Australia from 1949 and into the future

The COAG trials driven by the Prime Minister offer great promise. Pooling state and federal money, cutting through red tape and requiring mutual obligation on the part of Aboriginal communities is starting to pay off already.

The much maligned deal to install a petrol bowser in the remote community of Mulan in return for parents washing kids’ faces has seen the prevalence of trachoma plummet from 70 per cent to zero. Well may we argue that every parent should do it anyway.

I am responsible for nine Shared Responsibility Agreements (SRAs) signed in western NSW. Homes will be air conditioned but in return people must be formally trained in their maintenance and kids must be at school. At Burke we fund a bus and administrative support in return for which the community runs a night patrol to return kids on the night streets to their homes. Crime has dropped to 40 per cent.

It is hard, however, not to conclude that our first world welfare system is a big part of the problem.

Too much money goes too quickly on alcohol, gambling, fast food and tobacco. The diseases and events killing Aboriginal people are consequences of obesity, diabetes, tobacco, alcohol and I would add - illiteracy. We should respond with enthusiasm to proposals which come from Aboriginal people themselves for different models of welfare delivery.

Pooling some or all individual payments in some communities to ensure food, clothing and shelter is provided, is an initiative worthy of expansion. Further incentives could be built into such initiatives to encourage their uptake where Aboriginal people themselves have decided to take control of monies in their own communities.

Although symbolism is important, an Australian Republic is not our most urgent need. In the past three years the only people I’ve heard raise it have been in federal parliament. Australia will inevitably return to the issue at some point.

The most pressing constitutional issue is how we can best govern ourselves as a federation in a world vastly different from that of Henry Parkes. Increasingly, international pressures demand a nationalist approach in everything from diplomacy, border protection and counter terrorism to education and industrial relations. For Liberals there is a tension not only in adjusting to a different role for the States and the Commonwealth, but also in the fundamentals of a market economy.

On the one hand we support competition, but on the other we recognise the critically important role of newsagents and pharmacists as community anchors. Given that Coles and Woolworths have between them now almost 50 per cent of the grocery sector and tentacles into almost every aspect of Australian life, where is the place of the corner store in any emerging national identity?

Dame Pattie Menzies, her life and that of her husband, have given us a legacy upon which we must build the foundation for our future.