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Statement at the Senate Legal
and Constitutional References Committee Reconciliation Inquiry Media Conference

by Senator Aden Ridgeway,
28th August 2002

I would like to welcome
you all to Parliament House this morning and thank you for coming along.
I would like to acknowledge that we are meeting on Ngunnawal land, and
I pay my respects to the Ngunnawal People as represented here by Matilda
House.

I also thank Dr Bill
Jonas and Dr Carmen Lawrence for their attendance, their hard work on
reconciliation, and in particular what they have done to bring about this
new Senate Inquiry.

I acknowledge the
many Indigenous and non-Indigenous people who have been able to attend
this morning and pay tribute to their efforts to progress reconciliation.

It is wonderful to
see them all back in the halls of parliament house and putting their support
behind this initiative of the Senate. In particular, I would like to acknowledge
the presence of Dr Lowitja O'Donoghue, former ATSIC Commissioner and a
stalwart in terms of her commitment to the reconciliation process.

Reconciliation is
one of the few political issues that has enjoyed cross-party political
support over a significant period of time, is reconciliation.

We saw it back in
1991 when the entire parliament spoke with one voice and established the
Council for Aboriginal Reconciliation, and thereby launched a decade-long
national discussion and learning curve about how we could improve relations
between Indigenous and non-Indigenous Australians.

Now we are seeing
the Senate agree that we need to keep the focus on reconciliation, and
most importantly, we need to hold the government of the day accountable
in terms of what it is doing to deliver on reconciliation.

We've had ten years
of grassroots work on reconciliation which was kicked of by the Royal
Commission into Aboriginal Deaths in Custody.

We've had the presentation
of the Documents for Reconciliation by CAR, and the release of the 6 recommendations
from CAR to the Parliament.

The Democrats have
tabled a private members bill to give effect to the Council's draft legislation
to bring about discussions on a national agreement or treaty.

We've had the Senate
Inquiry into the stolen generations in 2000.

We've had the Commonwealth
Grants Commission Report into Indigenous funding.

And we've had successive
years of reports from the Indigenous Social Justice Commissioner.

And what has the
Government's response been?

We've heard a lot
about the importance of practical reconciliation, and how we have to focus
on meeting the basic citizenship rights of Indigenous Australians - like
health, housing, education and employment. Dr Jonas is going to talk more
about some of his concerns with this 'practical' agenda.

But we are yet to
receive a formal response from the Government to the documents for reconciliation
or the Final Report from CAR.

Whilst we all know
the strength of their resistance to a national agreement or treaty to
deal with the unfinished business - and Minister Ruddock reminded us of
this again yesterday at the opening of the Treaty Conference - we don't
really know what the Government thinks about the detailed National Strategies
to address Indigenous disadvantage, or to achieve Economic Independence
for Indigenous Australians - to mention just a few.

So how can we say
with any confidence that we know what is happening out there in Indigenous
people's everyday lives?

Can we measure the
government's record on the implementation of the recommendations from
this collection of reports?

What benchmarks can
we look to - we don't know what benchmarks COAG and some of the Ministerial
Councils might be working on, because the Government has not released
them.

Nor can we say with
any confidence where progress been made and what is working well, because
there is no comprehensive monitoring of government responses.

But we have a responsibility
to capitalise on the good will of all those Australians who took part
in the bridge walks in 2000 and very graphically showed their support
for the goal of lasting reconciliation.

That is why the Senate
has initiated this Inquiry - not to go over old ground and come up with
more strategies for achieving reconciliation - but to gather together
the evidence of what progress the Government has achieved to date.

We need to know what
benchmarks the Government will set to measure its own progress to address
Indigenous disadvantage and promote reconciliation. We need to be able
to monitor that progress and then all Australians are entitled to judge
the government on its record of achievement.

The Inquiry will
examine:

• whether processes
  have been developed to enable and require government agencies to review
  their policies and programs against the documents like the National
  Strategies to Advance Reconciliation.
• effective ways
  of implementing the recommendations contained in the many recommendations
  that have been made to government on reconciliation.
• the adequacy and
  effectiveness of any targets, benchmarks, monitoring and evaluation
  mechanisms that have been put in place to address Indigenous disadvantage
  and promote reconciliation.
• How the Government's
  responses compare to the recommendations that have been made, and the
  extent to which these responses match up with the needs and aspirations
  of Indigenous Australians.

The political leadership
of this country has allowed opportunities like reconciliation and those
opened up by the Mabo and Wik decisions, to be squandered.

The Senate is now
stepping in to ensure that we keep the reconciliation process moving forward,
and do not allow the excellent work that has been done to date to gather
dust.

Conclusion

At
the end of the day, we need to remind ourselves that there are only 410,000
Indigenous Australians - in a population of 19.5 million. We are living
in the fastest growing Western economy.

410,000 people is
quite a manageable number to deal with. Yet, many Australians are still
prepared to accept the stereotype of Indigenous affairs as being a terminal
case of public policy failure.

How is it possible
that 410,000 people should overwhelm our imagination? To say that the
problems confronting Indigenous communities are insurmountable and beyond
the resources of Government is just a cop-out.

It's now time for
some accountability, honesty and transparency in this area. It's time
for government to respond and act on the very considered and reasonable
recommendations that it has been presented with from so many quarters.

For too long, the
Government has taken the easy road and chosen to sit on its hands in relation
to the reconciliation process. After having spent a great deal of taxpayers'
money over the last decade to develop a strategy to move forward and bring
us closer to being a reconciled nation, there has been no Government response
and very little real action.

All Australians are
entitled to measure what progress has been made after 10 years, and to
have a process whereby the Government reports back on an issue that is
fundamental to the future of this country.

If Government won't
show leadership on such an important issue, then the Senate will.

I'd now like to hand
over to Dr Jonas.

Thank you

Last
updated 29 August 2002.