Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Social Justice Commissioner Mick Gooda, has called on all Australians to get behind the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples and use it to improve programs, policy and legislative development in Australia.
Speaking ahead of last Saturday’s second anniversary of Australia’s formal support of the Declaration on 3 April last year, Commissioner Gooda said the Declaration was a practical tool for building mutual respect and forging genuine partnerships between Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Peoples and state, territory and federal governments.
“The Declaration is more than just a piece of paper. The Declaration provides us with clear signposts to guide the protection of Indigenous peoples’ rights to land, culture, and the rights of Indigenous peoples to have a say in things that impact on our lives,” Commissioner Gooda said.
“The Declaration sets the standards we must all aspire to in order to ensure the survival, dignity and well-being of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples. Last year’s formal support of the Declaration by the Australian Government was an essential first step, but the challenge remains for all Australians to embrace these standards”, the Commissioner continued.
Commissioner Gooda said since the Declaration had been formally endorsed by Australia, it had been referred to in Parliamentary debates and in Senate Committee reports. He said Indigenous organisations such as the Goldfields Land and Sea Council and the North Australian Indigenous Land and Sea Management Alliance (NAILSMA) have demonstrated how the Declaration could be used to place the rights of Indigenous peoples “front and centre” in developing policies framed on the Declaration.
Family First believes that redressing the endemic disadvantage of Indigenous Australians is a matter of immediate priority. Family First believes Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people, like all Australians, have rights and responsibilities. Indigenous Australians have the right to good education, housing and health care.
This can best be done by rebuilding the role of family in indigenous communities and working with indigenous communities to create partnerships with public and private sector leaders in key areas of service delivery. Family First recognises that adequate health care and housing will support educational efforts for Indigenous children and youth, and that educational and employment opportunities will be vital to the future living standards of Indigenous Australians.
Dr Gordon Moyes said, “Family First wants to ensure that all indigenous children are literate to standards equal to non-indigenous children, so they will be able to fully participate in the community. This requires a substantial investment by Governments in schools, but it also requires indigenous parents to make sure their children attend schools and to ensure education is valued.”
For several years, Dr Moyes has been an active supporter of the HIPPY Program. HIPPY is an acronym, which stands for the Home Interaction Program for Parents and Youngsters. This is an innovative Aboriginal-run early-childhood enrichment project in La Perouse oversighted by the Brotherhood of St Laurence based in Melbourne.
HIPPY is a two-year, intensive early-childhood parenting program. It targets the most disadvantaged families by helping parents in their homes to help their three to five-year-olds develop “school readiness”, communication and relationship skills. There are strong connections now into the local Aboriginal population, including a community newsletter that contains both HIPPY and other local community information, and a HIPPY netball team of local children. The program is working with a target population that has issues of high levels of unemployment, low educational achievement, significant family disruption and mobility, and distrust of bureaucracy and authority.
“Family First wants a substantial investment to ensure that all Indigenous Australians have access to good health care. To boost the number of doctors in indigenous communities, Family First proposes abolishing the HECS debts for medical students who commit to work in these areas for a minimum of two years after they graduate.”
Dr Moyes concluded, “Family First believes that there should be an investigation into the feasibility of the private ownership of housing for indigenous Australians, as it may lead to better housing maintenance, house proud families and better communities.”