The Howard government's review did not recommend abolishing ATSIC

Given the history of the Howard government, it's a fair bet the ATSIC-identified unmet need in spending on infrastructure in Aboriginal communities will remain unmet.

It's a fair bet it will also remain largely out of sight and out of mind.

Public debate will be firmly focused on the future administration of Aboriginal Affairs.

This session of Parliament will see PM Howard introduce legislation to realise a long cherished political dream: the abolition of ATSIC and to replace it with a hand-picked advisory body.

It is interesting, in the context of the parliamentary debate we are about to witness and what has occurred since, to go back and carefully read what Howard said when he announced his intentions at a joint news conference with the Minister for Indigenous Affairs, Amanda Vanstone, at Parliament House on April 15. Howard told the assembled media he had called the news conference "to announce the results of Cabinet's examination of the report into ATSIC (pdf, 444KB) and related matters, which we commissioned last year, conducted by the former Senator Bob Collins, Jackie Huggins and the former New South Wales Attorney-General John Hannaford."

As a result of examination of that report and also a very extensive examination of Indigenous affairs policy, we can announce that when Parliament resumes in May, we will introduce legislation to abolish ATSIC.

ATSIC itself will be abolished with immediate effect from the passage of the legislation.

The regional councils will be abolished by the 30th of June 2005.

Our goals in relation to Indigenous affairs are to improve the outcomes and opportunities and hopes of Indigenous people in areas of health, education and employment.

We believe very strongly that the experiment in separate representation, elected representation, for Indigenous people has been a failure.

We will not replace ATSIC with an alternative body.

We will appoint a group of distinguished Indigenous people to advise the government on a purely advisory basis in relation to Aboriginal affairs.

Programmes will be mainstreamed but arrangements will be established to ensure that there is a major policy role for the Minister for Indigenous Affairs.

This will not result in less money for Indigenous affairs. It will in fact result in more resources being focused on challenging areas of Indigenous need.

We will raise the whole issue of service delivery and coordination at a grassroots level at the next COAG meeting.

The COAG trials in this area have been encouraging and have taught us a number of lessons, and I look forward to close cooperation with the states.

This is an area where surely we can put aside political differences.

The regional councils will have a role in the interim as we establish different mechanisms at a local level through consultation with communities and with local government and with state governments.

But as part of the announcement and as part of the legislation, they will disappear by the 30th of June 2005.

That, of course, does not in any way preclude processes whereby Indigenous people themselves will in different areas, according to their own priorities, elect bodies and people to represent them, and the government will in the course of consulting different sections of the community, be very keen to consult any bodies that may emerge from that process.

We have had reservations, and I've expressed them on a number of occasions on behalf of the government, about the operation of ATSIC.

We wanted however to allow the Collins, Hannaford, Huggins' examination to go forward and to give ourselves appropriate and adequate time to examine it.

But as a result of it, we've come to a very firm conclusion that ATSIC should be abolished and that it should not be replaced, and that programmes should be mainstreamed and that we should renew our commitment to the challenges of improving outcomes for Indigenous people in so many of those key areas.

The casual reader could be forgiven for thinking that this was a well considered response to recommendations flowing from the government-initiated and appointed review of ATSIC which, incidentally, cost the Commission $1 million.

It is, after all, the last advisory group of distinguished Australians appointed by the Howard government, to use the PM's words, to advise the government "on a purely advisory basis in relation to Aboriginal affairs".

Now hear the words of the only Indigenous member of that panel, Queensland academic Jackie Huggins.

It is 12 days after Howard and Vanstone's press conference in Canberra and I'm watching Ms Huggins sitting in a studio at SBS surrounded by "a diverse group of Indigenous leaders, other specialists in the area and members of the public," in the words of Jenny Brockie, moderator of the Insight program.

They have been brought together to debate Howard's plan and Brockie cuts straight to Ms Huggins by asking "did she see this coming?"

Ms Huggins explained that the review had taken over 12 months.

The government spent a lot of money on the review and there was no response and still is no response, to date, on that review.

Brockie: Did you get the feeling, though, that something like this might happen as a result of it or was it completely out of the blue?

Huggins: Well for me personally it was completely a bolt out of the blue. We knew that there would be changes. I didn't realise - nor did many people - how drastic those changes would be. So I was very much shocked and embarrassed and disappointed that as an Indigenous member, the only Indigenous member, of this review team and a woman, that the rightful opportunity to tell us about the review was not given by the government. I mean, I found out through Lola Forester (SBS journalist) who's in the audience tonight, through Indigenous media, that ATSIC was to abolished...

Brockie then introduced NT Country Liberal Party Senator Nigel Scullion as "the man the government sent along tonight to argue its case," and asked if he could "tell us who in the Aboriginal community was consulted about this decision?"

Scullion: "Well, in terms of the actual decision we need to understand that over 50 forums around Australia as part of the ATSIC review, we had over 150 submissions, and there were a whole range of other consultancy processes that went on. And there was just such a comprehensive issue within that process that said: "look, there is no public confidence out there about ATSIC ... and yes there was another recommendation but that was the principal recommendation".

Brockie: But there was not a recommendation to abolish ATSIC was there?

Scullion: Oh, certainly wasn't. But that doesn't necessarily mean it was outside our capacity and we've done that because we've had a very clear look at a widely consulted document. And I think they did a fantastic job ...

At the risk of further embarrassment to backbencher Scullion I won't go on.

He was clearly there to talk, not listen.

If the federal government can spend $1 million of taxpayer's money to conduct a review of an organisation, publicly lie about what it found, and then leave it to the media to inform members of the review panel about its official response, what are the prospects for influence of Howard's hand-picked group "of distinguished Indigenous people to advise the government on a purely advisory basis in relation to Aboriginal affairs"?

One suspects it will be absolutely none.

This all raises one key question in my mind.

Are there any "distinguished Indigenous people" out there who are clever enough to do the job and yet dumb enough to take it?

Put Howard's claim that this has resulted from an examination of the review report and also "a very extensive examination of Indigenous affairs policy," against what Jackie Huggins had to say on national television.

There has been no extensive examination of Indigenous affairs policy. This is what the review report called for.

You'll find it clearly articulated in its report.

It says: "Any changes to ATSIC's program delivery role should be considered as part of a Commonwealth/State/Territory examination of the most effective delivery of all services and programs of significance to Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Australians."

I humbly suggest Scullion go back and read the review report before the parliamentary debate on Howard's ATSIC legislation.

The principal recommendation of the review report was not to abolish ATSIC. It was to retain it.

Have a look at the following paragraph on page seven, Senator.

As the findings of this report show, there is widespread support for the objectives of ATSIC and a commitment to work constructively with it from all levels of government and other sectors of the Australian society. Reform to capitalise on this goodwill and commitment cannot come too soon.

Or try page 23:

In the course of this review there have been many suggestions about ATSIC and the way it has evolved, with criticisms levelled at nearly all aspects of its structure, role and operation. However, the overwhelming view expressed to the panel was ATSIC should continue to operate as the national representative organization ...

The review panel report made two over-arching recommendations.

The first, the existing objects of the ATSIC Act, should be retained.

The second, ATSIC should be the primary vehicle to represent Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples' views to all levels of government and be an agent for positive change in the development of policies and programs to advance the interests of Indigenous Australians.

Unfortunately, SBS scores a small share of the national television audience.

To the bulk of Australians, Insight is out of sight. More's the pity.

Hopefully the comments from Jackie Huggins will be picked up and ventilated in the national parliament when debate ensues on Howard's Bill.

The more I look at this whole grubby exercise the more it appears to be an attempt by the Howard government to kill off the ATSIC Board's High Court challenge to the first step in its mainstreaming campaign with the establishment of ATSIS.

The current carve-up of ATSIS programs looks for all the world to be the fevered actions of a government putting in place the regime its lawyers instructed it to implement last year ahead of the establishment of ATSIS (as exclusively reported upon by NIT).

Bring on the parliamentary debate and a Senate committee of inquiry.

Let's find out how the Howard Cabinet was able to agree to legislation seeking the abolition of ATSIC against the specific recommendations of its own million-dollar review, with no cabinet submission, no consultation with or support from Aboriginal people, and no consultation with the states or territories.

At the very least people like Jackie Huggins deserve it.