❓ Question on Indigenous Affairs reports, focusing on the Premier's initial reluctance to release them and his stance on Lieutenant General Sanderson's recommendations, particularly regarding regional government. The exchange reveals tension and differing perspectives on Indigenous representation and governance.
AnsweredQoN 718Legislative Assembly
QuestionView source ↗
INDIGENOUS AFFAIRS - REPORTS
718. Dr K.D. HAMES to the Premier:
I refer to the reports on Indigenous affairs tabled in
Parliament yesterday despite the Premier's previous determination to
withhold them.
(1) Given that
Lieutenant General Sanderson supports the release of the reports and has stated
that the recommendations and findings are crucial to public debate, why does
the Premier maintain that there is no public interest in their release?
(2) Why has
the Premier rejected Lieutenant General Sanderson's recommendation to
set up a form of regional government?
(3) Why is the
Premier paying the widely respected Lieutenant General Sanderson $200 000 a
year only to ignore his advice?
718. Dr K.D. HAMES to the Premier:
I refer to the reports on Indigenous affairs tabled in
Parliament yesterday despite the Premier's previous determination to
withhold them.
(1) Given that
Lieutenant General Sanderson supports the release of the reports and has stated
that the recommendations and findings are crucial to public debate, why does
the Premier maintain that there is no public interest in their release?
(2) Why has
the Premier rejected Lieutenant General Sanderson's recommendation to
set up a form of regional government?
(3) Why is the
Premier paying the widely respected Lieutenant General Sanderson $200 000 a
year only to ignore his advice?
AnswerView source ↗
(1)-(3) We have released the reports.
Dr K.D. Hames : Yes, finally - kicking and screaming.
Mr A.J. CARPENTER : Has anybody seen me kick and scream?
Dr K.D. Hames : He supported their release and yet you tried
to block it.
Mr A.J. CARPENTER : Please! The problem for the member for Dawesville is that he carries his guilty
conscience around like a great load.
We released the reports. The quarterly reports were provided to us as part of our government
deliberations. That is what they were
intended for. The coroner, as I recall,
asked to be provided with a copy of the reports and of the Dawn Casey report
into the functioning of the Department of Indigenous Affairs, which is a
cabinet document. Under normal
circumstances, such reports would not be released. However, in light of the fact that the
coroner had requested that they be provided to him, we thought it reasonable to
make them available. Does the member for Dawesville have a problem with
that?
Dr K.D. Hames : No; however, you were dragged kicking and
screaming.
Mr A.J. CARPENTER : Who is kicking and screaming? The reports have been made available.
Dr K.D. Hames : And yet you have immediately rejected his
advice.
Mr A.J. CARPENTER : Does the member
for Dawesville accept the recommendation that we should establish a form
of regional government?
Dr K.D. Hames : I have so much respect for Lieutenant General
Sanderson that I would look seriously at any proposal he makes.
Mr A.J. CARPENTER : So would I. In relation to the third part of the question -
Mr P.D. Omodei : What are you going to do? Just answer the second part about the
regional government.
The
SPEAKER : Leader of the
Opposition, I call you to order for the second time.
Mr A.J. CARPENTER : That interjection was interesting.
Dr
K.D. Hames : Why?
Mr
A.J. CARPENTER : The Leader of the
Opposition knows why that was interesting. Lieutenant General Sanderson recommended a drastically reshaped form of
government in Western Australia. He
recommended regional governments with a regional representative structure for
Aboriginal people not dissimilar - it is not exactly the same - to the one that
existed under the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Commission. As I recall, ATSIC was dismantled by the
Howard government in 2004. I have always
believed that ATSIC performed a pretty good function in Western Australia.
Mr
P.D. Omodei : Why did the Labor Party
agree with it?
Mr
A.J. CARPENTER : The issues with
ATSIC, which I thought were problematic, were not so much about its performance
in Western Australia but about the personalities and the issues attached to the
national leadership. There was always
criticism -
Dr
K.D. Hames interjected.
The SPEAKER : Order, member for Dawesville!
Mr
A.J. CARPENTER : There was always
criticism from Aboriginal communities that ATSIC was in fact not representative
and that the ATSIC regional councils did not represent the voice of Aboriginal
people. We have always had to juggle
those dynamics. Anybody who knows anything
about Indigenous affairs in Western Australia - I do not include the member for Dawesville in that group - understands that
there is a constant issue about whose voice is the most representative. We are dealing with a completely different
culture and completely different community expectations about the type of
interaction and who should or should not be negotiated with. A simple election process does not resolve
that issue in Aboriginal communities. The member for Dawesville never got his head around that. Many people who delve into issues of
aboriginality with naive but good expectations find themselves frustrated
because all their preconditioning and predetermined views of the world do not
fit. The issues are so much more complex
in Indigenous communities than we would like them to be. Unfortunately, simply running an election
process and saying that the winner is the representative voice of that
Aboriginal community is not the way or the model that is broadly accepted by
Aboriginal people. It would be so much
easier if it were. Instead, we need a
much more grassroots, sophisticated and multifaceted approach to all these
issues.
The issues of aboriginality in
Western Australia remind me of the Greek myth in which Sisyphus is
forever pushing a great rock up the hill. There is no end to his effort. The moment Sisyphus stops, the rock will roll back down the hill. There is no end to the effort that is
required. There is no magic
solution. There is no bureaucratic
structure that will deliver a magic solution or a silver bullet to the issues
in Indigenous communities in Western Australia. I have discussed this with Lieutenant General Sanderson. What I would like - what I wanted and what I
still want - is for him to use his undoubted integrity and his undoubted
capacity to open corporate doors and to make people listen so that they can
identify local solutions that will engage Indigenous people in the real
economy. I want him to do that in a way
that politicians such as myself cannot do because every action that we take
becomes the subject of political attack - even when those making the attack
know that we are doing the right thing. I wanted John Sanderson to rise above the political ruck and engage, through
the force of his personality, his knowledge and his undoubted status, the
private sector - corporate Australia both big and small - in his effort to
improve economic outcomes for Indigenous people. I still have that hope. From day one, I pointed out to him that this
task is not about redesigning the bureaucracy - it is a much different task
from that.
Dr
K.D. Hames : You pointed that out
from day one, yet subsequent to that he made his recommendation.
Mr
A.J. CARPENTER : I pointed it out in
all our discussions from day one and that is why I believe and hope and
sincerely trust that he is now engaged with me in this attempt to ensure good,
constructive outcomes from the Indigenous employment forum that we will conduct
in Perth next week. The objective of
that forum is not political. It is not a
forum for politicians. It is not a forum
for people to get up and make political statements. We are trying to design a forum to bring
together employers who already have some real prospect or capacity to deliver
economic benefits to Aboriginal communities - be they big, small, remote,
rural, regional or metropolitan communities - and perhaps make some progress in
improving the life circumstances of Aboriginal people. If we do not do that, we will spend the rest
of our lives pushing the rock up the hill, and, in politics, the moment we
stop, the rock will roll back down the hill again. However, we cannot do this on our own with
much effect. We need the private sector,
the corporate sector, all tiers of government and, critically, Aboriginal
people themselves to step forward and embrace a sense of responsibility for
economic improvement. What frustrates me
is that so often this debate descends into the blame game. Who is to blame?
Several members interjected.
Mr A.J. CARPENTER : It descends into the blame game and it
frustrates me that this is the case. Every time there is an issue or a circumstance - there are thousands of
such issues in Aboriginal communities all over this state - people point the
finger and say that the government must fix it. At one stage, the member
for Merredin brought into the Parliament a photograph of extremely poor
Aboriginal housing conditions. I ask him
now: does he know how old was the house in that photograph?
Mr B.J. Grylls : It was probably about 50 years old.
Mr A.J. CARPENTER : It was not. I think that the member for Merredin will
find that most of the houses depicted were recently constructed. The issue is not in the want of effort for
the provision of -
Mr B.J. Grylls : I was up there on the weekend and there were
plenty of 50-year-old houses in the region.
Mr A.J. CARPENTER : There are plenty of 50-year-old houses in
suburbia.
Mr B.J. Grylls : That would be right.
Mr A.J. CARPENTER : I live in one. The issue is not the want of effort, although
the coroner seems to have focused on a belief that there has been no
effort. Of course efforts have been
made. The opposition made the effort; it
said so. There has been a massive effort
to provide housing to Aboriginal communities. There is a deeper problem, and until members opposite get their heads
around the fact that the problem we must grapple with is a much deeper and more
sophisticated one, we will spend the rest of our time arguing about why the
bureaucracy is not delivering proper solutions and so on. Those are the types of issues that I wanted
Lieutenant General Sanderson, with all his experience, to address. They are still the issues.
Mr P.D. Omodei : Why don't you just answer the
question and sit down instead of going on like a parsimonious peanut?
Mr E.S. Ripper : That says it all about your leadership.
Dr K.D. HAMES : I have a supplementary question.
The SPEAKER : There will be no more supplementary questions
because we have been going for more than three-quarters of an hour.
Dr K.D. Hames : Yes, finally - kicking and screaming.
Mr A.J. CARPENTER : Has anybody seen me kick and scream?
Dr K.D. Hames : He supported their release and yet you tried
to block it.
Mr A.J. CARPENTER : Please! The problem for the member for Dawesville is that he carries his guilty
conscience around like a great load.
We released the reports. The quarterly reports were provided to us as part of our government
deliberations. That is what they were
intended for. The coroner, as I recall,
asked to be provided with a copy of the reports and of the Dawn Casey report
into the functioning of the Department of Indigenous Affairs, which is a
cabinet document. Under normal
circumstances, such reports would not be released. However, in light of the fact that the
coroner had requested that they be provided to him, we thought it reasonable to
make them available. Does the member for Dawesville have a problem with
that?
Dr K.D. Hames : No; however, you were dragged kicking and
screaming.
Mr A.J. CARPENTER : Who is kicking and screaming? The reports have been made available.
Dr K.D. Hames : And yet you have immediately rejected his
advice.
Mr A.J. CARPENTER : Does the member
for Dawesville accept the recommendation that we should establish a form
of regional government?
Dr K.D. Hames : I have so much respect for Lieutenant General
Sanderson that I would look seriously at any proposal he makes.
Mr A.J. CARPENTER : So would I. In relation to the third part of the question -
Mr P.D. Omodei : What are you going to do? Just answer the second part about the
regional government.
The
SPEAKER : Leader of the
Opposition, I call you to order for the second time.
Mr A.J. CARPENTER : That interjection was interesting.
Dr
K.D. Hames : Why?
Mr
A.J. CARPENTER : The Leader of the
Opposition knows why that was interesting. Lieutenant General Sanderson recommended a drastically reshaped form of
government in Western Australia. He
recommended regional governments with a regional representative structure for
Aboriginal people not dissimilar - it is not exactly the same - to the one that
existed under the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Commission. As I recall, ATSIC was dismantled by the
Howard government in 2004. I have always
believed that ATSIC performed a pretty good function in Western Australia.
Mr
P.D. Omodei : Why did the Labor Party
agree with it?
Mr
A.J. CARPENTER : The issues with
ATSIC, which I thought were problematic, were not so much about its performance
in Western Australia but about the personalities and the issues attached to the
national leadership. There was always
criticism -
Dr
K.D. Hames interjected.
The SPEAKER : Order, member for Dawesville!
Mr
A.J. CARPENTER : There was always
criticism from Aboriginal communities that ATSIC was in fact not representative
and that the ATSIC regional councils did not represent the voice of Aboriginal
people. We have always had to juggle
those dynamics. Anybody who knows anything
about Indigenous affairs in Western Australia - I do not include the member for Dawesville in that group - understands that
there is a constant issue about whose voice is the most representative. We are dealing with a completely different
culture and completely different community expectations about the type of
interaction and who should or should not be negotiated with. A simple election process does not resolve
that issue in Aboriginal communities. The member for Dawesville never got his head around that. Many people who delve into issues of
aboriginality with naive but good expectations find themselves frustrated
because all their preconditioning and predetermined views of the world do not
fit. The issues are so much more complex
in Indigenous communities than we would like them to be. Unfortunately, simply running an election
process and saying that the winner is the representative voice of that
Aboriginal community is not the way or the model that is broadly accepted by
Aboriginal people. It would be so much
easier if it were. Instead, we need a
much more grassroots, sophisticated and multifaceted approach to all these
issues.
The issues of aboriginality in
Western Australia remind me of the Greek myth in which Sisyphus is
forever pushing a great rock up the hill. There is no end to his effort. The moment Sisyphus stops, the rock will roll back down the hill. There is no end to the effort that is
required. There is no magic
solution. There is no bureaucratic
structure that will deliver a magic solution or a silver bullet to the issues
in Indigenous communities in Western Australia. I have discussed this with Lieutenant General Sanderson. What I would like - what I wanted and what I
still want - is for him to use his undoubted integrity and his undoubted
capacity to open corporate doors and to make people listen so that they can
identify local solutions that will engage Indigenous people in the real
economy. I want him to do that in a way
that politicians such as myself cannot do because every action that we take
becomes the subject of political attack - even when those making the attack
know that we are doing the right thing. I wanted John Sanderson to rise above the political ruck and engage, through
the force of his personality, his knowledge and his undoubted status, the
private sector - corporate Australia both big and small - in his effort to
improve economic outcomes for Indigenous people. I still have that hope. From day one, I pointed out to him that this
task is not about redesigning the bureaucracy - it is a much different task
from that.
Dr
K.D. Hames : You pointed that out
from day one, yet subsequent to that he made his recommendation.
Mr
A.J. CARPENTER : I pointed it out in
all our discussions from day one and that is why I believe and hope and
sincerely trust that he is now engaged with me in this attempt to ensure good,
constructive outcomes from the Indigenous employment forum that we will conduct
in Perth next week. The objective of
that forum is not political. It is not a
forum for politicians. It is not a forum
for people to get up and make political statements. We are trying to design a forum to bring
together employers who already have some real prospect or capacity to deliver
economic benefits to Aboriginal communities - be they big, small, remote,
rural, regional or metropolitan communities - and perhaps make some progress in
improving the life circumstances of Aboriginal people. If we do not do that, we will spend the rest
of our lives pushing the rock up the hill, and, in politics, the moment we
stop, the rock will roll back down the hill again. However, we cannot do this on our own with
much effect. We need the private sector,
the corporate sector, all tiers of government and, critically, Aboriginal
people themselves to step forward and embrace a sense of responsibility for
economic improvement. What frustrates me
is that so often this debate descends into the blame game. Who is to blame?
Several members interjected.
Mr A.J. CARPENTER : It descends into the blame game and it
frustrates me that this is the case. Every time there is an issue or a circumstance - there are thousands of
such issues in Aboriginal communities all over this state - people point the
finger and say that the government must fix it. At one stage, the member
for Merredin brought into the Parliament a photograph of extremely poor
Aboriginal housing conditions. I ask him
now: does he know how old was the house in that photograph?
Mr B.J. Grylls : It was probably about 50 years old.
Mr A.J. CARPENTER : It was not. I think that the member for Merredin will
find that most of the houses depicted were recently constructed. The issue is not in the want of effort for
the provision of -
Mr B.J. Grylls : I was up there on the weekend and there were
plenty of 50-year-old houses in the region.
Mr A.J. CARPENTER : There are plenty of 50-year-old houses in
suburbia.
Mr B.J. Grylls : That would be right.
Mr A.J. CARPENTER : I live in one. The issue is not the want of effort, although
the coroner seems to have focused on a belief that there has been no
effort. Of course efforts have been
made. The opposition made the effort; it
said so. There has been a massive effort
to provide housing to Aboriginal communities. There is a deeper problem, and until members opposite get their heads
around the fact that the problem we must grapple with is a much deeper and more
sophisticated one, we will spend the rest of our time arguing about why the
bureaucracy is not delivering proper solutions and so on. Those are the types of issues that I wanted
Lieutenant General Sanderson, with all his experience, to address. They are still the issues.
Mr P.D. Omodei : Why don't you just answer the
question and sit down instead of going on like a parsimonious peanut?
Mr E.S. Ripper : That says it all about your leadership.
Dr K.D. HAMES : I have a supplementary question.
The SPEAKER : There will be no more supplementary questions
because we have been going for more than three-quarters of an hour.
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