before the rains come. We are all hoping, at least in the Victoria River area, that we do not get the substantial rains at least for another month, to allow the causeway to be fully completed and commissioned for use. If we get to mid-November without heavy rain, we should have a brand new causeway commissioned and ready to go.
I also acknowledge the member for Katherine for organising the new power station there. I think credit where it is due. I have visited the almost complete power station, and I think that it is a big step for Kalkarindji/Daguragu. We have the power station up on high ground now, and with very good machinery there to provide power for both communities. In the other matters that came out of the flood, the store at Daguragu, which was a privately-run store, is now defunct. My understanding is that ATSIC has provided sufficient funds, something in the order of $750 000, to establish a community-owned store operating in Daguragu, in addition to the existing service station and store at Kalkarindji.
That will be a big step forward for those communities, because even with the best causeway in the world, there will be times when Daguragu will be cut off for periods. To have a store fully stocked on the other side of Wattie Creek is going to make that community far more secure, not to mention, cut out a lot of the tooing and froing between the two communities, which has been happening in recent times. I still have graphic memories of going across Wattie Creek in the police boats soon after the floods had occurred. To see people struggling to keep those two communities functional, with their vital connections cut by the creek, we did need to do something about that. I say to the member for Katherine, yes most of the things have been done. I have not forgotten about the flood relief payments, but we have the infrastructure in there, and I think the communities will be well off into the future.
I would also like to talk about Pigeon Hole. We are still progressing arrangements to establish a small community store at the old homestead area at Pigeon Hole. Pigeon Hole was one of the most stable and self-sufficient communities in the Northern Territory up to the floods hitting them. They survived the floods, got their housing back together, got all their possessions back together but, at that stage, the Victoria River Downs management decided to move the pastoral operation away from the side of the river. So, they lost the local store support there that was keeping them provisioned. They kept going for quite a while using the back road down to Kalkarindji and the other back road across to Yarralin, but it is an incredibly rough road and about a two-hour journey to get across to Yarralin. It is very difficult to keep the supplies up to the families when you are having to do that on a regular basis. They have been under a lot of pressure. They have stuck it out, to be honest. They are still there, and there are still half a dozen of the families making sure that the place is occupied and working. But I am sure if we get a store operation funded by ATSIC - and that is looking increasingly likely - we can restore Pigeon Hole back to its former splendor as a very good little community that does look after itself, and deserves the sort of support that we are trying to get to it.
The other matter I will talk on tonight is Simon Jabarnardi Fisher who is about to graduate from Northern Territory University with a masters degree. Simon conducted his masters study on the history of the Mt Doreen pastoral lease and the Warlpiri people, and their experiences since that pastoral lease became established. Some very powerful and sad stories came to light with the research that Simon did. It is a highly significant matter that a Warlpiri man has taken a post graduate degree at our own university here in the Territory. I would also like to pay tribute to Lisa Watts who was his co-student in the study. It is really a tribute to the NTU, a tribute to Simon himself, and I am very proud to see him graduate with that degree. His graduation occurred last week at one of the university’s regular graduation ceremonies.
We now have a fully-fledged post graduate in amongst the Warlpiri people at Yuendumu, joining a lot of other people from that community who have stuck at it with tertiary studies. I do not think that there would be any community in the Territory that has graduated from Batchelor College more teachers and health workers, child-care workers, and community administration graduates, than Yuendumu. They have a magnificent history in undertaking that type of study, and then showing the professional commitment when they returned to their community. So, good on you, the whole of the Yuendumu people, particularly Simon for his recent success. I look forward to seeing many a graduation ceremony in the future, where the effort continues there to produce these trained people.
Mr REED (Katherine): Madam Speaker, I want to raise an issue tonight that I hope will be of interest to the Minister for Primary Industry and Fisheries. It relates to the mango industry and particularly to Katherine. The honourable member would be aware that the mango growers in Katherine are experiencing a very good season. They have a reasonable crop and they are achieving pretty good market prices. It has been drawn to my attention that there are mangoes on sale in Katherine retail outlets that are Darwin-grown. The minister will probably be aware that there are quarantine arrangements in place, because of the mango seed weevil which exists in the Darwin region, but not in the Katherine region.
There are a number of growers in the Katherine area who are concerned that the product is being transported from Darwin to Katherine for sale and, of course, that there is a high probability that mango seed weevil could exist in that produce. It is not a matter of eliminating a competition in terms of Darwin mangoes being sold in Katherine, it is a matter of grower concern and protecting the industry.
From the point of view of propagators in Katherine who seek to bring material from Darwin to Katherine, be it seeds for propagation or other mango plant material, they are required to adhere very stringently to those quarantine arrangements, and quite rightly so. They are concerned, on the other hand, that product from Darwin is on the shelves in Katherine. It is something that I ask the minister to attend to, if he could, expeditiously. He would be aware – and I appreciate that he is acknowledging my comments across my Chamber - of the potential seriousness of this.
It is most unfortunate that mango seed weevil has found its way here into the Darwin area. It has been established here for a number of years and it is an encumbrance in terms of the restrictions that are in place for Darwin growers. It is not such a problem in terms of the product going interstate, because it is not going to areas where mangoes are grown. The transport of mango seed weevil, if it occurs, to places like Melbourne and what have you, does not bring about the risk that it does in transporting fruit into somewhere like Katherine where there are many tens of thousands of mango trees.
More and more people are making very large investments in terms of their mango plantations and, of course, those now, in many cases, are well established. In some cases, they also number trees in excess of 30 000 in individual plantations. We have seen the development of a very extensive mango industry in the Katherine region. Indeed, from comments that I hear in the industry, the Katherine production this year is much larger than the Darwin production. That in itself is a demonstration of just how important that particular crop is to the Katherine horticultural region, and its contribution in terms of the overall horticultural tree crop industry in the Northern Territory. I am sure that the minister would not want to see that jeopardised, and that he and his department would not want to see us experience an enlargement in the area that is affected by mango seed weevil. I take this opportunity tonight to draw it to his attention, on behalf of the mango growers in the Katherine region.
Whilst they are probably fewer in number, there are some people who are very well established in terms of propagation, in terms also of cross-breeding, if that’s the right term, in terms of developing new varieties of mangoes, so that in the future, perhaps, we have the opportunity with different textures, different tastes of mangoes, different flavours. Again, that might contribute in the future to further expansion of the mango industry, not only in Katherine, but also more so, right across the Northern Territory, to the benefit of the industry.
It is potentially a very serious issue. I think it is one that requires expedient action, urgency, indeed, in terms of investigating whether or not the reports are true, factual. If that is the case, it requires a prompt application of the quarantine regulations in the movement of mango fruit or any mango material from Darwin to Katherine, to ensure that the industry in the Katherine region is not put at risk. Also that we can be safeguarding the areas that are not infected by mango seed weevil but, if these quarantine regulations are not strictly applied, may be. I simply draw that to the attention of the minister and I look forward to a response quickly, in terms of being able to report back to those members of the industry who have brought it to my attention today.
Mr MILLS (Blain): Madam Speaker, I rise to speak about two matters that are directly related to the city of Palmerston, though general in their scope. Before doing so, I would like to reflect on words that I have spoken here before, that we do live in very interesting times. The debate today was, once again, a very, very interesting articulation of particular concepts. I trust that anyone who follows the debate that occurred would not respond solely on emotion, that the expression of sorrow and sadness was echoed right around this Chamber, and they would understand the almost complex concepts that were being argued, particularly from this side of the House.
There are adventures ahead, as I have mentioned before, and I really do believe that, though I am not quite sure what they all are. One comes in the nature of a black and white football team, the Palmerston Magpies. I listened this morning to the Minister of Sport and Recreation give reference to the importance of sport and recreation in its positive role in building community, and particularly, in the case of the Palmerston Magpies Football Club, in its ability to reach youngsters in our community and to direct them down positive pathways.
I have always believed, as one who has worked with communities in different ways, that powerful, defining agencies within a community - in this case, sport - are things that we really must understand how they are operating, the culture of the sporting codes and the part that they play in our communities. The Palmerston Magpies, I would have to say, are a very significant group in the culture of Palmerston. Inherent within that sporting community are the potentials for directing young people, in particular, down positive pathways. For that reason, fundamentally, is why I have such strong support for this group in our town. Not only that though, I must mention that it is not only youngsters. It does give a defining interest and focus to members of our community - and well rewarded, as all members would know - with winning the flag in the 2000-01 season.
I am a little concerned though, that the member for Arnhem is now the minister for the Power and Water Authority, as he is also closely associated with the Buffaloes. Palmerston Magpies played the Buffaloes at the grand final last year and the lights went out in the fourth quarter. I have already spoken to the honourable minister and asked that he do the right thing at that moment and not keep the lights out, if that were to happen again.
The Palmerston Magpies Football Club has an extensive history. I will not go into their history, but they were a club, generally, that was formed in north Darwin - they were called the North Darwin Magpies. They saw the opportunity to move to Palmerston, and it was a difficult time for them to find a place that they called home. They had some semblance of facility and some semblance of the potential in Palmerston, but they did not have a place they could really call home, because the grounds that they were using is the Archer Sports Complex which really has proved to be unsuitable. I need to say that quite clearly. I have argued that - and anyone in Palmerston who really thinks about it and has studied it, they know, sadly, that the Archer Sports Complex does not work.
The Palmerston Magpies have been encouraged, cajoled in many different forms, to find that their home, and it simply has not worked. Nor has it really worked for the Palmerston Raiders, as well. The reason being, first and foremost, is the sandflies. The sandflies are a significant problem in that area and they are something that just cannot go away, just with people having a greater resolve to call this their home. I can speak with great experience because the school that I was principal of was also in the same vicinity. The sandfly problem there was quite a significant problem, which dictated the times that we could have school fairs, and what time the school stayed open until, of an evening.
At the moment, the Magpies have relocated from there. They were in a position ready to move from Palmerston, and perhaps even tempted to come back to Darwin, for want of that very essential thing that a sporting club needs, and that is a home. I have done a fair amount of work to strengthen the link between the club and the town, the community, but what we need as a club and as a community, is a home ground facility. They need a place they can call home. It is a club that I have the utmost respect for, in the sense that there is no culture in the club of saying: ‘Oh, we want something and we want everything given to us because we deserve it’. They are a working club and they will work very hard to add value to whatever is granted to them. Their aspirations have been raised substantially by promises that were made in the last election to the tune of $2m, to go towards the Palmerston Magpies. Anyone astute enough can see that the Palmerston Magpies were a significant group, and a group that was offered this promise by this ALP candidate - and I understand, it would be endorsed by the Labor team. The club has registered that as a promise, and it is a promise that I will do my utmost to ensure is honoured.
I will also, to be fair, reiterate the sense that it is not a situation where a club is going to be putting its hand out and hoping for complete delivery from the hands of government. The government must play its part, and I ask the government to find a home ground facility for Palmerston - a place they can call home - ground, land. I encourage the minister to have meetings with the club officials. The club officials can direct the minister to pieces of land that have been under consideration. Negotiations commenced with the former government, but they must continue. The club has substantial membership. Their expectations are very high at the moment that something must be done. They are not a group to be played with, and I would have to say, that unless there is prompt response, there will be a challenge presented to the minister and to the present government. We are talking about a group of very focused sporting folk, who happen to wear the colours black and white, and they are very single-minded in their focus. That, as an issue, which will not go away, in fact, it will increase.
Turning to another issue, the Cancer Council. Through my electorate office, we have provided support to the Cancer Council with the Australia’s Biggest Morning Tea, and organised community members to come together and to raise funds in a social context in the Palmerston Shopping Centre - Palm City Oasis, I should say. I understand that $74 000 is raised through Australia’s Biggest Morning Tea. I had the privilege recently of being involved, to some degree, in the Relay for Life. This was an event that was spoken of amongst enthusiastic people, and people who are aware of the incidence of cancer in our community, and it was a concept that has run successfully in other jurisdictions, but it was new to the Northern Territory. There it is immense credit to the organisers that they persisted with their dream and made it become reality. I went along to Marrara to see whether this Relay for Life - which involved community groups walking around the Arafura Stadium and clocking up laps and receiving sponsorship - to see whether it actually would work. It was an immense relief, and a great credit to the organisers, that it worked a treat.
I will just give an outline of the situation that was presented at Arafura Stadium a little while ago. The event itself attracted 40 teams and 550 participants. In fact, I do not think I have seen as many people at the Arafura complex, at the athletics track there. $49 700 has been raised to date, a tremendous outcome and way above the expectations of the organising committee - way above. It was just a wonderful event to see people out there. Now the concept has been translated and been taken up by 40 different groups, and the echo around the groups that were there was: ‘We certainly want to be involved next time’. It can only grow from there.
Local businesses such as Channel 8, Top End Sound, Optus, Jag Pty Ltd, the Carlton Hotel, and many more, willingly supported the event, provided in-kind support and sponsorship, and helped to minimise the cost of staging this great event. Over 100 local entertainers, dancers, singers, and musicians donated their talents - and there were even masseurs on hand to massage feet and those who had sore muscles. They received a donation to keep the runners and the walkers injury-free for a 24-hour period. Other community organisations such as the Salvation Army, Nightcliff Rotary, the Surf Club, Little Nippers, the Guides, NT Surf and Rescue, St John Ambulance, were also on hand to make sure there was food, fun and security for all the participants and spectators.
The Relay for Life organising committee came together in July and took the job with gusto and enthusiasm. Now having experienced the event, other people have come forward offering to be a part of the 2002 committee, which indicated how people have taken the relay and its potential to become the Cancer Council’s premier fundraising event. Just to report on the Cancer Council - their fundraising for the year - it has been a bumper year for them in terms of fundraising. They raised $79 000 as I mentioned, in Australia’s Biggest Morning Tea, the work of volunteers right across the Top End; Daffodil Day, $92 000 from once again, on a structure of volunteerism and people being able to contribute to such a valuable cause; and now Relay for Life which raised nearly $50 000. There is a whole range of little activities that happen around the place – there is nothing more thrilling than to see volunteers working together to address something that affects everybody.
One of the issues that I think was most telling in the Relay for Life was there was a remembrance component where they had a silent moment for anyone to gather and light a candle for somebody who has left us, through cancer. A lot of people were gathering around - there was champagne, and people resting and waiting for their turn to walk around the track. People for a moment just thought: ‘Do I know anybody who has had cancer?’ You would only have to stop for a moment and you would start to recognise people in your own family, one after the other, who have left due to cancer. It really was quite an emotional time. It is an amazing event, and I would encourage anybody, when it comes up in its preparations for next year, to be involved in it. It is a great way of focusing people’s emotional response to cancer, and to do something positive and to raise funds for this great organisation.
Before finishing, I must say that Margaret-Anne Hummerston and the committee wish me to bring to the attention of the House, that the immense organisation that goes on with volunteers to raise funds to support this great project is supported by the Northern Territory government. They do make it clear that they wish this to be addressed, however, because the funding has been $130 000 and it has been unchanged for 6 years. I think on the strength of the community support for the current event - the Relay for Life and the potential that that has, and for their great year in terms of fundraising with volunteers all across the countryside - I think it is something that really should be addressed in terms of reviewing their funding with a very appropriate response for the sort of work that this group does.
There is a local connection in the Cancer Council fundraising - I wish to draw attention to the Palmerston City Council. As I mentioned before, there were 40 different terms, and one of those teams was made up of the Palmerston City Council. There were 31 team members. The captain was Alderman Robert MacLeod, who is a stalwart on the council, a great person to be involved in community activities. The team was made up of the CEO, directors, staff, elected members and partners. The Palmerston City Council raised, in fact, $3146 – I have the exact figures here. They won the certificate for the best fancy dress. A group of them wore Wee Willie Winkie nightshirts and caps and went around the track. There was a couple of them who dressed in federation costumes to get in the spirit of things. They also won the certificate for the most laps walked - 444 laps. The event was actually opened by the acting Mayors of both Darwin and Palmerston. I notice that the Darwin City Council did not have a team in, but I will bet you they will have one there in 2002.
Dr LIM (Greatorex): Madam Speaker, I rise tonight to join my comments with the member for Araluen in regards to the Cawood Court development. I was the Minister for Housing when decisions were made by the Northern Territory government to demolish the Cawood Court complex. Now, as the shadow minister for housing, having heard what the minister said in the last couple of days about Cawood Court, I feel it warrants some comment.
The decision that was arrived at to demolish Cawood Court, came about after many, many months of consultation. The member for Araluen, who was then the candidate, had canvassed the area extensively, spoken to the neighbourhood, found out about the antisocial behaviour that has been occurring in that area for many years. By the time it came to making a decision, there were only very few families left at Cawood Court, so the decision was then made to start relocating the families to other more appropriate accommodation. Once Cawood Court was completely evacuated, the intention was then to demolish the whole complex. Remember that in the Cawood Court region, within 100 m of that, there were three other high-density blocks, namely Mokari, Liana and Palmyra Courts. That was the reason why we had such a high element of antisocial behaviour.
We were approached by developers to see whether we were keen to sell the whole complex, with the intention that the complex would be converted into developments very much like Sunset Court and South Terrace. At that time, we recognised that there was already a saturation of units in Alice Springs. The real estate industry was having difficulties moving the units or selling the units, and so an increase of units in Alice Springs was not going to help alleviate any of the accommodation issues that are there in town. Furthermore, demolishing Cawood Court released some 12 000 m2 of land which could be very easily subdivided into R1 residential blocks, particularly along Nicker Crescent and Ashwin Street. It would help, again, fill the scarcity of residential blocks in Alice Springs.
We thought that we would also reserve a central portion of Cawood Court land to develop as a seniors village, very much like those that have been developed up here in Darwin. This was something that was very much wanted and needed by the senior Territorians living in Alice Springs. Once the seniors village was developed, many of our senior Territorians living in three- and four-bedroom homes would be offered accommodation there, thus freeing up the three- and four-bedroom homes which would then become available for families who are on the waiting list to get into those homes.
All in all, it was a well considered plan. The park next to Cawood Court - I think it is called Ashwin Park - was considered by the town council as one of the parks that it will close down and sell for development. Combining the two blocks together, you will have something like 18 000m2 of land that will be freehold, well-serviced and be available for development in a way that will be very good for the amenity of the area, and thus help with the building industry, housing for first home buyers, housing for people who want private residential blocks, housing for our senior Territorians, and including freeing-up three- and four-bedroom homes for people who qualify for public housing.
It is important that this government, this new minister, listens to what is needed in Alice Springs. There is a huge outcry in Alice Springs at the moment. If the Minister for Housing and Lands, Planning and Environment is not aware, then I suggest that he consults with his Minister for Central Australia. Minister for Central Australia, I suggest, you go home and talk to people in Alice Springs. It is important that you listen to people in Alice Springs, they need the land, they want the complex demolished. I believe it is important that you at least reconsider the proposal to sell it as a private development. It is not going to help Alice Springs at all in any way.
I also asked the Minister for Lands, Planning and Environment, I think two days ago, about what he proposes to do with Owen Springs. While he answered the question that he quoted prices from the Auditor-General, he never got to answering what he plans to do with the property of Owen Springs. Owen Springs was bought by the Northern Territory government under the CLP to preserve land for the future development of Alice Springs, to reserve land to allow tourism, preserving land for the Western Macdonnell development. It is important that Alice Springs is not land locked, and Owen Springs allows that expansion of Alice Springs unhindered. It is important that that goes ahead. I think it is important that the minister advises the House as to what he plans to do with it. My question, specifically, to him was about what he plans to do with the land and not about the price, although I did say about his quoting the price. He was claiming that we paid too much for the land when we, the CLP, was in government.
In the few minutes that I have left, I would like to raise a point that was raised in the Chamber a couple of days ago. The member for Braitling accused me, when she said that, when I tabled a petition relating to the Salvation Army, and I quote here:
- … when he tabled a petition relating to the Salvation Army Hostel for homeless men, but before he did he
read through those names on that petition, and some of those people were rung up and abused for signing it.
I do not propose to do very much about it except to draw her attention to the copy of Hansard dated 31 May 2001 where, indeed, I did present a petition from 48 petitioners. Nothing in the Hansard records that I read out the names at all. The member for Braitling might like to do something about that. I think there is some error there, and I will just table this for easy reference. It is in the Hansard already. I do not need to get it incorporated in Hansard again.
Motion agreed to; the Assembly adjourned.
Last updated: 04 Aug 2016