'Give us some hope'Source: The Age December 4 2004 A 300-kilometre walk. A handshake with the Prime Minister. Was Michael Long's trek to Canberra more than a gesture? Michael Gordon reports on the political impact of a footballer's simple plea.
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Even before he rested his blistered feet and sat down with John
Howard yesterday, Michael Long had achieved what a federal election
campaign had palpably failed to do. He had reactivated the national
debate on the plight of indigenous Australians. He has also
engineered what had seemed inconceivable: the first meeting
in seven years between the Prime Minister and the man who is
regarded as the father of reconciliation, Pat Dodson. Almost as remarkably, he had brought a tear to the eye
of Dodson's brother Michael, an advocate for the
indigenous cause who is not prone to public displays of emotion.
"We've been sweeping these problems as a nation under the carpet,''
Michael Dodson remarked after the meeting. "Michael Long has
ripped that carpet bare.'' The former footballer set off almost two weeks
ago, "blackfella-style'', to walk 658kilometres to Canberra (he
stopped early when Howard agreed to meet him). Long wanted to
highlight how bad things really are in indigenous Australia. Four
years previously, he had likened Howard to the "cold-hearted
pricks'' who stole both his parents. That was in early 2000, when a
Government submission asserted that there was no stolen generation,
that the proportion of indigenous children who were separated was
no more than 10 per cent and that this group included those
removed Long replied with a searing open letter to Howard that told his
own traumatic story and concluded: "Mr Howard, I am part of the
stolen generation. It's like dropping a rock in a pool of water and
it has a rippling effect, so don't tell me it affects 10 per cent.
No amount of money can replace what your Government has done to my
family.'' Just as Howard apologised two days later to those
offended by the submission, Long subsequently apologised for
likening Howard to the "cold-hearted pricks'' who implemented the
policy of forced removal. The Long Walk was made more poignant by the backdrop of
simmering tensions on Palm Island (see story page 6) and
Goondiwindi, where episodes of violence have demonstrated how
far Australia really is from being a reconciled nation. To outsiders, Long's gesture may have seemed a little pointless.
Indeed, an editorial in The Australian called it "a long march that
can solve nothing''. After all, Long's stated aim was to have a
meeting with the Prime Minister, yet there was never any doubt that
Howard would see him. Not only that, he had been offered, and had
rejected, a seat on the Government's advisory body on Aboriginal
affairs, the National Indigenous Council. But to dismiss the Long Walk as symbolic and even shallow is to
underestimate Long's frustration and grief, and to misunderstand
his wider purpose: to ensure that the voices of elders like Pat
Dodson are heard as the Government embarks on a new policy to end
passive welfare and address disadvantage in Aboriginal
communities. It is also to ignore the lack of trust that is a legacy of
Howard's almost nine years in power - the product of
decisions to wind back land rights, to deny the existence of the
stolen generation, to reject all the key recommendations of the
Council for Aboriginal Reconciliation (including for an apology for
past injustices and negotiations towards a treaty) and, finally, to
abolish the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Commission, the
body that was to deliver self-determination to indigenous
Australia. Now, there is a new plain-speaking, energetic minister in Amanda
Vanstone and a new, even radical, approach to what Howard has
always called "practical reconciliation''. The aim is to reduce duplication by "mainstreaming'' service
delivery and to dramatically expand the principle of mutual
obli
gation so that, for instance, there could be no funds for pools
in
Aboriginal communities unless children attend school. As Vanstone told the Senate this week: "It's all about sharing
responsibility, showing respect to each other and allowing local
people to shape their future.'' The approach picks up many of the points raised by Cape York
indigenous leader Noel Pearson, who has been campaigning for years
to end the passive welfare that has rendered too many communities
dysfunctional and racked by domestic violence, substance abuse and
suicide. But Pearson, like Long, declined an invitation to take a
seat on the Government's new advisory body. He had proposed that the chairperson of the council be elected,
with other members appointed by the chairperson and the Federal
Government. The proposal was rejected. Pearson has no problem with the quality or the commitment of
those, like Sue Gordon, who did accept appointments, but he
believes the body is flawed because of the lack of authority that
stems from the selection process and the advisory role. Now, with the Government's re-election and the distinct prospect
of it being in power for another six years, Long's aim is to ensure
that the most respected indigenous voices, like those of the
Dodsons, Pearson, Western Australia's Peter Yu, central Australia's
David Ross and Melbourne University's Marcia Langton, are
heard. The clear signal from the meeting is that he has succeeded,
though these are very early days. Pat Dodson was the unwitting catalyst for the walk when, at
Long's invitation, he and his brother Michael addressed a camp of
indigenous AFL players in Broome last month on the importance of
leadership. Long was moved when Pat Dodson told the story of Rosa Parks, the
black woman who refused to give up her seat for a white man on an
Alabama bus in 1955, propelling the civil rights movement in that
country. Shortly after the camp, Long rang Dodson and told him that
"enough was enough"; he was walking to Canberra to talk to Howard
and wanted Dodson and his brother to be there for the meeting. "He's a pretty committed man, pretty determined," Dodson said
this week. "I think he feels that gulf between the Government and
what he considers the senior leadership of his people. Of course I
said I'd come along." So, too, did Michael Dodson and the respected Victorian Paul
Briggs. Pat Dodson is a strong supporter of the Pearson strategy for
ending passive welfare and giving communities a stake in the
mainstream economy. He also backs the Government's philosophy of
mutual obligation, but warns of the potential for disaster if it is
driven by bureaucrats, without proper engagement of indigenous
communities. Dodson also believes it is time for the Government to talk
seriously with those leaders who were sidelined after the
Government's election in 1996, those who were considered close to
the Keating government and who remain committed to some form of
settlement between black and white Australia. "If he (Howard) is prepared to accept the kind of position
Michael is putting and enter a different relationship, I think
there is a whole body of us who would be prepared to do that,
without compromising the principles we believe in," Dodson
says. "We don't come as Laborites or anything else. We come as people
who are equally concerned about the need to create a better life
for Aboriginal people and ensure that the Aboriginal child has got
the same life expectancy as his or her counterpart in the broader
community." (Indigenous males can now expect to live 56.3 years, compared
with 77 years for all males. Indigenous female life expectancy is
62.8 years compared with 82.4 years.) Vanstone insists the door will be open to all, but says the NIC
will be the pre-eminent indigenous source of advice to the
Government. "We've got together a group of indigenous people who
are specialists in areas that we think are going to help us," she
says. At the council's first meeting, beginning next Wednesday, the 14
members will be asked their opinion of the Government's priorities
of making communities safer and ending passive welfare. While Vanstone says the aim will be to give communities a "real
voice" in tackling their problems and setting goals, she baulks at
the word self-determination. "Communities get the chance to shape
the Australian Government contribution to their community, instead
of that being decided in Canberra." The plan is for indigenous co-ordination centres to replace
ATSIC offices and combine all services so that communities can have
a single agreement instead of dozens of them. "Shared
responsibility agreements" will commit communities to perform
agreed tasks in return for infrastructure spending. It sounds sensible, but there are concerns about whether the
bureaucrats or the communities will have the capacity to make
agreements that result in better outcomes, whether over-zealous
bureaucrats will be paternalistic and whether existing programs
that are working could be discarded during the transition. Then there is the question of resources, and the strong view of
many who have worked in the area that more needs to be invested.
"If they're committed to having better outcomes, they have to be
honest about the need for additional resources," says Olga Havnen,
who has been involved in successful community development and
nutrition programs around Katherine in the Northern Territory. There is another concern, too. The concentration on disadvantage
and ending passive welfare means there is less focus on the need
for non-indigenous Australians to regain the momentum towards
reconciliation and on the progress that is being made. As Reconciliation Australia chief executive Mike Lynskey puts
it: "We tend to blame Aboriginal people if things go wrong. We've
got to get out of that habit. We've got to admit our own failures
as a general community." Long, through his work with the AFL in helping indigenous
players, can claim part of the credit for one unambiguous success
story: the positive impact of indigenous players across the
competition. Despite comprising about 2.4 per cent of the
population, in this year's national draft, indigenous players
accounted for three of the first 10 picks. Vanstone is aware of the concerns about the new approach, but
appears equally determined to ensure a smooth transition. But, like
Dodson and Long, she cautions that it will take time to turn the
statistics of disadvantage around. "If you get more kids in school, and we already have, it will
take a long time for that to show up in lower mortality rates
because those kids get better jobs, eat better food, have better
housing and are safer. "We want improvements and we want them as soon as we can get
them, but perhaps one of the mistakes of the past is to go for
shorter-term announceables, rather than long-term
improvements." Vanstone would like Long to reconsider the invitation to join
the NIC, saying it would give him direct access to the relevant
ministers and the Prime Minister. His emphatic view remains that he
wants any conversation to involve elders like the Dodsons - and he
was reassured by Howard's willingness to meet again. Long said he had been overwhelmed by the response of average
Australians on the road. "A lot of those people who came along were
affected by the issues and challenges we face." Did he feel he had achieved something, someone asked. "I've got
sore feet," came the laconic reply. The walk was now over, he
announced, but the nation's journey had barely begun.
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