Not the time to weaponise Indigenous affairs: Minister McCarthy

By MALARNDIRRI McCARTHY
Minister for Indigenous Australians

I would like to acknowledge the traditional owners of this country, the Whadjuk Noongar people, and pay my respects to Elders, past, present and emerging on this very special day.

I personally feel it very special because it’s my first time as Minister for Indigenous Australians to represent on the Joint Council with my Co-Chair Pat Turner.

So, I’m very pleased to be here. I’m also pleased to meet with the Coalition of Peaks who are here behind me but also the Ministers for Indigenous Australia across the States and Territories.

In particular the new ministers, we have new ministers also from the Northern Territory, from the ACT and also from Tasmania.

And we have an apology from the Queensland Minister.

But it is wonderful to be able to gather here with most of my colleagues across the State and Territory jurisdictions.

As I said when I first got into the role as Minister for Indigenous Australians I wanted to focus, as a high priority, the Closing the Gap targets, but in particular, the priority reforms.

It is about the structural issues within how we follow through on the National Agreement at a state and territory level.

Every state and territory government has agreed to the National Agreement.

I’ve had a thorough look at that and also looking at the policy partnerships across each area, whether it’s justice, whether it’s housing, early childhood, health – there are critical areas that we still need to keep working on.

Today I will be calling on those present in the Joint Council that we do have open and frank conversation.

We are deeply concerned about our youth across Australia, and not just in the justice system but what is their future as young Australians.

How can we give them hope? How can we expect the country to deliver on making sure our young Australians can have healthy lives, lives with hope for the future, lives where they don’t have to be homeless or couch surfing or living in overcrowded situations.

This is really going to be very important for us today as we gather, and I do thank my Co-Chair Pat Turner, who I’ve worked with closely since coming into this role.

But also, if I may add, reaching out to parliamentarians at the Federal level, the importance of trying not to weaponise Indigenous affairs when we know we have such severe targets which are not being met in the areas of out-of-home-care, in the areas of high incarceration rates, we must surely be able to come together.