Inconvenient Truth in Aboriginal Affairs

 

Photo credit: SkyNews

Because she's worried about intelligent Australians seeing through the intent of the so-called Voice to Parliament, Ms Langton claims there is no evidence that previous advisory bodies have failed.

I worked with such a body for 15 years; the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Commission (ATSIC) and its successor the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Services department (the latter lasted 12 months while ATSIC was abandoned).

On this one, rare occasion, I agree with Ms Langton. I don't believe ATSIC/ATSIS failed, however, I don't run the country and the people who funded ATSIC were convinced it was a failure. So much so, they shut it down.

ATSIC did a lot of good in a very challenging, politically unpopular, and highly visible portfolio. It built houses, airfields, sheds and other installations to enable business, provided a community employment program, and was engaged in a very wide range of programs all intended to improve the lives of indigenous Australians. Some improvement occurred.

True, there was a lot of waste. Houses it built were destroyed weeks after being finished; money was used for purposes that were not approved. A rich harvest of community managers managed to feed at the money trough. However, it could hardly have been called a failure.

If it did fail, it was because of the clients who didn't make the best use of the programs available. ATSIC funded businesses that eventually stalled because clients couldn't get themselves to work. Literacy and numeracy problems didn't help when it come to management, organisational and accounting issues.

ATSIC was the only opportunity indigenous people had through their Regional Council/Regional Planning process to provide bottom-up advice to governments on what was needed at grassroots level. To that extent, it certainly wasn't a failure.

Maybe the problem was that the organisation expected generations of challenges to be changed within a few years. An impossible task for any government.

Sadly, Ms Langton is pushing the Voice and doesn't want to associate past failure with the very high probability that any Voice will fail. It will.

The Voice will divide Australia, disrupt our community stability, degrade our government performance and will only benefit a handful of mostly wealthy, white Aborigines who will make a fortune and achieve nothing of any value to the many remote and regional Aboriginal Australians who need help.

I won't vote for a change to our Constitution and I explain why here:

#Robinoz

PS: ATSIC's budget for most years was about one billion dollars. We fund the Left-wing, biased, ABC for more than that and look what we get.

Are you part of the voiceless?

 "This voiceless group makes up nearly one-third of the people of Australia. Perhaps they educate their children in religious schools. Maybe they are unjabbed and remain Covid dissidents. I am guessing they value freedom and patriotism. Resent Woke corporatism. Feel that customer service no longer exists. Are ashamed of what is happening to our culture. Cheer on battlers and champion small businesses. Maybe unfurl an Aussie flag on Australia Day. Fear the coming digital surveillance state. Mourn what we have lost."

https://wentworthreport.com/2022/07/09/australias-true-voiceless/

I've had four COVID 19 innoculations, but align well with the author's other suggestions. 

I served my country in the Air Force (RAAF) during the Vietnam Era and worked for the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Commission (ATSIC) for 15 years before it was abolished.

ATSIC was the primary body that provided indigenous Australians with a bottom-up voice to the Australian Public Service agencies providing it with a cornucopia of generous benefits not available to any other of the 97% of Australians.

ATSIC built hundreds of houses, created work programs through its Community Development and Employment Program (CDEP). It provided a variety of infrastructure and other benefits and even provided ultra-low interest mortgages for anyone who met their guidelines. (indigenous and able to repay).

ATSIC had Regional Councils of elected representatives across Australia who, at considerable expense to the taxpaying public created Regional Plans that were to direct funding to projects that communities prioritised.

In the end, like many other well-intentioned government programs, ATSIC failed.

Now there are other agencies, do-gooders and funded bodies intended to serve the interests of the 3.5% of people who are indigenous or of indigenous descent.

We have 10 current part-indigenous representatives in our Parliament who can speak for the others. We don't need to mess with our Constitution to provide a voice for indigenous Australians.

The Australian electorate will never fall for guaranteeing places for indigenous people in Parliament who are appointed on race and not ability and popular appeal.

It will never happen.

#Robinoz 

PS: Race-based programs run by Australian Governments should be abolished and replaced with programs that provide help to all Australians based on genuine need