A system starved of funds
Tom Calma; 23/5/08; Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Social Justice Commissioner.
There is an urgent need to reform the native title system. The federal Government’s long overdue call to review the native title system and ensure it provides real benefits for indigenous Australians is welcome. The system is in gridlock. It isn’t delivering what was initially intended. It is too complex and takes too long. Our elders are dying before claims are finalised. There are too many parties involved and it is too adversarial. It costs us all too much financially and emotionally. Jenny Macklin’s proposal to pursue a more holistic approach to native title is encouraging: where native title is incorporated into the broader policy framework, in particular, ensuring that the economic development potential of native title is unlocked. Land is critical to economic development.
See: http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,,23743271-7583,00.html
An economic vision
Editorial; 23/5/08
Despite her background in Labor’s Left, Indigenous Affairs Minister Jenny Macklin is approaching her portfolio with pragmatism and common sense. This is evident in the federal Government’s push to help indigenous Australians harness the economic benefits of native title, especially mining royalties, to help close the gap between themselves and other Australians. Fifteen years after the historic passage of land rights legislation, a review is overdue. As the minister said in her Eddie Mabo lecture in Townsville on Wednesday, it is no longer tenable for remote, indigenous Australians “to continue to live in overcrowded housing in dysfunctional, despairing communities while substantial funds, nominally allocated for their benefit, are either locked up in trusts or distributed as irregular windfalls to be frittered away with no long-term good”.
See: http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,25197,23743263-16382,00.html
Tags: Aboriginal, Australia, health, Land, Welfare