NATIONAL RECONCILIATION
WEEK
378. Ms J.M. FREEMAN to the Minister for Aboriginal Affairs:
I refer to National Reconciliation
Week, which gets underway today. Can the minister advise the house on the work
being undertaken by the McGowan government to improve outcomes for Aboriginal
people, including the role that the Aboriginal Advisory Council of Western Australia
is playing in delivering key policies that support the community?
Mr B.S.
WYATT replied:
I thank the member for Mirrabooka
for the question, bearing in mind, as the member said, that today is the
commencement of Reconciliation Week, yesterday, of course, being National Sorry
Day. The question is timely, because although I have spent my entire life in
and around Aboriginal affairs, I must admit that when the then Leader of the
Opposition, the member for Rockingham, asked me to take on the portfolio area
back in 2012, I did it with some anxiety, not just because having Aboriginal
relatives from one end of the state to the other means that there are certain
expectation-management issues, but also because those who knew my father knew
that there was a reputational issue breathing down my neck, with a father who
had spent a lifetime in Aboriginal affairs. Suffice to say although it was an area that I loved and was keenly involved in,
I brought some anxiety to it. It is an area that I thoroughly enjoy, and
I think as a government we have and continue to make great impacts on the way
people live their lives.
In my first budget, and one of the
first policy areas the government took to the election, was the funding of the
Aboriginal ranger program, and that has had some great success. So successful
has this program been that the commonwealth government is now a very
significant funder of Aboriginal rangers across Australia, and it has a partnership
with the state government in Western Australia. Similarly, we have always
understood that we need to ensure that Aboriginal people are given the
opportunity to participate in the wealth of this state, and that is why we have
developed the Aboriginal procurement policy, which I think it is fair to say
all members support. Certainly, during the
debate on the Procurement Bill last week, it seemed that the policy has
support, because it has been successful. I think the targets are
achievable. They are public, and as a result agencies are required to explain
to their ministers and the government when they do not meet those targets, and
that has been significant in its success, with lots more Aboriginal businesses
being developed and managing to participate in the vast government contract
procurement model.
Secondly, there is native title. In
my lifetime, native title has fundamentally changed from being the fractious debate post Mabo and the Native Title Act 1993—the
mining sector in particular, but not just the mining sector, was
incredibly hostile to the idea that Aboriginal people might have rights and
interests in land—to the scenario now by which through the deliberate
policy approach of the government of agreement-making over the last three years
we have resolved 47 native title claims, 41 of which were by consent. We
deliberately took the litigation framework out
of native title. I think that changes the whole approach to native title,
particularly as we think about reconciliation. I do not think any
reasonable Western Australian has any hostility or objection anymore to the
idea of native title and the fact that Aboriginal people should be consulted
and have a right to wealth created on their land.
Similarly, if I can just make some
comments about the heritage process. There was some very prominent media today
about this. This is a piece of legislation from 1972. It is old and it is no
longer useful or fit for purpose, and, hopefully, most members would agree with
that. Over the years, there have been attempts to reform the Aboriginal
heritage framework. We are committed to that as well, and I hope to have
legislation drafted by the end of this year at the very least. I think members
have noted there has been a pause in consultations, and I want to emphasise that that was a result of a request from a range
of Aboriginal groups that did not want to meet during the coronavirus
response, because large groups would have been required to gather. We have
paused that for a spell, and hopefully we will get it going again in the very
near future. It is very important for Aboriginal groups, the mining sector,
industry, local government and government agencies that we have a more modern,
more respectful Aboriginal heritage framework.
Finally, I want to acknowledge the
Aboriginal Advisory Council of Western Australia, which continues to work with
the WA government. This is the peak advisory body to the Western Australian
government. It works very closely with us in designing a more representative
structure for regional engagement and decision-making. I like to think that in
my short lifetime a lot has changed in Aboriginal affairs. The rights of
Aboriginal people, the parts of decisions that affect them, the expectation
that we have of Aboriginal people participating in the wealth of our state and
Reconciliation Week, Sorry Day and the acknowledgement of country are great
examples that Aboriginal culture has by and large been broadly accepted as a great
Australian story that is yet to be fully integrated into how we understand our
national history. Reconciliation Week is the time that we certainly do that.